Torakusu Yamaha
Profile
Performance in office
Tenure
Tenure
Background
He was born the third son of a samurai-class family in Wakayama Prefecture. In 1871 he went to Nagasaki to learn watchmaking under a British engineer and tried to start a company to make domestic clocks, but gave up when he could not raise capital. He then lived in at a medical instrument shop in Osaka to learn repairs, and in 1883 moved to Hamamatsu at the request of a hospital there, making a living repairing medical instruments and clocks. His starting point was not making musical instruments but the skill of repairing machinery.
Selection
The turning point came in 1887, when, on the introduction of the hospital director, he took on the repair of an imported organ at a Hamamatsu elementary school. He carried one he had built himself to the Music Investigation Committee in Tokyo, where its director Shuji Isawa judged the tuning imperfect; his second instrument, in March 1888, was judged equal to imported ones. In March 1889 he founded Yamaha Fukin Seizosho as a limited partnership, but in 1891 one of the investors started a competing business, dissolution was voted, and he repaid the investments using the factory as collateral and returned to running it as a sole proprietor. When demand grew after the Sino-Japanese War he raised capital again, and in October 1897 he established Nippon Gakki Seizo Co., Ltd. with capital of ¥100,000 and became its first President.
Initiatives
In 1899, two years after the company was founded in 1897, he went to the United States himself on commission from the Ministry of Education to study piano making, brought back machinery and materials, and began making pianos in 1900. In 1903 he extended the woodworking skills developed for instruments into high-end furniture, and at the 1905 St. Louis World's Fair the company's pianos and organs won an honorary grand prize. Capital rose from ¥100,000 at founding to ¥240,000 after the Russo-Japanese War and to ¥600,000 the following year. In August 1913 he brought in Chiyomaru Amano, head of Hamana District, as Vice President, and he died in office on August 8, 1916.
Career
Career
Nippon Gakki
| Date | Position |
|---|---|
| 1887 | オルガンの修理・製作に成功 (translation pending) |
| Mar 1889 | 合資会社山葉風琴製造所を設立 (translation pending) |
| 1891 | 合資会社を解散し個人経営（山葉楽器製造所）へ戻す (translation pending) |
| Oct 1897 | President, Nippon Gakki (at founding) |
| Aug 1916 | Stepped down as President |