A great conceptual revolution is underway across the world, but is taking place so quietly that it has gone largely undetected . . . The new currents of thought . . . are changing our way of life and our ideas of what it is to be human. This great, invisible change I identify as the philosophy of symbiosis.

The philosophy of symbiosis is dynamic, free and light; it is the philosophy of the nomads of the new age

Kisho Kurokawa
Intercultural Architecture
The Philosophy of Symbiosis

The buildings of renowned Japanese architect, Kisho Kurokawa, are recognizable for their incorporation of other cultures into the Japanese-an openness to new elements that reconfirms his own tradition. The same values that motivate Kisho Kurokawa in architecture, motivate Eckart Rahn in music. Eckart Rahn, the founder and creative force behind Celestial Harmonies, shares a common spirit with Kisho Kurokawa. They both delight in the variety of our world's cultures and with great enthusiasm seek out ways to combine the unique qualities of seemingly disparate cultures in fascinating new ways.

Kurokawa uses the Japanese tea room as an example of the aesthetic vision he calls hanasuki. It is "an ambiguous, symbiotic aesthetic which simultaneously embraces splendor and simplicity. The goal is an ambiguous code in which two symbols simultaneously contradict and overlap." He calls it the "unchanging flux . . . the symbios is of flux or impermanence and changeableness with an unchanging quality that transcends the flow of time and achieves eternal existence."

It is this goal that Eckart Rahn strives for in the music he produces on Celestial Harmonies and its affiliated labels. "The music represents an intercultural dichotomy in which each cultural style is valued for itself while being influenced by the others." Rahn combines the old with the new, Eastern with Western. Like Kurokawa, he does not allow the juxtaposition to descend into schizophrenic chaos or anarchistic collage. The combinations are contextual and symbolic.

Several decades ago, Eckart Rahn began to explore this concept in his TIBETAN BELLS (13005-2, 13027-2, 13037-2) series, with Henry Wolff and Nancy Hennings bringing together sounds never before associated, sounds vastly separated in time, space, and tradition. The ancient resonances of the bells of Tibet were deployed within a musical framework uncompromisingly 20th century and Western. It was a novel synthesis of the sounds of East-West, past-present, then-now, and here-beyond.

Look, as well, to the innovative and precedent-setting flute performances of Paul Horn, who created an entirely new style with his improvisational recordings, INSIDE THE TAJ MAHAL (11062-2), INSIDE THE GREAT PYRAMID (12060-2), and INSIDE THE CATHEDRAL (11075-2). "In each," says Rahn, "Paul Horn's cultural awareness allowed the timeless interplay between his own inspiration and the great tradition that surrounded him."

It was Eckart Rahn who brought the East-West breakthrough of Japanese synthesizer performer Kitaro to audiences worldwide, bucking the common belief of the time that an Asian performer could not create a cross-cultural appeal.

The music of Celestial Harmonies spans the globe, from Europe, Northern Africa, India and Asia-Pacific, to North and South America. Much of the music represents the intercultural synthesis that Rahn so appreciates; artists like David Parsons who uses the aura of the HIMALAYA (17059-2) as his inspiration on the electronic keyboards, or Steve Roach who goes to Australia to mix the Aboriginal DREAMTIME RETURN (18055-2) with the expansive range of his synthesizers

Another example of Eckart Rahn's creative philosophy is his compilation, ASIA MUSIC (14068-2). Some pieces on this release are indigenous to Asia, others are performed in or are inspired by the region, and others are created by Asian musicians with their own symbiosis of Asian and Western styles, both ancient and modern. Similar releases of CAMBODIAN (19902-2) and VIETNAMESE (19903-2) music, two countries rich in tradition, which have been closed to the outside world for generations have been brought to the public awareness by Celestial Harmonies

Like Kisho Kurokawa, Eckart Rahn celebrates the idea of a "symbiosis of past, present and future . . . where each person can display his own individuality, where many different cultural spheres exist together." It has not always been an easy journey. As Kurokawa says, "Compared to an age of conformism when we could be lazy, we have no choice but to take the first steps on a path that may be difficult but which leads to a richly creative life."

• Patricia Bryers