Hiroe Kobayashi on Jazz of Japan | Brian McCrory

Sayaka Kishi Trio: Banquet

Fri, 13 Sep 2024 00:00:00 +0000

On Banquet, pianist and composer Sayaka Kishi’s latest album from 2024, her piano trio brightens things up with a banquet of delights. Kishi has long been a musician who loves to explore and mix genres with a sense of fun and dedication, and she is often found playing in Latin, Afro-Cuban, flamenco, fusion, and other groups. While the genres are many, Kishi consistently pulls from her knowledge of jazz standards, pop, classical, and other roots, bound together with swing and Latin beats and ad-libbed improvisation.

This particular album of hers was released under the Sayaka Kishi Trio name and is a follow-up to the same trio’s previous recording Life Is Too Great (2019). Also as such, the trio music on this album tends towards primarily jazz influences. Meanwhile, her other recent releases with various groups (piano/cello, piano/vocals, congos/vibraphone/piano, sax/organ/drums, etc) span colorful moods with different instrumentalists playing across genres.

Invoking the simple pleasures of chewing bubble gum with a playful, mild rebelliousness, the ten tracks start excitedly with the peppy opener “I Miss the Blue Sky”, pop-funk of “Bubble Gum”, and the calm and memorable “Noite Azul” moving in five-four time. The nine Kishi compositions (and one cover song) subtly reflect Kishi’s humorous personality while being mindfully crafted with nuanced changes, rhythmic surprises, and unexpected elements tucked away in corners throughout the album.

The opening track’s first section, for example, launches from a bouncing and carefree theme and immediately moves to a two-minute swinging conversation between bass and drums as the harmonic underpinning moves through several musical keys. Variety, twists, and sharp ideas continue to play out inconspicuously throughout Kishi’s music, like her unique spice or secret ingredient.

The next four songs “Wondering Bird”, “It’s My Jameson”, “Sora wo Kakeru”, and “Three Sails” continue to explore fun terrain with jazz moods infused with folky country, groovy shuffle, Bacharachesque emotive pop, and jazz/Latin bop in a Horace Silver hue. The music feels bright and brisk and is especially enhanced by the captivating dynamics, strength, and skills of Yasukagawa’s bass and Yamada’s drums.

Guest vocalist Hiroe Kobayashi (her partner in the group Sul Madrugada and their 2022 release Luar) adds evocative vocals and lyrics to the next song, #8 “Asas Brancas” for a cheery foreign trip, continuing into Chucho Valdez’s “Mambo Influenciado” for some rousing peaks. Finally, the album closes with Kishi’s “Hope of 2022” for a smooth and laidback finale, sweet as dessert.

Audio and Video

Sayaka Kishi Trio playing her composition “Kin no Bitou” in 2019:

Sul Madrugada: Luar

Fri, 25 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

While leading and participating in different groups through the years, musicians Hiroe Kobayashi and Sayaka Kishi have also played together on various projects incorporating standard jazz, pop, and Latin genres, and even Disney and movie songs. In 2022, the duo released their first full-length album entitled Luar under the band name Sul Madrugada. This name, Portuguese for “southern dawn”, together with the title Luar for “moonlight” beautifully describes the atmospheric direction the pair gravitates towards with this Latin jazz project. On this release, the duo is devoted to creating South American music in a package that embraces nature through the icons of the sun and moon.

Luar is a sparkling album with a running time of 45 minutes and contains a mix of original and Brazilian selections. Three songs from Brazilian artists are included, and the four original compositions also convey bona fide South American influences with slow ballads, catchy pop, and uptempo samba. The one exception to the theme is Stevie Wonder’s “I Just Called to Say I Love You”, played with a laidback midtempo groove for a mid-album refreshment.

While Kobayashi uses some English and Japanese lyrics, the vocalist mostly sings in Portuguese as on the covers of “Caminho das Águas”, “Encontros e Despedidas”, and “Flor de Lis”. Yet more often, the versatile Kobayashi enjoys vocalizing without words, adding nicely textured organic layers to the music with colorful oohs, aahs, and laas to build up the sound by using her voice as an additional instrument.

Similar to the musicians’ other albums, the songwriting on Luar is one of the main attractions. Kobayashi supplies two originals with tracks #1 and 3: “Primavera de Batana” soars lightly, with pretty harmonizing of voice, piano, and keyboard, and on “Canto de Céu”, the vocalist combines a poetry-like reading with guitar, keyboard, and distant choral singing for a wandering ambience.

Pianist Kishi’s original songs include the spiritual colors of “Luar”, the light pop of “Morning Blend”, and the spicy energy of “Early Samba”, which brings to mind another of Kishi’s groups Conviano, a popular and exciting Latin-based trio made up of conga, vibraphone, and piano.

Along with her songwriting, Kishi’s skill at juggling various instruments like piano, keyboard, and percussion is impressive. This sort of fluidity also extends to Sul Madrugada’s live shows, where Kobayashi and Kishi switch positions between acoustic piano and electric keyboard or guitar for selected songs. This vitality and variation are elemental to their absorbing music, engaging the audience like the attractive pull of heavenly bodies, sun and moon.

Audio and Video

Promotional video for “Early Samba”, track #7 on this album and the title of a four-song mini-album from Sul Madrugada:

Excerpt from track #1: “Primavera De Batata”