Free and open to the public Otomo Yoshihide and David Novak will discuss noise, an underground music made through an amalgam of feedback, distortion, and electronic effects, which first emerged as a genre in the 1980s, circulating on cassette tapes traded between fans in Japan, Europe, and North America. Otomo Yoshihide was a pioneering figure in the Electroacoustic Improvisation scene, and today is a musician and producer -- a cross-genre music maker actively performing free improvisation, noise, and pop, simultaneously and independently on a global scale. As a film composer, he has produced over 100 pieces of music for visual, film, and television works. In recent years, he has been making musical pieces and organizing a unique style of concert, mainly in collaboration with various artists and non-musicians under the name of "Ensembles." Additionally, he has been committed to music workshops and participatory projects with challenged children. He also extends his endeavors beyond the borders of music, including "Project FUKUSHIMA!," which started after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. Otomo was artistic directer of Sapporo International Art Festival 2017 and Ensembles Asia for the Asian Music Network. David Novak is Associate Professor of Music at University of California, Santa Barbara in the Ethnomusicology Department, and is Director of the Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Music. His book Japanoise: Music at the Edge of Circulation (Duke University Press Books, 2013) won the British Forum for Ethnomusicology Book Prize.