Haiku Music Challenge 21

Welcome to the twenty-first iteration of the Haiku Music Challenge, hosted by Naviar Records.

Natsume Soseki’s investigation of a rapidly westernizing Japanese society and its sense of alienation has kept him famous into the 21st century: to this day, he’s considered one of the greatest Japanese writers of all time. Soseki wrote novels (most famously Kokoro in 1914), haiku and children’s fairy tales.

the sky I see
seems full of
magnolia blossoms

Soseki’s haiku inspired twenty-two compositions. Here are the three I selected this week:

Track: The Sky I see Is The Same Sky You See
Artist: Audio Obscura
Genre: ambient, electronic

After working on his latest project for the last few months (a soundtrack for George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four), Neil aka Audio Obscura joined the Haiku Music Challenge with a haunting ambient/electronic piece.

Track: Dead Skies
Artist: Pedro Figueiredo
Genre: dark ambient

The dark and powerful Dead Skies by Pedro Figueiredo evokes a mysterious landscape and a vast, otherwordly atmosphere.

Track: The Sky I See
Artist: JRBjork
Genre: classical

Swedish composer Jan Bjork joined us last week with The Sky I See, a cinematic composition where the orchestral elements merge together to create an enveloping and overwhelming soundscape.

Thank you for listening. Next week we’ll be posting music inspired by Takahama Kyoshi’s haiku:

The clear day in the rainy season.

The madder red of the twilight appeared

And vanished instantly.

The deadline to submit your track is 12 June. To find out more and participate, please visit the Naviar Records site.