Abstract
Robert Garfias is a prominent scholar who has led the academic fields of ethnomusicology and cultural anthropology in the United States since 1960s. His doctoral dissertation has been highly evaluated as the first big work in the western academic world, which analyzes Japanese court music gagaku in a full scale and depth (published in 1976, Music of a Thousand Autumns: Tôgaku Style of Japanese Court Music). He is talented in many languages such as English, Spanish, German, French, Portuguese, Japanese, Burmese, Turkish, and Romanian and conducted fieldworks in the areas where these languages are spoken. The interview was conducted on March 22, 2013, at National Museum of Ethnology Japan (Osaka). It was just the time when the ethnomusicology course of the University of Washington, where he taught from 1962 to 1982, celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of its establishment (February, 2013). Shortly before it, the ethnomusicology course of University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), where he studied as a graduate student, also celebrated the fiftieth anniversary in 2010. The interview includes several topics as follows; 1) ethnomusicology and gagaku, 2) experiences in Kunaichô gakubu (Music Department of Imperial Household Agency), 3) the first American tour of Kunaichô musicians, 4) UCLA gagaku program, 5) present-day Kunaichô’s performance, 6) radio programs of world music in US, and 7) Japanese scholars. Garfias also pro-vided the interviewer old photographs including those given by the imperial musicians to him, some of which are attached in this interview transcription.