This looks to be a lovely evening and one I’m very much looking forward to. On Thursday this week (May 30th) local musicians Joel Stewart, & John Kuzel will team up with singer/songwriter Jon Levy for a night of classic and original tunes. And the cover charge is only 500 yen for a night of purely acoustic music from three very talented men.
Time: 19:30 ~ 22:30
Venue: Tadg’s Irish Bar & Restaurant
To find Tadg’s walk straight up Kiyamachi from Sanjo, before you get to Oike you should see the Empire building on your right. Tadg’s is on the 8th floor. Click here for a most convenient map.
Tomáš Mach at Papa Jon’s Eatery – Friday May 10th
Strictly speaking, I’m still too busy to be posting stuff here, but have decided to pop out of hibernation briefly to tell you all about this upcoming event at Papa Jon’s Eatery. It’s too important not to.
Among the musical acts at last year’s TEDxKyoto the stand out performance came from violinist Tomáš Mach. And the short speech he gave before playing (unfortunately not recorded in the video below) was almost as moving and profound as his music. I am very excited at the opportunity to see him play live again. If you are free on Friday the 10th – YOU HAVE TO GO SEE TOMAS MACH.
Tomáš Mach:
Czech violinist, composer and educator.
Studied at Conservatory in Teplice, Czech Republic and at Berklee College of Music in Boston, USA.
Winner of International Songwriting Competition in Nashville, Tennessee, USA.
Former profesor at Music Conservatory in Prague and teacher at Bangkok Symphony Music School in Thailand.
Tomas Mach performed all over Europe and USA.
Played along with many famous stars such as opera singer Andrea Bocelli, jazz star Bela Fleck, bluegrass legend Tony Trischka and many others.
In his music Tomas connects classical music with jazz and world music.
Tomas Mach plays master violin made by one of the world’s greatest living violin makers – Maestro Riccardo Bergonzi, Cremona, Italy.
This violin is a copy of famous violin called Hellier, made by Antonius Stradivarius in circa 1679.
See also –
Tomáš Mach’s website: http://www.tomasmach.eu/
Papa Jon’s website: http://www.papajons.net/
Papa Jon’s Eatery on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PapaJonsEatery
Three – No Wait – Two Acts @ Nega・Posi ~ Live Music in Kyoto
A week ago I paid a visit to live music venue NEGA・POSI. It’s been quite a while since I was last there, but my visit confirmed that it is still a great spot to tap into the local music scene here in Kyoto. For 1,200 yen I got to see three acts; one I knew and two I didn’t. All were charming, talented and quirky in their own special way. I’ll let the music speak for itself. Details of how to find NEGA・POSI can be found here. Check out their scheduled performances here. [Read more…]
Phil Norton & Max Dodds at Papa Jon’s Eatery – Video
Many thanks to Charles Roche for hosting yet another great night at Papa Jon’s last weekend. “Jazztronic” poet Phil Norton and singer Max Dodds provided excellent entertainment for a full house and a very enjoyable time was had by all. Here are a few video samples from the show, with news of more upcoming events below:
What with storytelling nights and musical performances Papa Jon’s Eatery is becoming quite the events venue, and its popularity means it is also a great gathering place for old friends. Here are some more upcoming events both there and at Tadg’s bar =>
February 22nd, Friday – Max Dodds will perform again with The Poor Boy Ensemble at TADG’S Irish bar & restaurant. Show starts at 8pm.
Admission: 500 yen
February 24th, Sunday – The Flame storytelling event at Papa Jon’s.
This month’s theme: “Friends & Loversâ€
Admission Free
Paul Crouse, Tom Brown and Charles Roche are scheduled story tellers. There is a music surprise or two planned and time permitting there will also be an open mic section.
The Flame is an English Language event and no translations are provided.
March 2nd, Saturday – at Papa Jon’s local singer/songwriter Jon Levy with Dom Liberati, his much respected musical accomplice from L.A.
