Shotaro Harakawa

HARAKAWA Shotaro

Horn

Born in Chiba City, Kumamoto Prefecture. Joined the team in 2012.
He began playing the horn at the age of 15. He graduated from the Faculty of Music at Tokyo University of the Arts. He studied at the University of the Arts in Berlin as a recipient of the Agency for Cultural Affairs' overseas training program for emerging artists in 2016. He has studied the horn under Takafumi Yamaguchi, Hirofumi Mori, Kozo Moriyama, Takato Saijo, Christian Dallmann, Sebastian Posch, and Ozan Cakar.

What made you start playing an instrument?	I was invited to join by a high school classmate because the shape of the horn was beautiful.
What is important in a performance	How does your sound reach the audience?
One of my favorite songs	Wagner: Prelude to Act 1 from the opera "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg" This piece condenses the highlights of the opera "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg," allowing you to enjoy the entire opera (approximately 5 hours long!) in just 10 minutes. The opera is set in Nuremberg, Germany in the mid-16th century, and was completed in 1867. The Meistersingers are master singers. Young knights, goldsmiths, scribes and other skilled singers from a variety of occupations gather in the center of Nuremberg to decide the champion singer. It's like a singing contest in Japan! The prelude, which contains all the emotions of the Meistersingers who appear in the story, such as joy, conflict, and sadness, is gentle, sometimes rough, ephemeral, and elegant. It feels like every instrument in the orchestra is a soloist at the climax of the opera. I love it.

What made you start playing an instrument?

I was invited to join by a high school classmate because the shape of the horn was beautiful.

What is important in a performance

How does your sound reach the audience?

One of my favorite songs

Wagner: Prelude to Act 1 from the opera "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg"

This piece condenses the highlights of the opera "Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg," allowing you to enjoy the entire opera (approximately 5 hours long!) in just 10 minutes. The opera is set in Nuremberg, Germany in the mid-16th century, and was completed in 1867.
The Meistersingers are master singers. Young knights, goldsmiths, scribes and other skilled singers from a variety of occupations gather in the center of Nuremberg to decide the champion singer. It's like a singing contest in Japan!
The prelude, which contains all the emotions of the Meistersingers who appear in the story, such as joy, conflict, and sadness, is gentle, sometimes rough, ephemeral, and elegant.
It feels like every instrument in the orchestra is a soloist at the climax of the opera. I love it.

Shotaro Harakawa

Horn

About the Japan Philharmonic