Yumi Nara

After graduating from Soai University, Yumi Nara received a scholarship from the French government to study at the Paris Conservatory, where she gained the attention of Olivier Messiaen. Based in Paris since then, she has developed an extensive career performing French music all over Europe. Her performances, of music from medieval to contemporary, have received great critical acclaim, in particular, ‘Harawi’ by Messiaen, ‘Pierrot Lunaire’ by Schoenberg, and ‘Trois Contes de l'Honorable Fleur’ by Ohana. She has also performed works by Satie, Les Six and Ravel in Eastern Europe and Russia, with the support of the French government Ministère de la Culture. Through performances of ‘Butsumyôe’, a piece by Jean-Claude Éloy based on the novel The Life of an Amourous Woman by Ihara Saikaku, and of the mono-opera ‘The Tale of Genji’ by Yoritsune Matsudaira, she has explored the possibilities found in links between Japanese music and culture and western contemporary music. Yumi performed Messiaen’s ‘Poèmes pour Mi’, accompanied by pianist Roger Muraro, to mark the centenary of the composer’s birth. In Japan she participated in a performance of Debussy’s ‘Pelléas et Mélisande’ with the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jean Fournet, Poulenc’s ‘La Voix Humaine’ in a production by Michel Wasserman, ‘Aoi no Ue’, a musical drama in verse composed by Yoritsune Matsudaira and directed by Yoshi Oida, and a series of concerts devoted to French songs at the Osaka Mozart Salon. Her CD ‘Debussy: Melodies’ was awarded a ‘choc’ (top award) by the music magazine Le Monde de la Musique, and her recording of Massiaen’s ‘Harawi’ is included in the Deutsche Grammophon box set of the complete works of Messiaen.
[as of April 2023]