Tradition and Beyond

About the Artist
Michael Gould is an Assistant Professor of Music at the University of Michigan and has received international recognition as a performer and scholar in the field of contemporary percussion performance and pedagogy. Having served for several years as percussion specialist at Huis Ten Bosch European resort in Nagasaki, Japan, Michael has performed with leading artists and performing groups from around world, including pan virtuoso "Boogsie" Sharpe and Brazil’s São Paulo All-Stars. He also served as Director of Kawatana City’s "Sekai Ongaku Kenkyukai-World Music Ensemble.

Michael has toured nationally as percussionist/drumset specialist with the performing group the Dallas Brass and can also be heard on the Seabreeze label with jazz artist Miles Osland. He has also played with Marvin Stamm and Al Vizutti at the International Trumpet Guild and recently as percussionist for the national tour of "big" the musical. Michael has performed with the American Spiritual Ensemble of New York, Brass Band of Battle Creek, Lexington Philharmonic, Top Brass, Saxon’s Civil War Band, Nevada Symphony Orchestra, and the Las Vegas Percussion Quartet. He has served on the faculty of Illinois Summer Youth Music and the Bands of America-World Percussion Symposium. Michael is an educational artist for Zildjian cymbals, Yamaha Drums and Percussion and Innovative Percussion mallets.

Michael "Chikuzen" Gould began learning the shakuhachi, the Zen bamboo flutes of Japan in 1982 in Kyoto, Japan under the guidance of world reknown masters Taniguchi Yoshinobu and Yokoyama Katsuya through 1996 and is one of only a dozen non-native Japanese to ever obtain the rank of Grand Master (Dai Shihan). Since returning to the U.S.A., he has been busy teaching, performing and recording the mysterious sounds of this flute that was the "tool" of Zen monks in Japan during the middle ages. Having spent his first two years back teaching Zen Buddhism and Shakuhachi at Wittenburg University in Springfield, OHio, Michael is currently Shakuhachi instructor at Oberlin University, Oberlin, Ohio and at the University of Michigan, where he is now based. Not only giving solo concerts, Michael often performs with the koto (Japanese Zither) and does lecture/presentations on the Zen origins of this "instrument" to help people understand the background culture that gave birth to such a! natural "tool".

Product Description
Michael Gould2 is a performing duo comprised of Western and non-Western percussion instruments and shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute). The duo performs traditional Japanese music as well as original compositions. Michael Gould, an Assistant Professor of Music met Michael Gould, master of shakuhachi quite by accident. Upon arrival at the University of Michigan, School of Music to teach percussion in 1998, Michael Gould became entwined in a series of mistaken identity through a long series of e-mail messages, phone calls and contracts to perform shakuhachi intended for the other Michael Gould. Some months later, the two Gould’s met and realized that there was much more in common with each other than just their namesake’s. Both lived in Japan for long periods of time and are musicians with a passion for Japanese music. From their first meeting an incredible friendship was forged and the beginning of a common musical path.

The compositions that are included in this CD have all started as images. Most of these images were taken from our collective experiences in Japan. As we began to perform together, the subjective nature of these images became much more refined into an objective, refined body of work.

Tradition and Beyond,Michael Gould

New Age Music: