Recently I was inspired to dig through some orphaned tracks and have decided to post a few. We do a lot of experimenting when it comes to song writing and end up having a lot of different tracks that don’t quite fit into the On Ensemble sound for one reason or another. As a composer one thing I’ve always tried to do is to challenge myself to do the thing I’m least comfortable doing when it comes to making music. When I first started off I was just intimidated to finish a song so I would force myself to finish pieces and present them to whatever group I was in. Then it was writing pieces in non 4/4 time, then it was writing melodies and then harmonies and now it’s writing lyrics. Some of these explorations get turned into On Ensemble material some of them get spun into other projects then there are some that kind of fall between the cracks. This track is one of those tracks. It’s a free jazz inspired piece based on a 13/8 groove. For a while I got all inspired to write songs in 13 after we had done a collaborative piece with Patrick Graham based on different patterns in 13. Before that it was pieces in 5 and now I just want to write things in 7. I don’t really know how 13 snuck in there in-between the 5 and current 7 obsessions. Anyhow I original wrote this as a piece that we could play with Russel Baba and he’s featured on Saxophone along with Kaoru Watanabe on fue. This is a live recording from the first and currently only time we’ve performed this track. I’m thinking of featuring it on our next album but we’ll see how it all works out. The pictures during a sunrise at Borobudur taken during my Indonesian Arts Education fellowship in central Java. Enjoy!

On Ensemble returned from a great weekend at the 2nd Annual Eastern Taiko Conference. It was quite a busy weekend. On Thursday I (Shoji) flew into New York and performed that night with Kaoru Watanabe and Patrick Graham at Zebulan. It was a great way to start the weekend. We performed an all improvised set and it’s always great to perform with musicians like Kaoru and Patrick. The next day we drove to Wesleyan and met up with Maz and Kris who were on tour with Taikoproject. The three of us spent the weekend leading workshops and getting a sense of the East Coast taiko community. Through our tours we’ve met quite a few of the East Coast groups but it’s still surprising how quickly groups are springing up.

On Saturday we performed a great concert with Kaoru Watanabe, Patrick Graham, Kenny Endo, Miles Endo, Isaku Kageyama and TAIKOPROJECT. In the first half we played an integrated set with Kenny, Kaoru and Patrick based on our ongoing TAIKO 2.0 collaboration. Isaku and Miles joined in for a couple of pieces and really added to the mix. In the second half Maz and Kris switched costumes and took the stage as TAIKOPROJECT. I joined them to perform “Omiyage” then Kenny led a rousing 8 person version of “Symmetrical Soundscapes” to end the concert. Hopefully I’ll be able to post some video of the concert soon in the meantime enjoy these photos from Ben Pachter’s flickr account.

All in all it was a great weekend of taiko. A huge thank you goes out to Cheryl Tan and the organizers of the 2nd annual Eastern Taiko Conference who did a great job organizing the conference. At each one of these taiko gatherings there are a ton of behind the scenes people who helped make all this happen. Stuart Paton and Burlington Taiko were carting drums around everywhere, David Cheetham came all the way from Vegas and was a life saver producing the concert, there were helpful volunteers everywhere and somebody made hundreds of warm musubi to greet the participants as they arrived. As a workshop leader and performer we have the easy job just show up teach a workshop and play but the real props should go to all the organizers and volunteers who make these events possible.

Here at On Ensemble each of us has several musical projects we are involved with. Kris and Maz both perform with Taikoproject, Kelvin performs with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and I perform with Hiroshima and have always been into producing electronic music. Two years ago I formed an electronic music duo with longtime friend and two time Grammy winning composer Christopher Tin called Stereo Alchemy. I’m excited to announce our debut album God of Love will be released this Valentine’s Day and is on pre-sale now! We are calling our sound ‘decadent electronica’ a seductive mix of trip-hop, post punk and synth pop that will appeal to fans of Massive Attack, Portishead, The Postal Service, M83 and Nine Inch Nails.

