Hajime Okumura (January 13, 1925 – April 2, 1991) was a Japanese composer, music educator, pianist, oboist and bassoonist. Okumura studied music and composition with Kan’ichi Shimofusa (himself a former student of Paul Hindemith) at Toyama Army School; Tamezou Narita and Kiyoshi Nobutoki at the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music in Tokyo (now Tokyo University of the Art).
Akira Ifukube was a fellow student. Okumura was a lecturer at Musashino Academia Musicae in Tokyo. As a composer he is best known for his works for concert band; he can be considered as a Japanese pioneer in this genre. One of his well-known works is his Rhapsody for piano and orchestra. He also wrote several operas and in the period 1952-1965 the music for fourteen films. Okumura’s style is often described as eclectic, in which he uses tonal modernism. (Dutch Wikipedia)
