Megumi Masaki
Megumi Masaki is a Japanese-Canadian pianist, multimedia artist, educator, researcher, arts administrator, conductor, and curator. She specializes in the interactive possibilities of sound, image, text, and movement in the creation and performance of multimedia works involving the piano enhanced by technology.
Early life and education
Masaki was born in Tokushima, JP. She began her piano studies in Winnipeg, MB with Alice Nakauchi and continued with She received her Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from Western University in London, ON, studying with Ronald Turini and Peter Katin. Her graduate degree in Piano Performance and Literature was also from Western University, and her Master's thesis, A Survey of Toru Takemitsu's Solo Piano Music, was supervised by Dr. Jack Behrens. Post-graduate work was at the Royal College of Music in London, UK, where she received an A.R.C.M. Diploma in Piano Performance, and an Advanced Studies Diploma in Piano Performance under the instruction of Kendall Taylor, with Philip Wilkinson as her academic supervisor.Career
Academic
Since 2006, Masaki has been a member of the piano faculty at the School of Music at Brandon University in Brandon, MB, Canada, and she was made a full professor in 2014. Notable students include Everett Hopfner, George Waddell, Xiaoni Shen and Andreas Eggertsberger. In 2007 Masaki founded the educational outreach project "Masaki's Rising Stars of Brandon University" in partnership with rural arts associations, schools, and personal care homes. The project offers performances and workshops to communities where interaction with music is limited, simultaneously providing Masaki's students with research opportunities as well as touring and performance experience. Masaki received the Brandon University Alumni Association's Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2010.In addition to piano instruction and pedagogy, Masaki directs Brandon University School of Music's New Music Ensemble and its New Music Festival. In 2019, in collaboration with Brandon University Indigenous Peoples' Centre Knowledge Keeper Barb Blind, Masaki founded the BU Indigenous New Music Festival, a two-day festival featuring a complete program of contemporary classical music by indigenous composers.
Masaki is also on faculty at the Casalmaggiore International Festival, a student-focused solo and chamber music summer school and festival in Casalmaggiore, Italy; the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity in Banff, AB, Canada; and Chetham's International Piano Summer School in Manchester, UK. As the Artistic Director of the Eckhardt-Gramatté National Music Competition in Brandon, MB, Masaki has championed the festival's focus on Canadian and contemporary music, leading in the commission of numerous new Canadian works. In 2016, she was a Musician in Residence at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, specializing in interactive electronics and video and serving as an installations mentor.
With the composer and computer music specialists Keith Hamel and Robert Pritchard, Masaki has collaborated on a research project to develop a three-dimensional digitally augmented keyboard system at the Institute for Computing, Information and Cognitive Systems Sound Studio and School of Music at University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC. Also with Robert Pritchard, she has worked to develop the Sleeve/Hand Responsive User Garment, a project exploring the use of e-textile sensors and active infrared tracking to create new interactive live performance tools and environments.
Professional advocacy
Masaki is in demand as a speaker and guest lecturer, specializing in the area of music performance anxiety and optimal performance. She has presented on these subjects at numerous conferences, including the International Symposium on Performance Science: ISPS 2011, in Toronto; the International European Piano Teachers Association Conference 2010 and the International Society for the Study of Tension in Performance Forum 2010, both in Ljubljana, Slovenia.As a guest professor, she has conducted masterclasses and lecture recitals in many universities and academic institutions across Canada, the USA, Europe, and Asia on subjects such as contemporary performance practices, interactive piano and computer music in live performance, cross-cultural exchange and new music trends, and gesture and hand-tracking software applications in live interactive performance.
Masaki is a member of the Advisory Council for the Canadian Music Centre's Prairie Regional Office and the board of the Canadian New Music Network. She has served as a jury member for the Manitoba Arts Council, the Ontario Arts Council, the Canada Council, and is an academy delegate for the Canadian Academy for the Recording Arts and Sciences.
Performance
Masaki is a prolific performer, and frequently collaborates with composers, visual artists, writers, computer scientists, and choreographers on interdisciplinary projects involving new technologies. She is a member of the Windsor, ON performance collective Noiseborder Ensemble, and of Slingshot-Kidõ, an interdisciplinary collective based at the University of Hartford, CT. With Noiseborder Ensemble she has presented more than twenty original multimedia pieces featuring a combination of acoustic and electric instruments with live processing and mixing of sound and video, and she is active in the ensemble's SSHRC-funded research project entitled "Integrating Sound and Image in Multimedia Performance."Masaki has premiered over ninety works for piano, chamber ensembles, and multimedia. As a solo artist she has commissioned pieces from notable Canadian composers such as Nicole Lizée, Brent Lee, Keith Hamel, and T. Patrick Carrabré for piano, electronics and poetry by Margaret Atwood; Orpheus. As a chamber musician she has collaborated with the Penderecki String Quartet, the Gewandhaus Orchestra soloists, Shauna Rolston, and Koh Gabriel Kameda, among many others. She has concertized across North America, Europe, and Asia, including such venues as the National Arts Centre Ottawa, London's Royal College of Music, the Dark Music Days Festival in Reykjavik, IS, and Coronet Concert Hall in Okazaki, JP.
A devotée of the music of Sophie Carmen Eckhardt-Gramatté, Masaki has done much to advance the legacy of this Manitoba-based composer, including recording Eckhardt-Gramatté's piano compositions and her works for violin and piano duo, publishing a critical performance edition of the composer's Piano Caprices, and appearing on film as a historical researcher and pianist in the film “Appassionata: The Extraordinary Life and Works of Eckhardt-Gramatté”, produced by Paula Kelly.
Recordings
| Role | Title | Details |
| pianist | Stars on Ice: The Piano Bar |
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| pianist, researcher | Appassionata: The Extraordinary Life and Music ofSophie Eckhardt-Gramatté |
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| pianist, documentary subject | New Music: The Pianist |
Grants & Awards
2012: Canada Council for the Arts: grants for International Touring and for Commissioning of Canadian Compositions2014: Manitoba Arts Council: grants for Composer Commission & Development
2014: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada: shared grant for Research & Creation in the Fine Arts. Project entitled "Integrating Sound and Image in Multimedia Performance."
2015: Manitoba Arts Council: grant for Composer Commission & Development
2015: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada: shared grant for Insight project entitled "Mapping the acoustic space of live electronic music."
2016: Manitoba Arts Council: grant for Composer Commission & Development
2016: FACTOR Canada: grant for Juried Sound Recording
2016: Canada Council for the Arts: grant for Music Production
2017: Manitoba Arts Council: grant for Composer Commission & Development
2018: Western Canadian Music Awards: nomination for Classical Artist/Ensemble of the Year
2020: Manitoba Arts Council: grants for Share - Connecting at a Distance and Professional Development