Intersection Between Rousseau, Mozart to be Explored by Bin Ebisawa

By Cassie Ferguson

Gazette Staff

The world contains a few experts on philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau and a few on composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart but of those experts, very few indeed have made any kind of connection between the lives of the two 18th-century giants.

President of Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo, Bin Ebisawa will be presenting a little known intersection between philosophy and the aesthetics of music in an upcoming colloquium on "Rousseau and the Mozarts -- Their Relation Considered." The seminar will be held in the Thompson Room (Room 110) of the Barker Center on Monday, April 27, at 4:15 p.m.

"Professor Ebisawa is that extremely rare bird who is an authority in both Rousseau and Mozart. The opportunity to hear someone who wears both hats is unique," said Mozart scholar Robert Levin, Dwight P. Robinson Jr. Professor of Music.

Through four decades of researching Mozart and translating his correspondence into Japanese, Ebisawa has found interesting correlations between Rousseau and the Mozarts, father and son, that could be traced in their works and thought.

"Up until now, there has not been any significant attempt to connect these two grand names of Rousseau and Mozart," said Ebisawa.

"However, in my years of research -- separate research -- on Mozart and Rousseau, connections and relations have surfaced, and this has been the genesis recently of a much closer look and investigation into the relation -- direct or indirect -- between the two men as well as Mozart the father."

Ebisawa has written 27 books on the composer and on the philosopher and in 1991 edited the Japanese version of the Philips' Complete Mozart Edition of 190 compact discs, each accompanied by a book.

Ebisawa's talk will be sponsored by three departments: music, philosophy, and Romance languages and literature.

"This epitomizes the type of interdisciplinary exploration that should happen more often," said Levin. "I look forward to this talk with unalloyed enthusiasm."