This paper takes twentieth-century music for the koto as a case study for critiquing hierarchical understandings of “composers” and “performer-composers,” the latter of whose knowledge has been treated as peripheral under the conservatory model. Weaving autoethnographic vignettes with historical background on the colonial roots of Japan’s music education system, I highlight the ways in which contemporary composer training, grounded in conservatory epistemologies, orients students toward extractive modes of music creation, treating non-symphony orchestra instruments as resources to be mined for inspiration or cachet. As a corrective, I urge a care-focused ethos of composition centering community, collaboration, and engagement with instruments’ historical canons. Relatedly, I argue that the work of figures stigmatized with the “performer-composer” label should play a greater role in music higher education curricula today.