Classical Influence
While there isn't a mile-long list of classical influences that Japanese music had on the West, there are still some notable examples of how traditional instruments of Japan began making their way into some compositions.
The reasoning as to why Japanese music didn't have a huge influence on the western world initially is mainly due to the fact that, during the time period when classical music was largely developed was the Edo period in Japan, in which Japan had removed itself from the outside world, causing them to miss the musical development of the majority of the Baroque, Classical, Early Romantic and half of the Romantic era(s).
However, the Western interest in Gagaku, an ancient form of Japan's imperial court music led to the influence of several Western composers such as Henry Cowell, La Monte Young, Lou Harrison and Benjamin Britten in the mid twentieth century. This caused a larger use of traditional Japanese instruments, but sadly didn't hold the attention of western composers for very long.
The reasoning as to why Japanese music didn't have a huge influence on the western world initially is mainly due to the fact that, during the time period when classical music was largely developed was the Edo period in Japan, in which Japan had removed itself from the outside world, causing them to miss the musical development of the majority of the Baroque, Classical, Early Romantic and half of the Romantic era(s).
However, the Western interest in Gagaku, an ancient form of Japan's imperial court music led to the influence of several Western composers such as Henry Cowell, La Monte Young, Lou Harrison and Benjamin Britten in the mid twentieth century. This caused a larger use of traditional Japanese instruments, but sadly didn't hold the attention of western composers for very long.
Modern Influence
In more recent years, however, we've seen a huge western interest in Japanese pop culture, from Japanese animation and graphic novels to Japanese pop music. One interesting thing to note is that, while the West's electric-based music of 70's-80's (characterized by up-tempo beats that were easy to dance to) were a big influence in what became J-Pop (which similarly up tempo beats with a large focus on electronic music), J and K-Pop (K-pop being Korean pop music) both heavily influenced the sudden resurgence of electronic music in Western pop, creating an interesting loop of cause and effect.
As mentioned above, Japan had a head-start in the pop-electronic department, with a very similar concept as what Western pop has become recently: a synth/snare driven beat following a song designed to be both peppy and catchy, and both genres have a similarly bad reputation due to their similar sound. Despite this, much of J-pop is significantly more complexly written than it's western equivalent to anyone living in the west, mainly because we're not used to the pentatonic scales used in Japanese music, which you can read about under the Japanese Music Theory tab of this website. This creates both a positive and negative view of J-Pop in western society, because while J-Pop does bring a different style of note and chord progression to the table, it's the same electronic, upbeat music, the same driving rhythmic beat, and the same trumpet or saxophone parts to make it have jazz-like qualities. Both styles are becoming very intertwined and similar, which may sadly cause a very static point in the music industry, seeing as how much influence both groups have taken from one-another.
As mentioned above, Japan had a head-start in the pop-electronic department, with a very similar concept as what Western pop has become recently: a synth/snare driven beat following a song designed to be both peppy and catchy, and both genres have a similarly bad reputation due to their similar sound. Despite this, much of J-pop is significantly more complexly written than it's western equivalent to anyone living in the west, mainly because we're not used to the pentatonic scales used in Japanese music, which you can read about under the Japanese Music Theory tab of this website. This creates both a positive and negative view of J-Pop in western society, because while J-Pop does bring a different style of note and chord progression to the table, it's the same electronic, upbeat music, the same driving rhythmic beat, and the same trumpet or saxophone parts to make it have jazz-like qualities. Both styles are becoming very intertwined and similar, which may sadly cause a very static point in the music industry, seeing as how much influence both groups have taken from one-another.