Tatsuya Nakatani (JP) – percussion David Stackenäs – guitar

This duo started in 2005 and has since then toured occasionally over the years, in the US, Scandinavia and Japan (2011 and 2013). In February 2020 they will do their third Japanese tour – celebrating Tatsuyas 50th birthday!

Tatsuya Nakatani is an avant-garde sound artist, composer, and master percussionist. Active internationally since the 1990’s; Nakatani has released over 80 recordings and tours extensively, performing over 150 concerts a year. His primary focus is his solo work and his large ensemble project, the Nakatani Gong Orchestra. With his activity in the new music, improvisation and experimental music scenes, Nakatani has a long history of collaboration. He teaches master classes and lectures at universities and music conservatories around the world. Originally from Japan, he makes his home in the desert town of Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. 

Nakatani creates his distinctive music centered around his adapted bowed gong, supported by an array of drums, cymbals, and singing bowls. In consort with his hand carved Kobo Bows, it is an instrument he has spent decades developing. A master of extended percussion techniques, it can be difficult to understand the genesis of his sounds. Nakatani approaches his orchestral project (NGO) as an arrangement of formations of vibrations, incorporated in shimmering layers of silence and texture. Within this contemporary work, one can still recognize the dramatic pacing, formal elegance and space (ma) felt in traditional Japanese music.