Yasui wins concert music composition award for 25th year in a row

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
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Posted: Nov 1, 2010

Byron Yasui
Byron Yasui
Byron Yasui, a UH Mānoa professor emeritus of music composition and theory, is a recipient of the 2010-11 American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) award in the Concert Music Division.
 
The award, granted by an independent panel, is based upon the unique prestige value of each writer’s catalog of original compositions, as well as recent performances in areas not surveyed by ASCAP.  Since 1985, Yasui has received ASCAP awards in serious music composition.
 
Retiring from UH Mānoa in August 2010, he has been on the faculty since 1972. “It’s always nice and encouraging to receive recognition at the national level in any form for our research,” he noted.
 
Yasui obtained his bachelor’s degree in secondary music from UH Mānoa, and Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in composition from Northwestern University.  He was named one of the nation’s 500 most influential Asian Americans in the field of education in the 1996 edition of AVENUE magazine.
 
Yasui has had two orchestral works premiered at Carnegie Hall in New York, and his works have been performed at numerous national symposiums and music festivals. He was also a part-time double bassist with the Honolulu Symphony. Yasui remains active as a freelance jazz double bassist and a classical guitar duo partner with Brazilian virtuoso Carlos Barbosa-Lima.