Kenjiro Ezaki was born in
Tainan (
Taiwan). He studied at the
Nihon University in Tokyo from 1953 to 1957 under
Yoritsune Matsudaira and later under
Vladimir Ussachevsky at the
Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. During his early years he received two composition awards: The first prize at Music Composition of Japan in 1956 and a first prize at the
ISCM World Music Days in 1962 where his composition
Beating was performed After his return to Japan Kenjiro Ezaki founded his own electronic music studio and was a member of a composer group called "Group Design" which focused on electronic and computer music. Other members of this group were
Norihiko Wada,
Satoshi Sumitani, and
Komei Hayama. Ezaki was also a member of
GROUP 20.5, a circle of Japanese composers of avantgarde music that was founded by
Hifumi Shimoyama. Ezaki composed the first known Japanese fully computer-based composition, which was premiered at the
Expo '70 in
Osaka. ==Compositions==