Karakui

My friend Eriko Ikehara and I received a grant from the Center for New Racial Studies to put together a multi-media/mixed performance on Black Japanese.  It will be February 12th in the bay area (space tbd). If you (or someone you know) are Blackanese and has photos, comedy, performance pieces, spoken word, prose, artwork, etc.…

Misako Oshiro is one of the greatest singers of Okinawan traditional songs. Born in 1936 in the Taisho-ku district of Osaka, where large numbers of exiled Okinawans live, she moved to Okinawa when still a child and grew up on the north of the main island in the village of Henoko. She took an early…

At 83 years of age, Koutoku Tsuha is the oldest performing singer and sanshin player from the first generation of Okinawan recording artists. Born in 1927 in Yomitan on the main island of Okinawa, his father was a teacher of classical Ryukyu music, and his uncle was also a music teacher and a Ryukyu dancer.…

At last the long-awaited album from the newest line-up of Sadao China’s protégées Nenes has been released on the Dig label. Okurimono (the title means ‘gift’) contains thirteen tracks and runs to 54 minutes. This time Nagisa Uehara is the only surviving member from the previous quartet who made the Sai album in 2008. Among…

This is the second album from Ska Lovers, the joint project of producer, programmer and keyboard player DJ Sasa and Hokkaido-born Okinawa-based singer and sanshin player Kanako Horiuchi who is also an accomplished performer of Okinawan minyo. Their idea is to play well-known J-pop songs in ska and rocksteady versions together with a large helping…