Tomoko Sugawara (Japan/USA) enjoys playing harps in a variety of styles, from early music to contemporary, and drawing from Asian and Western sources. She performs on instruments ranging from the concert harp to reconstructions of ancient harps. Tomoko will demonstrate a reconstructed angular harp from her native Japan, called kugo, and play the earliest notated Chinese and Persian songs from the time this harp flourished in eastern and western Asia. Her concert will be complementary to Bo Lawergren‘s lecture about the earliest harps of Eurasia.
Tomoko graduated from Tokyo University of the Arts and has received many grants from such organizations as the Asian Cultural Council and the Japan Foundation. She has given numerous solo recitals, including ones at World Harp Congresses, at Columbia, Harvard, and Princeton Universities, and at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The British Museum.