Hiroshi Sato (佐藤博, June 3, 1947 – October 24, 2012) was a Japanese singer-songwriter, born in

Chiran, Kagoshima was a List of towns in Japan, town located in Kawanabe District, Kagoshima, Kawanabe District, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. Chiran is famous for producing Japanese tea. As of 2003, the town had an estimated population of 13,667 and the populatio ...

and raised in

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

. He was an influential keyboardist in the Japanese

jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, ...

and

soft rock Soft rock is a form of rock music that originated in the late 1960s in Southern California and the United Kingdom which smoothed over the edges of singer-songwriter and pop rock, relying on simple, melodic songs with big, lush productions. S ...

scenes during the late 1970s and 1980s, later dubbed "

city pop is a loosely defined form of Japanese pop music that emerged in the late 1970s and peaked in the 1980s. It was originally termed as an offshoot of Japan's Western-influenced "new music", but came to include a wide range of styles – including ...

Early life and career

Hiroshi was born as the eldest son of a temple in his home town of Chiran in the

Kagoshima Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyushu and the Ryukyu Islands. Kagoshima Prefecture has a population of 1,599,779 (1 January 2020) and has a geographic area of 9,187 km2 (3,547 sq mi). Kagoshima Prefecture borders Kumamoto P ...

, but moved to

in 1949 at the age of two. During his high school years, Sato obtained a

reel-to-reel tape recorder Reel-to-reel audio tape recording, also called open-reel recording, is magnetic tape audio recording in which the recording tape is spooled between reels. To prepare for use, the ''supply reel'' (or ''feed reel'') containing the tape is plac ...

and began learning how to play the bass guitar and drums, recording his work in a garage. At age 20 he also began playing the piano, and later stated that "when I was 20 years old, I practiced so much that I was willing to give up the world if I didn't turn pro." Around 1970, he started his career as a pianist in a jazz band in

Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of 2. ...

, eventually leading to his collaboration with other blues musicians such as the West Road Blues Band and

Masaki Ueda Masaki Ueda (; born 7 July 1949) is a Japanese R&B and soul singer and composer. Life and career Born in Kyoto, the son of a doctor, Ueda spent part of his childhood with his grandparents in Himeji, Hyōgo, as both his parents became infected ...

, as well as folk musicians such as Kyozo Nishioka as part of "The Dylan", Masaji Otsuka and

Ryo Kagawa was a Japanese folk singer and singer-songwriter. Kagawa was known as a central figure in the Kansai folk-music boom of the late 1960s and early 1970s in Japan, and was a key influence on the early musical development of such major Japanese arti ...

. In 1976, along with forming

Shigeru Suzuki is a Japanese musician, songwriter and guitarist. He first became known as a member of the influential rock band Happy End in the early 1970s, before starting a solo career and becoming a prolific session musician. As of 2006, Suzuki had contr ...

's short-lived band Huckleback and collaborating with

Haruomi Hosono , sometimes credited as Harry Hosono, is a Japanese musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. He is considered to be one of the most influential musicians in Japanese pop music history, credited with shaping the sound of Japanese pop for ...

and his friends from

Tin Pan Alley Tin Pan Alley was a collection of music publishers and songwriters in New York City that dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It originally referred to a specific place: West 28th Street ...

, he released his first solo album "SUPER MARKET" through

Nippon Columbia , often pronounced ''Korombia'', operating internationally as , is a Japanese record label founded in 1910 as Nipponophone Co., Ltd. It affiliated itself with the Columbia Graphophone Company of the United Kingdom and adopted the standard UK C ...

. He released 14 total albums up until his hiatus after "Oracle", which was released through Eastworld Records in 1996.

Discography

Albums

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sato, Hiroshi 1947 births 2012 deaths Japanese male singer-songwriters Japanese singer-songwriters Singers from Kyoto