Admission: 500 yen
See also –
Papa Jon’s website: http://www.papajons.net/
Papa Jon’s Eatery on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PapaJonsEatery
The Flame Story Page on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KyotoFlame
Jon Levy @ Papa Jon’s Eatery
Mewby and I really enjoyed Jon Levy’s show at Papa Jon’s last Friday. Great songs, lovely guitar playing… Jon is a very talented young man! Here are two beautiful songs I recorded. Take a look and if you like them, why not come and see Jon play there again on March 2nd?
You can see more videos of Jon’s music, get free downloads and keep up-to-date with his schedule here: http://jonlevymusic.com/
You can also follow him on Twitter: @jonlevymusic
Here are some more up-coming events at Papa Jon’s:
January 27th, Sunday – The Flame storytelling event.
This month’s theme: “Mama Maya” we’re still here!
Stories by Raioul Cervantes, Catherine Oki, Ted Taylor, Nicholas Sillavan.
Musical & poetic interludes from Max Dodds & Phil Norton
Admission Free!
February 10th, Sunday – Music & Poetry
Max Dodds will be playing original pieces from his new CD “Songs From Crooked Pine”
“Jazztronic Poet” Phil Norton will deliver monologues
Admission: 500 yen
February 24th, Sunday – The Flame storytelling event.
This month’s theme: “Friends & Lovers”
Admission Free
No storytellers yet scheduled for this event. If you would like to share a story or be put on the mailing list please email Charles Roche at kyotoflame[at]gmail.com
March 2nd, Saturday – Jon Levy returns. This time with Dom Liberati, his much respected musical accomplice from L.A.
Admission: 500 yen
See also –
Papa Jon’s website: http://www.papajons.net/
Papa Jon’s Eatery on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PapaJonsEatery
The Flame Story Page on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KyotoFlame
Songs from Crooked Pine
Looking for a gift to buy that special someone this Yuletide season? You could do a lot worse than invest in Max Dodd’s latest CD!
At the end of last month Max Dodds gave a grand performance at the release party for his new CD, “Songs from Crooked Pine”. It was a splendid night and the CD is splendid too. Get yourself a copy if you haven’t already and buy some as Xmas presents too! This is his first solo album, and you can buy it online right here. There also a few copies available at Tadg’s Irish pub. It’s a limited edition first printing with the covers hand printed in black-and-white on an old Kyoto printing press. The beautiful illustrations are by his very talented wife, Aika. Here’s a clip from the party:
Some more clips from Max’s previous shows here and here.
SONORIA by Hanna Preuss December 1st & 2nd @ Atelier Gekken
Thanks to Micah Gampel for the following event information:
Please come for live performance art from Europe and special event
this Saturday and Sunday December 1st & 2nd. Celebrating the anniversary of 20 years of friendship between Slovenia and Japan. With a short film of a Bunraku collaboration performed last Saturday in Wachi, Kyoto. You will enjoy a performance of Sonorous Theatre presented by Hanna Preuss, a well known composer and director based in Ljubljana Slovenia. Her company are once again in Kyoto at Atelier GEKKEN with SONORIA. Natasha Burger a well known film actress from Prague and Slovenia will perform in a sonorous soundscape of light and image in abstract choreographed movement. A solo performance employing powerful surround sound to tell a story with deep existential meaning but in a very gentle way.
Details:
SONORIA by Hanna Preuss Saturday December 1st & Sunday 2nd, at Atelier Gekken
Saturday from 4pm
Sunday from 2pm
1,500 yen each day
Location: Atelier GEKKEN (ã‚¢ãƒˆãƒªã‚¨åŠ‡ç ”)
Three blocks east of Shimogamohondori at the intersection with Kitaojidori, on the north side you`ll see the Atelier Gekken building on the left. Here is a map: http://gekken.net/atelier/access.html
Address: 1 Shimogamo Tsukamoto cho Sakyo-ku Kyoto (京都左京区下鴨塚本町1)
Tel: 075-791-1966
Mail: info@gekken.net
Read about SONORIA at
http://gekken.net/atelier/pg628.html
Yugao & Carmen Alvarez @ Zac Baran – Video
My apologies to all for the tardy nature of this post, but here finally are the videos from Yugao’s performance with Carmen Alvarez earlier this month. Incidentally, Carmen will be holding a flamenco party and performance at the restaurant Tio Pepe this Friday, so if you like what you see below, you know where to go. Entry is 2,500 yen which includes one drink and a plate of tapas. Here is a map to the location and Carmen says the start time is “19.00 or 20.00”, so good luck with that!
