‘Reunion’ by Kaoru Tsubakida
Kaoru Tsubakida (As)
Shota Watanabe (Pf)
Kaoru Tsubakida
Tsubakida was born in 1964 Iwami, Tottori.
He started playing jazz when he attended Nihon Fukusi University.
He studied jazz theory with Toshihisa Morita. He also took saxophone lessons from Akira Omori and Masato Kumoi.
In 1992, he paticipated many jam sessions In New York City and was greatly influenced by Atsushi Ikeda,Yosuke Inoue and Shingo Okuda.
In 2001 he played in Seattle Year Shot Jazz Festival as a member of the C.U.G.Jazz orchestra.
At this time, he released four albums; ‘Make It So’ in 2004, ‘Color Scheme’ in 2008, ‘The Cloudless Sky’ in 2012, and ‘The Mountain With No Name’ in 2016.
He also teaches the instrument and many players he taught are now playing as professional musicians.
Kaoru Tsubakida is currently playing as a member of Shuhei Mizuno Big Band and Kenny’s All Stars Big Band, as well as his own group.
Shota Watanabe
Born 1988, Nagoya, Japan
Starting classical piano from age four, Watanabe grew up with the musical influence of his father, guitarist Norio Watanabe. As a teenager, Watanabe became interested in jazz and in 2003, started to study under Donny Schwekendiek.
Watanabe started performing music in public from 2004, joining the jazz funk band ‘Akamon’ in 2005. From 2009 he devoted himself to playing jazz, participating in many tours with bands such as the Wataru Hamazaki Quartet, Kaoru Tsubakida Quintet, noon and the Hideaki Kanazawa Trio.
In 2010, Watanabe took part in the recording for the album “Once upon the summer time” by Japanese singer “noon”, performing at Tokyo STB, Osaka Billboard and Blue Note Nagoya, on the recording release tour.
Shota Watanabe currently performs with his own band, in addition to providing musical support in a wide range of music genres to various other artists, mainly in the Tokyo and Nagoya areas of Japan, as well as nationwide.
