柳原由佳 on Jazz of Japan | Brian McCrory

Yuki Ito Trio: Semendo Sementes

Sun, 14 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Semendo Sementes is a jazz piano trio album from bassist Yuki Ito released in 2021. While bassist and composer Ito has recorded albums with different forms and combinations of musicians, and even a solo bass album, this is her first physical full-album release where she leads a piano trio. Joining her in the trio is pianist Yuka Yanigahara and drummer Hiro Kimura, regular members who were also on her previous digital mini-album release. As the leader for this group and live recording, for this set Ito plays original compositions that she wrote and arranged. To this set list, Ito includes one cover song, the old jazz standard “Time After Time” that was arranged by drummer Kimura.

Emiko Voice & Yuka Yanagihara: Enyana

Sun, 02 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Enyana is the first collaboration album from vocalist Emiko Voice and pianist Yuka Yanagihara. Their new group and album name, Enyana, merges the EMI of Emiko and YANA of Yanagihara. There is also a bit of wordplay on the Japanese phrase en ga aru /(縁がある) which can mean there’s a connection or linking of fates between people or things in a certain situation. One variation of the phrase is “/enyana!/” (縁やな! /or えにゃな!), a playful Kansai-dialect version with a meaning like “It must be fate!”

Magnolia: El viento y las flores

Mon, 03 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Magnolia is a trio made up of vibraphone, piano, and percussion, and their debut album, El viento y las flores was released in 2022. This fifty-six-minute album contains ten tracks of all original compositions, four from vibraphonist Reiko Yamamoto and three each from pianist Yuka Yanagihara and percussionist Hitomi Aikawa. Despite having three independent composers, their tight interplay and musical personalities seem tightly bound together, as if their collective music just blooms out intuitively unified.

Yuka Yanagihara Trio: Beloved Ones

Sat, 23 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Like pianist Yuka Yanagihara’s previous album Inner Views from 2019, her songs on this year’s release Beloved Ones are also focused on both external vistas and inner reflections. It is as if the inner-outer boundary is balanced, permeable, and transferring the trio’s music and inspiration from in to out and back again, fluidly.

From the previous album to this one, the imagery shifts from close (raindrops on a window) to far, with natural scenery in theme for both. A second link to her previous album is found in a track on the Beloved Ones, “Rainy Song #3 In Winter”. This song continues the story started in the opening two tracks on Inner Views, “Rainy Song 1: At Midnight” and “Rainy Song 2: In the Forest”. Comparing the two album covers and the pieces’ progression, the rain has stopped and the eye’s focus has extended further into the world, onto meadows, trees, and mountains.

Yuka Yanagihara Trio: Inner Views

Fri, 12 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Pianist Yuka Yanagihara’s second piano trio album is Inner Views from 2019, where she plays eight of her original songs in a piano trio format with bassist Yoshiki Yamada and drummer Ryo Noritake. In harmony with the album’s title and cover image, the music is on the whole introspective, focused on the near rather than the far. As Yanagihara puts it herself, these are eight songs that focus on the landscape of one’s mind.