Keiko Harada’s music does not engage with loudly articulated superficialities, but with a kind of communication achieved without words. This process is at the centre of her work, and listeners can directly participate by opening themselves to the resulting sound.

The composition midstream+ for trombone and accordion (2004/2008) – like almost all the other works on this CD – is an example of Harada’s attempt to form a sense of musical commonality between two instruments with strikingly different sound qualities. Harada carefully develops situations for the collision of individual musical spaces.

Working with Harada’s scores requires from the performers not only enormous technical mastery, but also a completely open, concentrated, and communicative awareness of the performing partner. It also requires a high degree of self-awareness, which relates to the body’s awareness of sound. Because the composer emphasizes that her work demands from the players – and one might add, from the listener as well – love and respect towards music.