Here is the music. First an atmospheric number from the boys…
Then Carmen takes the stage in her kimono…
And finally the perennial favorite, “Spain” by Chick Corea.
Shakuhachi player, Koichi Yoshida is off to find fame and fortune in Europe over the next few months, but promises he will return to Kyoto from time to time, so when he does I’ll be sure to let you all know when Yugao perform in Kyoto again.
TEDxKyoto 2012
Congratulations to Jay Klaphake and his team for successfully organizing the very first TEDxKyoto last Sunday! I attended this event with a good deal of curiosity. I have never attended a TED event before. However, having seen a number of inspiring talks online from the main TED event, my expectations were naturally set high. How would TEDxKyoto match up?
Naturally, there were both high points and some low points too. A number of presentations impressed me so much that I was EXTREMELY glad to have attended and overall, I think the event was a worthwhile venture. I’ll be interested to see how it develops over the coming years, for they clearly plan to continue it.
High points:
I don’t know when they’ll have videos of the event up online, but when they do here are the speakers you should look out for.
Shinya Senmatsu – Deer hunter.
I don’t eat meat myself but this gentleman had a purity of purpose that I could respect. He talked about his experiences as a volunteer in East Timor and the disillusionment he felt then for modern society and its money-based economy. Rejecting this world and determined to be self-sufficient and self-reliant, he took to living the traditional life of the hunter. In support of his lifestyle he offered the following very valid point. Japanese deer having no natural predators (the last wolf died in 1905) have become a pest and must necessarily be culled. The numbers culled are roughly equivalent to those hunted, however, all that culled meat is simply treated as garbage and burnt. Isn’t this a waste of a precious natural resource? Certainly, I believe a diet based on nature’s bounty must be healthier than eating the meat from factory farmed cattle pumped full of drugs and anti-biotics, and force fed grain or worse even than that, force fed same species meat.
Tomas Mach – Violinist
There were a number of musical acts during the course of the event, but violinist, Tomas Mach gave an incomparable performance. The short speech he gave before playing was profound. The music touched me deeply. Watch the video when it goes up, and if you ever get the chance to see him play live, grab it.
Jeffrey Jousan and Ivan Kovac – Filmmakers
These two cheery chaps introduced a wonderful and moving video about life in Ishinomaki, Miyagi after the disaster. At turns heartbreaking and inspiring these are the true stories of the survivors. It’s a short movie and it is freely viewable online, so take a look and be inspired: Then and Now
Angelica Lim – Roboticist
With infectious enthusiasm this lady introduced us to the world of robotics, how robots can help us in the near future and how researchers are attempting to make them more socially acceptable by giving them more empathetic, human characteristics. Her little robot companion also treated us to a little dance which went down a storm.
Eri Itoh – Scientist
Eri itoh works in the area of air traffic control and she told us all about current developments that will lead to more efficient, and much, much safer flight management systems. I think anyone who has ever flown has a vested interest in this subject – you know, staying alive, -Â so everyone in the hall was sitting forward, intent, listening very, very carefully to her every word.
Garr Reynolds – Presentation Guru
This guy was superb. As my friend Shaheed put it afterwards, “I felt comfortable with him”. It’s true. As soon as he was on stage he had us up and standing, doing stretches and high-fiving our neighbours. I’m British and I don’t normally go for that sort of thing, but on this occasion I participated happily. Mr. Reynolds had us in the palm of his hand from the word go. With energy, and gentle humour, he introduced us to the emotional power of multi-media presentations, which he demonstrated with some touching stories from his own family history. His standing ovation was richly deserved.
