Her early debut album Falling In Love With Phineas drops a name in its title that hints at how Matsumoto’s music and quick fingers are filled with hard swinging and elegant playing. On her trio records and at live performances, she naturally transforms her enthusiasm for highly dextrous, fluid pianists like Phineas Newborn Jr. and Oscar Peterson into her own personal style with dazzling energy.

This inspiration is also present on this release in the form of rapid tempos, elegant passages, and sparkling improvisation. At the same time, Matsumoto’s virtuosic fire and passion are balanced by the pianist’s original compositions and sensitive ballad picks. The eight-song, 45-minute album features the uptempo burners that audiences always look forward to as well as the exquisitely smooth and slower rhythms of ballads and bossas. It all works to set heads bopping, bring forth smiles, and set graceful moods as the tracks play out.

The album begins with a deeply comfortable laid-back groove for the title track “Oh, Lady Be Good”. Tracks #2 “I Love You and #7 “Bye Bye Blackbird” fit the bill for intense barn burners with head-turning improvisation and nicely detailed arrangements. Similarly, track #5 “Tadd’s Delight” is Matsumoto’s arrangement of a tune drawn from the standard jazz repertoire, an uptempo treat that always excites listeners. These standards are handled with expertise and respect while incorporating Matsumoto’s artful designs with interludes, coordinated accent hits and bass lines, and several prearranged intros, outros, breaks, and vamps.

Along with jazz standards are three of Matsumoto’s originals, tracks #3 “Contact”, #4 “Pleiades”, and #6 “A Queen of the Night”. These slower, introspective moments, featured particularly on “Pleiades” and “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”, create space for delicate playing and patient absorption nestled among the higher-energy songs. The two ballads are also the two longest songs on the album, and Matsumoto starts and stops time for brief moments as she gently sets free the emotion of the notes in the melodies and improvisation. For an extra pleasing musical touch right at the end, Matsumoto includes the beautiful introductory verse for “Nightingale” played at the intro, and recalls it once again on the way out.

As for the meaning of #4 “Pleiades”, the word refers to the Messier 45 star cluster also known as “The Seven Sisters” located near the Taurus constellation. Reading Matsumoto’s notes for this song uncovers what it means to her, conveyed through her sensitive playing that brims with love and gratitude. With the same celestial theme, it must not be a coincidence that she is adorned with glittering stars on the album cover, undoubtedly guided by her heavenly intentions.

Liner Notes

(Translated from Akane Matsumoto’s original Japanese liner notes.)

1. Oh, Lady Be Good

George Gershwin was one of America’s finest composers. Originally written for the 1924 Broadway musical “Lady, Be Good!”, this is the first song written together with his brother and lyricist Ira Gershwin for a Broadway musical, 1924’s “Lady, Be Good!” Achieving success at a young age, Gershwin continued writing songs while fighting a deep loneliness: “Music is the only proof that I’m alive”. His brother, who understood him best, was always at his side. Although he passed away at the young age of 38, it’s said that he composed over 600 songs in the twelve years of his musical life. Expressing his feeling that “I don’t have time to fail,” the great composer never stopped growing and continued to produce new ideas one after another in his songs. (Akane Matsumoto)

2. I Love You

This song was written for a 1944 musical called “Mexican Hayride” by musician Cole Porter, who gained a sudden leap in popularity with his 1932 masterpiece “Night and Day”. In my favorite biopic about Cole, a movie called De-Lovely, there is a scene where he made a five-dollar bet with a friend on whether or not a song could be written from a cliched phrase like “I love you”. The result was this song. There was a memorable line that the songs he wrote in jest were a hundred times more profitable than his serious songs. However, on the other hand, some say that Cole wrote all of his songs for his lifelong companion and wife Linda, and that he stopped composing after she died. They must have been more closely connected than anyone else. They continue to exist together in Cole’s music. (Akane Matsumoto)

3. Contact

My grand piano finally arrived. For me, as someone who spent over twenty years with an upright piano, this was the very thing that I was longing for. While I was in university, I used to visit friends who had grand pianos and let me play as much as I liked. The grand piano that I welcomed home sounded just like I had imagined it would. The ringing pianissimo notes spread out as if slowly permeating the room. Whatever I play feels good, and I can’t help but smile. I felt like I had finally found it. “A good instrument helps the player to grow.” These are the words of Aoki-san, the piano tuner who I have wholeheartedly relied on for many years and who helped me choose this piano. I wonder how my wonderful union with this beloved instrument will change me in the future. This song is the first piece that I wrote after sitting down at my long-awaited piano for the first time. (Akane Matsumoto)

4. Pleiades

How meaningless are hatred and conflict? Some say that the Pleiadians came from a distant star 440 light-years away to fill the Earth with love. Whenever I meet a kind person, I begin to imagine wildly “I wonder if this person was a Pleiadian in a past life?” These are the kind of gentle people who always empathize with others and give love unconditionally. How many countless times have I been saved by their presence… how deeply I admire their humanity. With feelings of gratitude that cannot be fully expressed… (Akane Matsumoto)

