Shizuyo Oka
Shizuyo Oka studied the clarinet under Michel Arrignon and the bass clarinet under Jean-Noel Crocq at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, and completed her courses with three first prizes for clarinet, bass clarinet and chamber music. In 2000 – 2001, she performed with Yo-Yo Ma in the Silk-Road Ensemble. She has been a member of the Ensemble Recherche since 1998. Her soloist activities have involved solo concertos with the Josef Suk Orchestra in Prague, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonic Orchestra of Luxembourg, and the Spanish Radiotelevision Orchestra, among others. In addition, many solo pieces have been created for her by, among others, Georgy Kúrtag, Toshio Hosokawa and Mark Andre. In addition to her extensive concert activities with the ensemble recherche, she has taught master classes at universities worldwide (Austria, France, Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Ukraine, China, South America, the USA, etc.). She has also been teaching at the Ensemble Academy Freiburg every year since 2003.