Honourable mentions:
The first speaker, the scientist Hiroshi Matsumoto was a charming fellow, who spoke on the noble topic of taking the long view in terms of human progress. A worthy message. However, his field of research is in the science of extra-terrestrial energy generation. I would have liked to have heard more about that. The last image he showed of a future world powered by space energy and orbited by space farms and space cities, was just too tantalizing! Why didn’t he talk more about that?
The journalist, Jake Adelstein gave a talk on life lessons he has learned from encounters with yakuza and the cops that bust them. There was one thing he said that stuck in my mind. It was something like the injustices that we encounter in life, are those we are meant to correct. I liked that a lot and I think I will carry it with me.
Creativity & design leader, Catherine Courage, may have been good, (she did get a standing ovation) but unfortunately she was the last speaker, and I was too burned out on speeches to take anything in anymore. Sorry about that.
Teething troubles:
This was an all-volunteer organized and staffed event and I imagine many of those participating haven’t done anything like this before. Undoubtedly, future events will run smoother. However, as the T in TED stands for “technology,” I was a little surprised at the recurring technical difficulties they had on the day with both sound and images. It wasn’t a huge problem, and there was enough good will in the hall to overlook it, but they definitely need to have that area down pat for the next event.
A few suggestions –
- The screen, used to project images and video onto, needs to be smoother, as the one used made some videos hard to distinguish. That was a pity.
- With the exception of the first guy (who was excellent), the simultaneous interpretation (from Japanese to English at least) was pretty poor. I found it easier to listen directly to the Japanese (which thankfully wasn’t as technical as I had feared). I’m not sure what to suggest for this, other than preparing and translating a rough script of the talk before the event…?
- Not to single anyone out, but a bit less of the whooping and hollering in between the talks please.
- Apparently sustainability is a matter of some importance to the TEDxKyoto organizers. The mail I received with my ticket asked me not to print it out so as not kill trees. I believe they also employed someone to study the event as it progressed and suggest ways they could make it more sustainable in future. These are commendable aims! I have two tiny wee suggestions. Don’t cater the event with throwaway paper plates and cups, and don’t give each guest a “gift bag” full of throwaway advertising leaflets.
Those tiny gripes aside, organizing an event of this scale is a massive undertaking and for the most part they pulled it off very well indeed. I think everyone who attended found it a valuable and entertaining experience and I’ll be keen to go again, for I am sure it will only get better. Congratulations again to all involved in producing TEDxKyoto. You can be proud of what you have achieved so far, and our wonderful city, Kyoto, really deserves an event like this, so a big thank you for making it happen.
Shakuhachi & Flamenco Live with Yugao – This Weekend!
Our old friend the shakuhachi player, Koichi Yoshida, and his band Yugao have an autumn show at Zac Baran this weekend and the wonderful flamenco dancer Carmen Alvarez is back from Spain to join the performance! You can see some clips of Carmen in action with Yugao from a performance last year here. A little birdy tells me that Koichi is planning to move to France soon… so this might well be our last chance to see this unique blending of musical cultures here in Kyoto for quite some time.
Blending jazz, classical, traditional Japanese and Indian music, Kyoto’s most popular fusion ensemble forms something a little greater than the sum of its parts. Three years of tinkering with structures and honing sonorities have only made this new and arresting sound even harder to classify — and more difficult to forget. Don’t miss your chance to hear YUGAO, live at ZAC BARAN!
8th (Saturday) Open: 18:30 / Start: 19:30
9th (Sun) Open: 17:00 / Start: 18:00
Advance tickets: 2000 yen / On the door: 2500 yen
Booking: http://yugao-music.com/ticket/ticket.html
Location: Zac Baran is a legendary cafe/bar/music spot on the north side of Marutamachi a short walk east of Higashioji Dori. Here is a map.
To learn more about Yugao and their music please visit their website. You can also view several videos of their performances there.
