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August Junker (Musician)

August Junker (* January 28, 1868 in Stolberg near Aachen, † January 5, 1944 in Tokyo) was a German musician. He is most well known for his contributions to the development of western and classical music in Japan at the beginning of the 20th century, along with Rudolf E. Dittrich and other German and Austrian musicians. For thirteen years he taught music at the Tokyo Ongaku Gakko, the first Western-style music academy in Japan, where he promoted German music and instrumental lessons and created the first Japanese Western-style orchestra. His students Rentaro Taki and Kosaku Yamada are regarded as the founders of the Japanese art song, which combines western (German) composition technique with eastern (Japanese) lyrics.

Life and Work

His father, a glass blower, taught him to play the violin at an early age. When August was ten years old, they played together in taverns and at village festivals. At thirteen, Junker enrolled in the Conservatoire in Cologne, where he was trained as a violinist. Being a top student, he was allowed to play for Johannes Brahms. At the age of seventeen, he became a student of Joseph Joachim in Berlin. By 1890, he had joined the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and was appointed concert master by Hans von Bülow. [1] From 1891 to 1897, he became the first violist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He then travelled through Egypt and southeast Asia until he arrived in Yokohama, Japan. There he worked in a music store and became acquainted with foreign musicians living in Japan. He assembled an orchestra that performed at charity concerts, for which he was noticed and eventually offered a position at the Academy of Music Tokyo, Tōkyō Ongaku Gakko in 1899. Junker taught string instruments to students and took the lead over the choir. The wind section came from the court orchestra, which was taught by Franz Eckart, a German military band master, who had been appointed to establish military music in Japan. Within a few years, August Junker had inspired and taught enough students to found a Japanese symphonic orchestra. He arranged visits and performances from many German musicians in Japan. He also encouraged Japanese students to study music in Germany and established contacts for them. He received multiple honors for his contributions. The Prussian government appointed him Royal Music Director and Prussian professor. From the Japanese emperor, he received the Order of the Holy Ark (瑞宝 章, Zuihōshō) and the Order of the Rising Sun (旭日 章, Kyokujitsushō). In 1912 he returned to Germany with his Japanese wife Nobu Kamada and two daughters and settled in his hometown Stolberg, where he held concerts and taught music. The couple had another daughter, as well as a son who died in infancy from diphtheria. In 1934, 22 years later, he and his wife returned to Japan, where he and his daughter Marion Kayser, born Junker, held concerts. He also led the Shochiku Orchestra and taught at the Tokyo Musashino Academy of Music. He died on January 5th, 1944 in Tokyo.