Tayutauta

CD
(Improvised Music from Japan, IMJ-507)
Released on March 28, 2004
Purchase price in Japan: 2,000 yen (tax not included)
(For purchase outside of Japan, prices vary.)

• Recorded by Yumiko Tanaka in her four-and-a-half-tatami-mat room in Yashiro, Hyogo prefecture, on September 10 (1), June 15 (2), June 16 (3), June 17 (4), September 11 (5), August 21 (6, 7), August 24 (8, 9), August 25 (10), and August 26 (11), 2003
• Mastered by Toshimaru Nakamura in Tokyo on October 5, 2003
• Produced by Yumiko Tanaka
• Design by Samm Bennett and Haruna Ito (Polarity Design)
  
• Includes liner notes by Yumiko Tanaka in Japanese and English

1. Furuike ya (5:40)
2. Kaze ga Toku de (7:01)
3. Amayadori (13:23)
4. Yuki (8:26)
5. Chirei (3:33)
6. Ruten (8:39)
7. Yamanoha (5:19)
8. Otozure (1:10)
9. Tayuta (10:29)
10. The Gateway (0:46)
    
    mp3 excerpt: track 1
    mp3 excerpt: track 2
    mp3 excerpt: track 3

All music by Yumiko Tanaka
Yumiko Tanaka: futozao shamisen, vocal

Yumiko Tanaka made her mark as a traditional shamisen artist specializing in the female-school gidayu style. Tanaka was a member of Otomo Yoshihide's Ground-Zero in 1996-'97, and she is currently involved in a number of fields, ranging from contemporary classical music to free improvisation to avant-garde theater. Suprisingly, this energetic and multi-faceted musician has to date released no solo or leader recordings--making this collection of 10 totally improvised solo works a debut CD of sorts. On Tayutauta, Tanaka uses the gidayu shamisen in ways that leave traditional playing methods far behind. Here, the instrument's characteristic flavor is nowhere to be found. The performances--which incorporate such techniques as plucking, bowing, and the use of "prepared" objects--are calm and sedate, but suffused with a strong feeling of cohesion backed by Tanaka's distinctive musical stance and sensibility. This is improvised music of rare quality.

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