Albums

Pianist Hideaki Hori lets his dexterous fingers do the talking on In My Words from 2010, a solid jazz trio record from Japan. Hori leads a bright, swinging trio on this jazz record, full of high-energy peaks and steady grooves. Extremely nimble in his playing, Hori’s clearly executed phrases fill his improvisation with exciting patterns and curlicues, urged on by the propulsive anchor of rhythm section members Daiki Yasukagawa on bass and Gene Jackson on drums. ...

Seiji “Taddy” Tada cooks with bebop, blues, and ballads on Workout!! from 2018. This album, his 13th as leader, is a dream come true for the musician, as he recorded with stellar American jazz musicians whom he had previously toured with, famed jazz drummer Lewis Nash and his trio. No doubt these players, all worthy idols of Tada’s, provided extra inspiration for the high-caliber and exciting playing on this recording. ...

Jazz pianist Miki Hayama’s 2006 album Prelude to a Kiss features beautiful piano jazz improvisation over smart compositions with a solid jazz trio, straightforward and serious modern jazz. This album, her second as leader, received a 5-start rating from the Japanese jazz magazine Swing Journal. While the album cover art and title present a gently elegant mood, the music does not shy away from stimulating energy. The ten tracks cover an equal amount of original compositions and rearranged jazz covers (“Beatrice”, “I Love You”, “Skylark”, “Whose Shoes”, and “Prelude to a Kiss”). ...

An unlikely fusion of heavy metal and modern jazz strikes all the right chords on NHORHM’s fourth album New Heritage Of Real Heavy Metal -Extra Edition-, released in 2019 in Japan. While jazz musicians have traditionally interpreted popular music and Broadway musicals for inspiration, NHORHM harvests heavy metal for a surprisingly fitting and rich source of material. Pianist Hitomi Nishiyama expertly rearranges heavy metal songs for piano jazz trio arrangements, imbuing the music with her characteristic elegance, darkness, intelligence, and fun. The intricate harmonic lines that Nishiyama excels at playing fit well with the dense heaviness of her carefully curated metal choices, complemented marvelously by the dexterous energy of Ryoji Orihara’s fretless bass and the rhythmically clever dynamics of Manabu Hashimoto. Far from benign cocktail jazz, the resulting music has a smart sharpness inspired by the volume and roughness of the metal spirit. While not distorted or aggressive, it is both light and heavy, and definitely rocks in its own way. ...

Fans of vintage vocal jazz will be drawn to singer Yako Horikita’s debut album Shining Hour, a swinging collection of twelve jazz standards delivered with a shining, sparking sincerity. Singing along with a piano trio plus saxophone, Horikita picks winners from the classic jazz songbook with tunes including “Nice Work If You Can Get It”, “Falling In Love With Love”, and “Under A Blanket Of Blue”. Horikita’s voice, a pleasant mix of deep huskiness with a light delicate touch, is confident, friendly, and warm, fitting perfectly with her jazz combo’s solid performance. ...

The silvery tones of masterful jazz sax glide and soar through dynamically modern jazz on Mabumi Yamaguchi’s 2017 recording Let Your Mind Alone. With eight original songs penned by Yamaguchi, the music is solid, confident, dramatic, and melodically entrancing. From the gripping opening track “Sequel To A Dream”, the songs flow with a fantastic balance of stimulation and control, offering various styles from peppy bossa rhythms, loose, modern swing, sweet ballads, and brightly positive tunes mixed with stimulating dark tinges. ...

Jazz vocalist Mie Joké’s 2018 release Etrenne is a fun and fancy swing jazz outing, a fresh throwback to classic vocal jazz recordings. Like the best of jazz lover’s disks, this collection hits the mark with a great selection of familiar jazz standards performed with a loving touch. Vocalist Joké purrs atop her jazz group with a confident grace, a breathy tank of soulful emotion and romance. Her solidly swinging jazz combos feature accomplished veteran musicians, with a different group performing for “Side A” and “Side B of the recording as if on a classic jazz vinyl LP. ...

With a vintage romantic feel inspired by classic cinema, Shinichi Kato’s 2011 release Bass on Cinema is a well-crafted collection of great film music. Performed as a duo, with Kato on bass and Taihei Asakawa on piano and synthesizer, the album contains absorbing and dramatic moments, as befitting a tribute to the great songs of cinema. With the deep bass on melody, the dazzling piano and arrangements fill out the canvas with cinematic moods ranging from calm, sweet, and introspective to mysterious suspense, classical refinement, rock-and-roll abandon, and delicate melancholy. ...

