BIO
A harpsichordist and composer, Asako Hirabayashi's first recording, on the Albany Label, was entirely composed and played by her, was selected as one of the top ten albums of the year 2018 and was awarded the Gold Medal Award by the Global Music Awards. It was also selected as one of the five best classical CDs of 2010 by Minneapolis Star Tribune. The recoding also received seven favorable reviews internationally.
Ms. Hirabayashi and her music have been described as “A superb player, also a gifted creator of music” (The Diapason, 2010), “ Her contemporary harpsichord music is ingenious, fanciful, diverse and unpretentious… I admit I’ve never been a fan of the harpsichord, she has changed all that for me and awakened me to the idea that a composer can reinvent an instrument…” (Fanfare, 2010), “A strong case for her instrument's third-millennium credentials…the best harpsichordist. A delight!” (Minneapolis Star Tribune, 2010),“With stylistic influences from her native country, American jazz, French Impressionism, and Latin and South American rhythms and sensibilities, Asako Hirabayashi brings us enticing music and outstanding performances on this impressive recording.” (International Alliance for Women in Music, 2011),
“Twenty-four tracks of passionate, sparkling, lyrical, even poignant music to help secure the harpsichord’s presence in the new millennium.” (Fanfare, 2010), “…charming, unreservedly melodic, poignant and lighthearted”(American Record Guild, 2010).
Ms. Hirabayashi has won numerous grants and awards including the 2009 McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians and two Minnesota State Arts Board’s Artist Initiative grants as a soloist. As a composer, she won 2016 McKnight Fellowship for Composers, several first prizes in Alienor International Harpsichord Composition Competition (6th, 7th and 8th consecutively) and NHK International SongWriting Competition in Japan. She was awarded the 2012 Jerome Fund for New Music by American Composers Forum to write her first concert opera Yuki-onna (Snow Witch) which premiered in 2015 and a 2019 Schubert Club Composer Award to complete her second opera Hebi-onna (Snake Woman). She is an awardee of MN Opera's Miniatures 2021 grant: Tiny Operas and Big Ideas project to write and perform a short opera. She on Opera America’s Discovery Grants to premiere her opera Hebi-onna. Ms Hirabayashi has appeared as a featured guest soloist in international festivals and concert series worldwide since her New York debut recital at Carnegie Hall. Her live performance of her own composition was featured in the United State’s most popular classical music program, Performance Today in 2018. She holds a Doctoral degree in Harpsichord Performance from the Juilliard School and a master’s degree in composition from Aichi Art University in Japan Her compositions have been performed in fourteen different countries.
Ms.Hirabayashi has given lecture recitals at the Juilliard School, Miami University, the University of Kentucky, Northern Kentucky University and the International Bach Festival in Sumy, Ukraine. She has given master classes at the Tchaikovsky National Academy of Music in Kiev, Ukraine, Sumy Conservatory, Sumy, Ukraine, Northern Kentucky University, the University of Minnesota, Sibelius Academy of Music in Helsinki, Finland and the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, Japan.
Ms Hirabayashi’s new innovative approach of interpreting English Virginalists’ ornament signs is reflected in her treatises “New Interpretation of English Virginalists’ Ornament Signs” and “The authority of the Bevin table in the interpretation of ornament signs in Elizabethan Virginal music”.They have been published in United Kingdom, the United States and Japan.
