tonight, I went to Kioi hall to see the performance by chihiro yamanaka and other 2 trio members. as today was the crucial meeting day and thus I have relatively free this afternoon. then as planned I left the office before 6:00pm and reached Akasaka Mitsuke.
I previewed the music that she would play tonight by listening to her latest cd. but the quality of the hall is one of the best when the piano is played, and the players are all world class. so when their music began, I felt some cold chill as it really exceeded my expectation. as noted before, I went to roppongi to enjoy jazz and some food at one of the oldest jazz club, but unfortunately the sound there didn't feel good, and what's worse, the players are not good in general, since considering the songs, sometimes the piano and the base were too loud. fundamentally, the tone of their musical instruments were the worst.... in short, the performance at that Roppongi club was just crap... therefore, today's genuine professional performance seemed quite impressive for me, along with the quality of their sophisticated musical instruments and the hall.
apart from music itself, MC by chihiro was so funny. everyone roughed at her interesting story like on her way to the tour , she bumped into the worst weather and how she managed to reach the next concert area...
she finished her story with her gratitude to the driver of Toyama kotsuu based on how excellent that driver's sense of direction was because he didn't use GPS navigation system when they went through the way from Toyama to Nagoya...
I've known how funny she is because I have read her journals and tweets before, on top of her essay published as a book.
It is natural that her performance felt as the best of the best, but I was completely struck by her performance. I thought her recent style got more steady when I saw her video which filmed her studio recording and live performance in NYC. But it wasn't true. her quite aggressive play is actually alive. She looked so passionate but very sensitive and accurate to follow the tones with amazing speed... her figures can't be captured properly even by human eyes... It was like a lightning thunder... how aggressive she was is easily understandable when the audience see her continuous movement, up and down, intermittent stop when the bass of the three musical instruments got together. so I hope that today's performance will be out as a DVD after her concert tour finishes.
By the way, after the concert, I could get her autograph and meet with her very closely... I know that she looks so pretty when I saw her recorded materials, but actual looks was beyond my imagination.... I cant forget her smile at me when passing me her autograph... she's amazingly beautiful....
maybe tonight my sleeping quality will be deteriorated as I am too high...
anyway, I'll stay motivated to acquire jazz piano and music theory from now on too.
regards,
kenji