Special Guest Contribution // Press Release The birth of a world of visual sound! SOULSTATION will spark your own creative imagination. This trio makes powerful and fascinating music. Upon Listening to Bassist Minoru Yoshiki’s New Album: For jazz musicians, the ideal music is the kind where subjective ideas bounce off each other, yet somehow give birth to a harmonious whole. This album brilliantly achieves that ideal. When the wind blows, trees sway and rustle. When it rains, placid streams become rushing torrents. The natural world is full of such examples of call-and-response. So is the music of this trio, which is just that: a force of nature. ...

Expressing an exuberance for life with an original jazz spirit, Life Is Too Great from the Sayaka Kishi Trio is a vivid recording, full of variety and infused with the pure music spirit of Sayaka Kishi. Active in many groups and collaborations, Kishi returns to the classic piano trio form on Life Is Too Great and leads a powerhouse jazz trio, showcasing talent and songwriting with new original tunes, with the ever-hardy, invigorating Ryoji Orihara on fretless bass and crisp rhythmic master Akira Yamada on drums. ...

Like the expansive cover depicting a peaceful blue ocean and sky, jazz bassist Daiki Yasukagawa’s trio on Kanmai creates a mood of a rolling deep and lofty grace. The album includes nine modern jazz tunes, most being original compositions from Yasukagawa, and one each from pianist Sato and drummer Hashimoto. Two standards are also included, a swingy, stylish “Long Ago And Far Away”, and a bowed-bass feature on “Greensleeves”, a delicate, sacred performance heavy with emotional weight. ...

On Bénin Rio Tokyo, Japanese vocalist Nobie takes us on a musical journey spanning West Africa, Brazil, and Tokyo with sparkling duo collaborations. This music is catchy and deep, with layers of voice and guitar infused with a spirit of love, respect, and masterful finesse. With an ideal selection of musical partners and songs, Nobie’s rhythmically thrilling and lush voice cascades through the music like water over rocks, beautifully soft and dynamic. ...

Easy and breezy, as if dozing in a hammock between palm trees, Layla Tomomi Sakai’s The Island stirs up visions of vacationing and relaxing in sultry lands as music floats softly by. Sakai’s deep voice embraces the listener, dancing lightly through bossa novas and Latin-tinged music. The music is comforting, the musicians performing pieces that come and go in an uncomplicated manner, lulling the listener into a state of reassuring comfort. Sakai uses her voice gently yet confidently, producing an effect of sweet directness with an affectionate touch. ...

Through a beautiful piano sound with deep reverberations, Seiji Endo’s latest solo album releases atmospheric music as if arising from the dreams and memories of ancient Japan. Genji Monogatari Volume 1 features the pianist performing his original compositions with dramatic textures woven from this ancient Japanese epic. As with his previous albums Sakura Meditations and Circle For Peace, Endo plays his entrancing music alone, freely and beautifully. On this album, the novel’s influence adds layers of exoticism to the dramatic compositions. The result is evocative and mysterious music that strikes the heart. ...

The sympathetic joy of listening to three accomplished musicians improvising and creating beautiful music together is aroused on Sympathy from the Hitomi Nishiyama Trio from 2013. This kind of sympathy, that of being made happy by the joy of others, builds on the listener’s own enjoyment in listening to the art created here. The Hitomi Nishiyama Trio creates music that is exquisite and graceful, delicate and refined, where the music flows and builds and whirls in a stylish modern jazz style, with piano chords and melody lines moving over the deep bass and crystalline cymbals like wind passing through and around leaves on boughs, swaying and producing tranquil sounds of nature. ...

Hikari Ichihara’s fifth album Move On features the trumpeter’s quintet performing finely-tuned compositions with jazz integrity and a vibrant sound full of sparkling energy. The tracks range from knife-edge sharp modern jazz, bouncy swing, wistful ballads, and rapid-fire straight ahead jazz. Also included is a single jazz standard, a fresh interpretation of “Everything Happens To Me”, delivered here with a relaxed groove. The quintet consists of strong, like-minded players who play with a polished yet intimate feeling, creating a solid framework for the improvisers to gracefully leap and flow over. Ichihara’s trumpet solos consistently capture attention, full of impressive decorative swoops and turns, loaded with dramatic soul and a beautifully fluid and organic sound. ...

