Mayumi Miyata (Tokyo, 1954) is distinguished by being one of the first artists to bring the Gagaku wind instrument Shō to worldwide recognition and to expand its awareness not only as a traditional instrument but one that has a valid place in contemporary music. Having graduated from Kunitachi College of Music in piano, Mayumi Miyata studied Gagaku and in 1979 she joined the Gagaku ensemble at the National Theater of Japan. Since her debut recital in Tokyo in 1983, she has been active as a soloist and stunned audiences in Europe and North America, in concert halls like La Scala in Milan, Vienna Konzerthaus and at festivals such as London Proms, Wien Modern, Festival d’Automne à Paris, Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik and the Pacific Music Festival. She has worked closely with John Cage, and other composers such as Toru Takemitsu, Toshio Hosokawa, Helmut Lachenmann, Paul Méfano, Klaus Huber, and Pierre-Yves Artaud. Her recent collaborations include the BBC Symphony Orchestra with Kazushi Ono, the Orchestre Symphonique de la Monnaie with Kazushi Ono, the NHK Symphony Orchestra with Charles Dutoit for their European tour, the New York Philharmonic with André Previn, the Tanglewood Festival Orchestra with Seiji Ozawa, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra with Vladimir Ashkenazy, the Bamberger Symphoniker with Jonathan Nott and the Orchestre National de Lyon with Jun Maerkl. Furthermore she was nominated as cultural ambassador by the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs, promoting knowledge of the Shō overseas.