Spiral Music: Masayo Ishigure + Kyoko Kurokawa

Spiral Music presents acoustic music every Wednesday evening at the base of the Museum's spiral staircase. Artists who specialize in music from the Himalayas and South Asia are invited to forge a connection between their music and the art in the galleries.

Masayo Ishigure began playing the koto and jiuta shamisen at the age of five in Gifu, Japan, and has created a n extensive multi-faceted career that continues to stretches the limits of the koto while maintaining a strong grasp on the tradition. In 2005, Masayo Ishigure was a recording artist for the Grammy Award–winning soundtrack for the movie "Memoirs of a Geisha" by John Williams alongside Yitzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, and others.

In 2001 she released her own solo CD entitled "Grace". Ishigure has performed at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall-Weill Recital Hall, BAM, Merkin Hall, Asia Society, Japan Society, the Metropolitan Museum, and Symphony Space and has been invited to perform at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, and the Smithsonian Institute.

She is joined by Kyoko Kurokawa on koto.

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