Isaku Kageyama (born December 12, 1981, in San Francisco, United States) is an American musician, composer, producer, and educator, specialized in

taiko are a broad range of Japanese percussion instruments. In Japanese, the term refers to any kind of drum, but outside Japan, it is used specifically to refer to any of the various Japanese drums called and to the form of ensemble drumming m ...

drums. He is a member of Tokyo-based taiko ensemble called

Amanojaku The is a demon-like creature in Japanese folklore. Mythology It is usually depicted as a kind of small oni and is thought to be able to provoke a person's darkest desires and thus instigates them into perpetrating wicked deeds. It is described t ...

and he currently attends

Berklee College of Music Berklee College of Music is a private music college in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern American music, it also offers college-level cours ...

. He is famous for his fusion of traditional Japanese music with jazz, rock and club music, whereby he has collaborated with many jazz artists such as

Eric Gravatt Eric Kamau Grávátt (born March 6, 1947) is a jazz drummer from Philadelphia. He has played with McCoy Tyner, Joe Henderson, Weather Report, Byard Lancaster, Dom Um Romão. He was a member of Weather Report from 1972–1974. Discography With ...

Terumasa Hino is a Japanese jazz trumpeter. He is considered one of Japan's finest jazz musicians. His instruments include the trumpet, cornet, and flügelhorn. Early life He was born in Tokyo, Japan, and his father was a trumpeter and tap dancer. Hino start ...

Toshinori Kondo was a Japanese avant-garde jazz and jazz fusion trumpeter. Career Kondo was born in Ehime Prefecture. He attended Kyoto university in 1967, and became close friends with percussionist Tsuchitori Toshiyuki. In 1972 the pair left university, an ...

, and

Kazutoki Umezu is a Japanese jazz saxophonist. He has performed with Tom Cora, Samm Bennett, Ruins, Michiyo Yagi , a Japanese musician who studied koto under Tadao Sawai, Kazue Sawai and Satomi Kurauchi, and graduated from the NHK Professional Training ...

, as well as a wide range of

ethnic An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

musicians.

Early life and education

Isaku was born on December 12, 1981, in San Francisco, California. He attended St. Joseph International School in

Yokohama is the second-largest city in Japan by population and the most populous municipality of Japan. It is the capital city and the most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a 2020 population of 3.8 million. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of To ...

, and graduated from

International Christian University is a non-denominational private university located in Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan, commonly known as ICU. With the efforts of Prince Takamatsu, General Douglas MacArthur, and BOJ President Hisato Ichimada, ICU was established in 1949 as the first ...

in 2004 with a BA in

international relations International relations (IR), sometimes referred to as international studies and international affairs, is the scientific study of interactions between sovereign states. In a broader sense, it concerns all activities between states—such as ...

. He currently attends Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts.

Taiko career

He began playing taiko in 1987 under the tutelage of

Kenny Endo Kenny Endo (born April 2, 1953) is an American musician and taiko master. He is the leader of several taiko ensembles and regularly tours, performing traditional and contemporary taiko music. Endo is also the first non-Japanese national to recei ...

in Tokyo. In 1989, Isaku joined Amanojaku, where he continued to study taiko skills with Yoichi Watanabe for the next 20 years. From 2006 to 2011, he toured with Amanojaku as one of the principal drummers. In 2011, Isaku entered Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he currently studies percussion and contemporary writing and production. He also collaborated with Yuu Ishizuka, a member of rival group

Oedo Sukeroku Taiko is a taiko group from Japan. It is considered the first taiko group to begin touring professionally and, sometimes, the first professional taiko group. The group formed in Tokyo in 1959, and is one of the oldest recognized taiko groups in Japan. ...

. His style is specific and modern as he plays taiko drums together with electric guitar and electric bass players to form a kind of

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...

or punk music sound.

Taiko educator

Kageyama teaches taiko at

Wellesley College Wellesley College is a private women's liberal arts college in Wellesley, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1870 by Henry and Pauline Durant as a female seminary, it is a member of the original Seven Sisters Colleges, an unofficial g ...

University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from Hart ...

, and heads a taiko club at Berklee College of Music. He is the author of "20 Tips to Better Taiko" and has produced an educational CD ''Jikata''.

Awards and honors

Isaku won highest honors at the Mt. Fuji Odaiko Competition in 2000, and the Muroran Taiko Contest in 2003.

External links

Isaku Kageyama official webpage

References