Yuichiro Aratake’s The Light Flows In is a solo piano collection which sets a calm, relaxing mood, offering peace through original songs and charming jazz and pop standards. With patience and sincerity, Aratake performs the pieces as slow ballads, reflecting the gratitude for loyalty, friendship, and support that inspired the performances. This album features a special Bösendorfer Imperial Concert Grand piano, the deep and full tones echoing beautifully as the pianist moves freely through his selection of originals and familiar covers (“I Loves You, Porgy”, “Round About Midnight”, “What The World Needs Now”, “Blackbird”). ...

Pianist Harumi Nomoto’s 2014 release Virgo is a constellation of grooves, moods, and textures, boldly incorporating inter-genre approaches as piano jazz is woven with Eastern sounds, African rhythms, and hip-hop-influenced beats. Virgo follows the pianist’s previous albums Another Ordinary Day (2002) and Belinda (2007) and completes a trio of records that progressively show an expansion of creative vision and songwriting tact. Through arrangements honed at Japanese jazz clubs through prior years, the music was released to eager fans with this album of seven originals plus an arrangement of Thelonious Monk’s “Green Chimneys”, which gets a unique slow-and-low groove treatment here. ...

Through jazz, folk, rock, and imagination, the music on Zephyr unfurls like smoke rising from fragrant incense, floating and curling in beautiful patterns in the air. A trio consisting of saxophone, acoustic guitar, and electric guitar, the front-forward unit is unbound by genre, producing otherworldly sounds evocative of folk songs from a distant world. Peaceful, comforting, and deep, the ten tracks feature mostly original music supplied by the members, summoning tranquil and emotional moods. The music is lyrical and poetic, with suggestions of Jan Garbarek, Al Di Meola, Bill Evans and Stan Getz, and even Sting and the Beatles felt among the album’s tracks. ...

The deep, soulful voice of Masako Kunisada warmly embraces the listener on her 2014 recording M, performing classic jazz tunes as well as selections from the 70’s/80’s American soft-rock songbook, and closing with a tender ballad. The simple directness of this recording reflects an honest ethic, a special feeling of being home-made, made with care, carefully curated. Guided by happiness and an irrepressible joy for music, Kunisada sings from the heart and draws from various influences including jazz, R&B, Japanese soul and more, infusing it all with her sincere, expressive voice. ...

United by a stellar theme of the universe, the Tokyo jazz quartet Blue Dot explores stars and galaxies on their debut album Halo from 2016. Through ten songs tuned to the mysteries of space and time, the music is solidly modern and positively charged. Tokyo-based drummer Makoto Takeshi leads a quartet consisting of sax, piano, bass, and drums, with original songs supplied by all members of the group. The energetic opener, “Sturm und Drang” (by pianist Tamashi Goto) is a sharp-edge sprint through modern jazz, while “Bird” (by bassist Goro Takano) is a creative and mesmerizing tune, soft and deep, inspired by dreams of flying. ...

New York-style jazz with a fresh Japanese take is the focus on 2010’s Playing New York, where popular Japanese pianist Akane Matsumoto leads a trio with veteran NYC musicians Nat Reeves (bass) and Joe Farnsworth (drums). With ten songs ranging from speedy bebop to romantic ballads, well-known tunes from jazz influences are covered, such as Oscar Peterson’s “Wheat Land”, Bud Powell’s “Celia”, and Duke Ellington’s “Sunset and the Mockingbird”, a sensitive and lingering close to the album. Matsumoto also presents three original tunes: “Playing”, a whirlwind Phineas Newborn Jr-style quick bop, “Twilight”, a soft, tender ballad in three, and “My Dear”, a comfortable and heart-warming bossa nova tune. ...

Art music from two musician artists, N.40° is sweet and stimulating, mellow and manic, alternating between states on this compelling album. The emotive trumpet-and-piano duo of Shinpei Ruike and George Nakajima delivers atmospheric standards as well as boundary-pushing free improvisations. With moments of both comfortable and experimental jazz, the pieces alternate from limpid and romantic to free and offbeat wild abandon; fun improvisational pieces are placed like splashes of color between beautiful jazz songs (“The Nearness of You”, “Pure Imagination”, “Alone, Alone and Alone”). ...

