- This set of variations for guitar is easily Yocoh’s best-known composition. It entered the repertoire of John Williams,1 and he recorded it several times.2 It has also been recorded by Angel Romero and many other guitarists.
- Yocoh gave the score to his Sakura variations to John Williams when Williams first visited Japan, in 1963.3
“My main point was to play music I like. In my contemporary program there’s a great contrast of styles, including some pieces that some people may think are not actually contemporary. For example, Sakura variations by Yocoh…I absolutely do not subscribe to the view that contemporary has to mean experimental and avant-garde. Contemporary means it’s happening now. I think that the experimental and the avant-garde are a part of contemporary life, but not the soul of it.” – John Williams, on including Yocoh’s Sakura variations in his contemporary repertoire4
Sources
- Jim Tosone, Classical Guitarists: Conversations (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2000), 159.
- Ibid., 173, 176.
- John Williams, John Williams to Yuquijiro Yocoh, May 2, 1995, letter, from yuquijiro-yocoh.com, accessed November 16, 2021, http://yuquijiro-yocoh.com/archive.html.
- Jim Tosone, Classical Guitarists: Conversations (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2000), 159.
Cut IDs
24386