Newbies to Japanese jazz get a soundtrack to a primer
For a music fan wanting to explore jazz for the first time, an ideal starting point may be the current chart-toppers, which includes Robert Glasper, Esperanza Spalding and Jose James. Alternatively, he or she may choose to start with the classics, diving into the ...
Japanese acts play music ambassadors at Canadian Music Week
After rock group Jake Stone Garage hit the final chord of one of their powerful guitar-heavy songs, the crowd let out a few hoots and applauded politely. For a Western band this may have seemed a bit unreceptive, but luckily Jake Stone Garage are from ...
Jazz Week Tokyo pairs Pink Martini with Saori Yuki
Coming out of winter lineups are beginning to be announced for the many summer festivals, but music is always in the air and next week those sounds will be jazz. Jazz Week Tokyo will be held at Tokyu Theatre Orb in the Shibuya district's Hikarie ...
Jazz acts must embrace some new standards
Drop by your local jazz club and on an average night there's a fair chance the band will at some point play a rendition of "Autumn Leaves," "My Favorite Things" or " 'Round Midnight" — or maybe all three. You might hear an inspired ...
It's believed that time spent living abroad can be a journey of self-discovery, and for Miho Hazama that has certainly been the case. Moving to New York to study for a master's degree in jazz composition at the Manhattan School of Music (MSM) was ...
Building off that four-letter word — 'jazz'
Something I've noticed recently when browsing the jazz sections of record shops is the proliferation of sub-genres among the Japanese artists. Just hearing the names is enough to get a fan excited about the apparent explosion of creativity. For example, postrock jazz acts such as ...
Rediscovering Japan's 'lost generation' and Tokyo Beatles
LIFE.com unearths photos of pill-popping hipsters, doing the hippie hippie shake, back in the day.