Music that takes you places, Visible/Invisible from the Ryosuke Hashizume Group presents six works of art from the saxophonist/composer, perfectly executed by the five musicians, through mellow, warm electric guitar, grooving and smooth electric fretless bass, organic and emotive piano, thrillingly creative drumming, and center-stage visceral tenor sax, filling out the spaces of otherworldly jazz. Through sounds ranging from ethereal and delicate to deep and groovy, the music steadily develops in dramatic style, patiently, with nooks and crannies of musical texture creating a fulfilling, lush experience. This is art music, creative jazz with rock, modern classical, and free elements, carefully crafted with space for the skilled musicians to stretch out together, painting fantastic and vivid colors with harmonic richness and rhythmic dynamicism. ...

Glamorous Osaka-based singer Maki Fujimura enraptures the audience with her silky voice and energetic improvisation on this live album recorded at the intimate Tokyo jazz bar “Apple Jump”. Going by “The Duo!” together with the amazing pianist Hideaki Hori, the two musicians expertly create music with pulse, Fujimura building upon and playing with Hori’s rhythmic timing and impeccable pianistic touch, with her soft yet strong vocals gliding around the piano’s notes in perfect interplay. ...

Tokuhiro Doi’s Amalthea from 2011 presents a modern jazz quartet from Japan led by the evocative tones of jazz clarinet. Although jazz clarinet can prompt thoughts of bouncy big bands and classic swing music, this album veers more towards dark and mysterious shades that will interest fans of creative modern jazz. Doi’s mature compositions embrace the sounds of jazz in various settings: mid-tempo walking jazz, energetic and frenetic jazz, and elegiac European classical sounds. Like many other modern recordings, facets of bebop, hard-bop, and cool jazz influences also surface effortlessly in the soulful music. ...

Enterprising singer Sanae Ishikawa presents us with her passionate voice on Grown-up Christmas Gift from 2018, a mini-album celebrating classic and modern Christmas songs in a jazz and pop setting. As part of her successful Seasonal Japanese Songbook Project crowdfunding, the popular singer released this album along with her full-length album 冬-Winter- to great anticipation, just in time for the Christmas season that year. 春-Spring- (2019) and 夏-Summer- (2020) have also been released in this jazzy J-pop series, with a hope of seeing 秋-Autumn- in the not-too-distant future. ...

Although it may seem overly-ambitious to reinvent the classic 1961 Bill Evans Trio live recordings Waltz for Debby and Sunday At The Village Vanguard, pianist Taihei Asakawa boldly takes that challenge on his deeply fascinating and atmospheric avant-garde solo piano recording Waltz for Debby. Performed live for an audience in 2018, the material and mood are compelling: introspective and patient, occasionally decorated with flights of vibrant melody, constantly summoning emotion from the notes released from the beautifully-recorded piano. ...

Jazz pianist and composer Fumie Chiba’s Tip of Dream is a great example of modern jazz piano from Japan, displaying high-caliber technique and creative approaches to modern jazz composition. Through the album’s eight tracks, Chiba plays with confidence and verve, showing shades of McCoy Tyner’s rapid abstractions, Bills Evans’ melodic sentimentality, and Mulgrew Miller’s well-rounded fluency and swinging groove. The set starts off strong with “11th Door” which quickly demonstrates the control and power that this trio delivers. The performance is sleek and modern, at times aggressively powerful yet not lacking a sensitive touch and deep energy. From the attention-grabbing opening, the music moves into pretty ballads, lyrical sentimentality with modern flourishes, Herbie Hancock-style funky jazz, and finishes with a piano solo with balanced pop prettiness. ...

Inspired by a modern, clean European jazz sound, the jazz piano trio Trispace on their debut 2010 album brings to mind modern jazz along the lines of Swedish jazz supergroup Esbjörn Svensson Trio (EST). Focused in concept, Trispace plays with delicate, beautifully recorded instruments, airy jazz-rock beats, and occasional odd-beat rhythmic structures that carry the listener along on comfortable musical journeys. Even the stylishly serene jacket design conveys the intended atmosphere, perhaps paying homage to the great modern jazz recordings from the ECM label visually as well as aurally. ...