At the time, I had just begun composing my String Quartet No. 2. Watching television footage of the devastated areas and the nuclear power plant accident, grief and anger welled up within me. Little by little, those emotions seemed to migrate into the notes themselves.
When the piece was finished, I realized that it contained such an overwhelming fury that it seemed to go beyond the realm of music. After making appropriate revisions, I gave the work the title String Quartet No. 2 — Asura, A.E.1. I wanted to express the feeling of becoming an Asura. “A.E.” stands for After the Earthquake. I decided to attach this designation so that the disaster would never fade from my own memory. My most recent work has now reached A.E.130.
As might have been expected, however, the memory has indeed faded. Today the country is rushing headlong toward restarting nuclear power plants, as if nothing had been learned from that accident. Where is the ship called Japan heading?