God of Love is a concept album that sets Renaissance and Romantic era poetry to beat driven tracks and epic soundscapes. It features vocals by singers Melissa R. Kaplan (of Universal Hall Pass and Splashdown), Mozez (of Zero 7), and Lia Rose (of Built for the Sea). The album was mixed by three-time Grammy-winning engineer Darrell Thorp (Radiohead, Beck, and Paul McCartney) and mastered by Tom Baker (Nine Inch Nails, Marilyn Manson).

For a preview of the album and a free download of the title track ‘God of Love’ visit: www.stereoalchemy.com.

During our time in Pinedale we ended up eating at the Wind River Brewery three times in two days and even made friends with some of the regulars (shout out to Kenny!). Yesterday we drove from Pinedale to Gillette through terrible weather. It was slow going but we arrived in one piece. Tomorrow we’ll be going out to a local elementary school for a couple of lecture demos. Today we finish our tech early and are settling down to watch the Niners!

Graphation Film Festival No. 1 Trailers from Graphation on Vimeo.

Yamasong is screening at the Graphation Film Festival at 8:00pm on Thursday March 16th at the Hive Gallery! There will be a Q/A panel with myself and Sam after the screen then a showing of one of the Jim Henson masterpieces that inspired Yamasong, The Dark Crystal!

Graphation @ the Hive
Thursday, March 17th, 8:00pm
The Hive Gallery and Studios
729 S. Spring St.
Los Angeles, CA

Kaoru Watanabe

TAIKO 2.0 at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts is coming this Saturday March 12th!  Today we are highlighting Brooklyn based flute and taiko player Kaoru Watanabe.  Kaoru was born into a musical family, both of his parents play with the St. Louis Symphony.  He’s a graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy  and the Manhattan School of Music.  He got his start playing taiko in St. Louis then later with the New York based group Soh Daiko.  In 1998 Kaoru moved to Sado Island to become an apprentice with Kodo.  He became the first American to become a performing member of Kodo and spent six years touring around the world with the ensemble.  In 2005 he become Artistic Director of Earth Celebration, Kodo’s annual world music festival held in Sado every summer.  In 2006 Kaoru left Kodo for New York City and has quickly become one of the most sought after fue and taiko players in North America.

I first met Patrick at a frame drum workshop he was giving in Tokyo while I was living there. After meeting him I remember being encouraged knowing that there were other musicians out there wandering the globe following the same path I was on.  Several years later once we started On Ensemble we were re-introduced through a mutual acquaintance who thought we would be natural collaborators.  Imagine the surprise when it turns out we had met several years earlier half way around the world!  Ever since then we’ve played together every chance we can and we’re looking forward to having Patrick be a part of TAIKO 2.0 at the Cerritos Center.

Also check out Patrick’s album Rheo which is an On Ensemble favorite and features two tracks that we’ll be performing at Cerritos Center!

Our first guest artist profile is the amazing dancer Chieko Kojima.  Chieko was born in Iwafune, Tochigi Prefecture and joined Ondekoza in 1976.  When Kodo was formed Chieko distinguished herself as one of the few regular performing members and became Kodo’s principal dancer.  As a member of Kodo she has toured around the world and has become known for her innovative interpretations of Japanese folk dance.  Chieko also performs with the song and dance group “Hanayui” and producers her own solo performances and collaborations.  She is currently on tour with Kaoru Watanabe and luckily we were able to work out her schedule so that she could join us for this special Cerritos Center concert.

On a personal note Chieko’s taiko playing style has been very influential to my own development as a taiko player.  When I first saw her play “Hana Hachijo” I was blown away by the beautiful her innovative movements and the way her movements and rhythms combined to make such effortless phrases.  It was that kind of effortless phrasing of movement and rhythm that I tried to incorporate into the open source piece “Omiyage”.