Can anybody give me any information on the Tokyo Quintet and the New York Quintet please?Current status,websites,repertoire,recordings,that sort of thing.

MH

The Tokyo Quintet was Keiko Abe's chamber group of marimba, flute, clarinet, double bass, and percussion. Nippon Columbia released two boxed set LP albums, "The Tokyo Quintet: The Contemporary Music of Japan" (1974) and "The Tokyo Quintet: plays the music of the animated films" (1978). Both are long out-of-print. Their repertoire included Akira Miyoshi's Nocturne, Teruyuki Noda's Obsession, Yoshihisa Taira's Pentalpha, Yoji Yuasa's Territory, and Katsuhiro Tsubonoh's Ripple of the Wind.

The New York Quintet was my chamber group of the same instrumentation, modeled after the Tokyo Quintet, and active from 1981-1985. We did a studio demo test recording of the new Sony PCM-F1 digital recorder, but released no commercial recordings. Our repertoire featured pieces of the Tokyo Quintet, plus new commissions including Irwin Bazelon's Quintessentials, Harold Farberman's A Summer's Day in Central Park, John A. Lennon's Ever the Contrary, Robert Hall Lewis' Diptychon, and Andrew Thomas' Dances for Five.

The Pleiades Quintet was Takayoshi Yoshioka's chamber group of the same instrumentation, modeled after the Tokyo Quintet. They released a CD, "Sparkling Music in Heaven" (1992) (Fun House Classics, FHCE-2003) and featured repertoire including Akira Miyoshi's Message Sonore, Takekuni Hirayoshi's Stars Party for 5 Players, and Taro Iwashiro's Affection from the Pleiades.

The Tokyo and New York Quintets are no longer active; the Pleiades Quintet may be -- contact Takayoshi Yoshioka for current information.

My favorite piece for this combination was always Miyoshi's Nocturne (published by Ongaku).

WM