Akira Nishimura | en

Akira Nishimura (西村 朗 Nishimura Akira, born September 8, 1953 in Osaka, Japan) is a Japanese composer. Nishimura studied composition and musical theory on a graduate course at Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. While at the university, he also studied Asiatic traditional Music, religion, esthetics, cosmology, and the heterophonic concept, etc., all of which has had a lasting influence on his music to the present day. Nishimura has won many awards for his works, as listed below. Nishimura was the Composer in Residence of the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra 1994-1997. He is now a professor at the Tokyo College of Music, and the musical director of Izumi Sinfonietta Osaka.

Nishimura has been awarded a Grand Prix for Composition at the Queen Elizabeth International Music Competition in Brussels, The Luigi Dallapiccola Composition Award (Milan), three Otaka Prizes, and four other national prizes in Japan. He has also served as the Composer in Residence of the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa; Musical Director: Hiroyuki Iwaki, 1993-94; and, the Composer in Residence of the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra; Musical Director: Kazuyoshi Akiyama, 1994-97.

In recent years, Nishimura has been commissioned from many overseas music festivals and performing bodies such as ULTIMA Contemporary Music Festival, Oslo, Octobre en Normandie, Rouen, Arditti String Quartet, Kronos String Quartet, ELISION ensemble, Hanover Society of Contemporary Music, etc., and his new works were performed at WIEN MODERN, Vienna, Warsaw Autumn, Warsaw, MUSICA, Strasbourg, Brisbane Festival of Music, Brisbane, etc.

Nishimura is at present a Professor at the Tokyo College of Music, and a member of the Board of Directors for the Japan Federation of Composers. .