5. Tadd’s Delight

This is a song by pianist Tadd Dameron, one of the first to incorporate bop idioms into his arrangements. The king of jazz Miles Davis revered him as an arranger. He earned a great amount of confidence from jazz musicians, including having a big impact on Benny Golson who also composed many famous songs. Tadd Dameron also contributed written pieces for Count Basie, Coleman Hawkins, Sarah Vaughan, and others. Even while he was buffeted by major changes in jazz history from the 1940s to the mid-1960s, through bop, hard bop, cool jazz, and contemporary jazz, he pursued his creed to the end: “I want my music to be beautiful, and it must swing.” “If people whistle the music I wrote on their way home, that’s all I need”. He carried on with his style of sharing music that fit with audiences. (Akane Matsumoto)

6. A Queen of the Night

This is a memory from long ago. One summer night I was told to come outside, so I went to the front door in my pajamas and opened the door. It was Queen of the Night, flower buds that my father had carefully cultivated. They were beginning to open, and I could see that the buds were slowly turning upwards, little by little, and heading towards blooming. Illuminated by the moonlight, the large white flowers stood out even more in the darkness, and a strong fragrance floated all around. By morning, the color and scent of the wilted flowers would be gone. Still, I was captivated by how they had bloomed so majestically over a short time. It was an experience where I was able to witness the beauty of existence. (Akane Matsumoto)

7. Bye Bye Blackbird

Bid adieu to a world of hardship and sorrow, and return home to a place where loved ones are waiting. Ever since Miles Davis played it, this song became a very famous standard number that has been taken up by many musicians. It has become my regular habit to close my performances with this, to thank those who have come to listen to me play and to wish them a next day full of hope. And as for me, playing this song makes me truly happy and full of positivity. My wish to make lots of people smile though jazz has not wavered at all over the last twenty years. Even if I play it every day, I don’t get tired of this song, and it always gives me courage. (Akane Matsumoto)

8. A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square

The scene is a park in London as night is being welcomed in. This is a love song that reminisces romantically about the meeting and parting of a couple. The story is illuminated through the beautiful voice of the nightingale’s song, as if the bird is watching over them. This is a masterpiece by the American composer Manning Sherwin and is beloved by many vocalists including Frank Sinatra, Anita O’Day, Nat King Cole, and Carmen McRae. It was included in the 1940 musical New Faces, a type of musical revue that centered on the enjoyment of song and dance rather than focusing on a clear storyline. The beautiful introductory section of this song is another of its charms. (Akane Matsumoto)

Obi Notes

Akane Matsumoto at the pinnacle of her evolution as a pianist and as a widely in-demand accompanist and backing musician.

This album is the crystallization of her wish to “make lots of people smile through jazz.”

Filled with the fun, the beauty, and the charm of the piano trio!!

Audio and Video

• Promotional video with excerpts from the first four tracks and a video of the recording of “Bye Bye Blackbird”:

• Audio for “Tadd’s Delight”, track #5 on this album:

• Audio for “A Queen of the Night”, track #6 on this album:

• Audio for “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”, track #8 on this album:

• Excerpt from track #1: “Oh,Lady Be Good”

(Aside: Following this apostrophe trail, this album’s bluesy first track may be no accidental serendipity but an intentional pick. Starting with the album title Ol’ School Jazz, the first track “Driftin’”, and that song’s origin on Herbie Hancock’s Takin’ Off, that’s three apostrophes already. Did the friendly informality of this “jazz apostrophe” as used in the day carry a similar effect — particularly for the “jazz atmosphere” of certain albums, laid back but highly skilled, casual but serious — as emojis and internet abbreviations do today? A prototype for the simple, effective, and immediate impact of quick slang like LOL, OMG, WTF? BRB…)

Ol’ School Jazz is a 14-track album loaded with unforgettable tunes from several eras of jazz history. Kumagai and Kawamura’s duo project honors that history with integrity and love by selecting familiar but excellent songs from the swing, bebop, and hard bop eras of the 1930s-60s, mainly. For fans of jazz classics and honest playing, it doesn’t get much better than Thelonious Monk’s “Evidence”, Benny Golson’s “Stablemates”, and Dizzy Gillespie and Kenny Clarke’s “Salt Peanuts”.

Jazz jam session favorites are also represented: “Caravan”, “All the Things You Are”, “If I Were A Bell”, “Alone Together”, and even “Cherokee”, no doubt a speed challenge when played by a drumless duo. One mood outlier among the straight-ahead swing and bop is Wayne Shorter’s “Sleeping Dancer Sleep On”, the tender highlight of the album and a beautiful melody played lovingly by the duo.

Filling out the package is one original song, the comfortable home base of a groovy jazz blues simply titled “Blues”. Each player also gets their own spot alone: Kawamura plays a brilliant bass solo on “Up Jumped Spring” in a relaxed midtempo swing, and Kumagai wraps up the album with a gospel blues piano solo for the last track, the spiritual and expressive “Amazing Grace”.

Audio and Video

• Audio for “All the Things You Are”, track #5 from this album:

• Excerpt from track #11: “Blues”

On Pray, Kumagai’s trio opens with “Brotherhood”, setting up an atmospherically moody yet light and relaxed vibe. Other album highlights include his live-show favorite “Yellow Tail”, a well-developed modern jazz exciter, and “Choir’s Got Fired”, a laid-back groove with irresistibly catchy riffs and an album highlight. The music is influenced by modern jazz players like Robert Glasper as well as hip hop concepts and includes enough dashes of unexpected changes, odd meters and beats, honest sensitivity, and spicy dissonance to keep the album in regular rotation for a great J Jazz piano trio playlist.

Audio and Video

• A live performance of “Yellow Tail”, the seventh track on the album:

• Excerpt from track #5: “CHOIR’S GOT FIRED”