Links to the performers’ websites:
Yugao
Yoshida Koichi
Ikeda Ippei
Fujisawa Bayan
Carmen Alvarez
Sons of Choro 7 @ Sons Music Bar on Thursday, July 26th
Well I am off on a wee trip to Borneo in the next couple of days, which I’m quite happy about. Sadly however, I will therefore miss the next Choro Canãrio show at Sons. If you haven’t caught it before, this is a regular and increasingly popular monthly live acoustic show that I highly recommend. I have posted so many videos of Choro Canãrio on this site already though, that on occasion I thought it might be interesting to see some of the Sons bar regulars enjoying the music too. This video also features the omnipresent Lawrence Barrow.
Choro Canário @ Sons music bar
Choro Canãrio:
Ryoichi Katoh (Bandolim)
Shinya Setono (Violão de 7 cordas)
Nosso Choro with Akimitsu Katoh (Cavaquinho)
Date: Thursday July 26th
Time: 20:30 ~ till everyone drops from exhaustion.
Charge: 1000 yen (includes one glass of wine served after the show)
Location: Sons is situated on the east side of Gokomachi on the ground floor of the Gokomachi Building (御幸町ビル) just south of Marutamachi. You have to walk into the building past “Dolch” Italian restaurant on your left and the bar is situated at the end of the hallway ahead of you. There’s a Google map here, or you can use the map for the Italian restaurant Dolch.
Sons is open 12:00-23:00 Monday – Saturday, and from 19:30 most Sundays.
Address: 〒604-0981
京都市ä¸äº¬åŒºå¾¡å¹¸ç”ºé€šä¸¸å¤ªç”ºä¸‹ãƒ«æ¯˜æ²™é–€ç”º553 御幸町ビル1F
Tel: 075-223-5881.
Choro Canário play “Noites Cariocas”
Here’s a happy little number from Choro Canário’s last show at Sons music bar on May 31st. Details of their next show on the 21st of this month are below. Cariocas are the people of Rio de Janeiro and this tune means “Nights of the Cariocas.”
Choro Canário @ Sons music bar
Date: Thursday June 21st
Time: 20:30 ~ till we all drop from exhaustion.
Charge: 1000 yen (includes one glass of wine served after the show)
Sons is situated on the east side of Gokomachi on the ground floor of the Gokomachi Building (御幸町ビル) just south of Marutamachi. It is open 12:00-23:00 Monday – Saturday, and from 19:30 most Sundays.
Tel: 075-223-5881.
Click here to view videos of their 4th live show in April.
Also Up & Coming:
Satoko Okuda & Aya Oto World – Upcoming Shows!
The Flame II ~ Unscripted True Stories
Heidi Durning’s 音℃ Dance & Soundscape
Max Dodds & Friends @ Tadg’s
Here as promised are some video clips from Max Dodd’s show at Tadg’s the other week. Max will of course be performing a solo show as the “Human Jukebox” this coming Saturday at our Tohoku fundraiser up by Demachiyanagi. Other musicians performing are Felicity Greenland, Jen L. Teeter, Hiroyuki Tokuda, Ai (from Jet Pepper Tower and Chi to Bara) and there is a possibility that Choro Canário may also put in a flying guerrilla style performance too!
Now back to the music! Scroll down to the end to see Robert Yellin’s guest spot! [Read more…]
Choro Canário @ Sons Music Bar – This Thursday!
I’m really rather chuffed that Choro Canário are using a picture that I took for their latest flyer!
Choro is a type of Brazilian acoustic music, that predates both Samba and Bossa nova. It is typically light, graceful, intricate and sweet to the ears. Choro Canário are Kyoto locals Ryoichi Katoh on bandolim and Shinya Setono on the seven stringed classical guitar. Their performances are a little bit of magic. To listen to some of their music, please check the links below.
The show starts 8.30 and goes on till late! Only 1,000 for entry!
Bar Sons is situated on the east side of Gokomachi on the ground floor of the Gokomachi Building (御幸町ビル) just south of Marutamachi. It is open 12:00-23:00 Monday – Saturday, and from 19:30 most Sundays. Tel: 075-223-5881.
To find out more about Choro Canário, please visit Ryoichi Katoh’s website at http://bandolim.exblog.jp
You can find Choro Canário videos at the links below:
Choro Canário @ Sons
Nosso Choro @ Sons Music Bar