Vienna 2011-03-30 Ayankoko meets reformART - 'Kazuhisa Uchihashi, just listening'

Kazuhisa Uchihashi (内橋和久, ''Uchihashi Kazuhisa'') is a Japanese guitarist involved in

free improvisation Free improvisation or free music is improvised music without any rules beyond the logic or inclination of the musician(s) involved. The term can refer to both a technique (employed by any musician in any genre) and as a recognizable genre in its ...

music. Born in 1959 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 ...

, Uchihashi began to play the guitar at age 12, playing in various rock bands, though he later studied

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

music. In 1988 he joined the band the First Edition, and in 1990 formed the band

Altered States ''Altered States'' is a 1980 American science fiction body horror film directed by Ken Russell and based on the novel of the same name by playwright and screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky. The film was adapted from Chayefsky's 1978 novel and is his fi ...

. He was also a member of

Otomo Yoshihide is a Japanese composer and multi-instrumentalist. He mainly plays guitar, turntables, and electronics. He first came to international prominence in the 1990s as the leader of the experimental rock group Ground Zero, and has since worked i ...

Ground Zero In relation to nuclear explosions and other large bombs, ground zero (also called surface zero) is the point on the Earth's surface closest to a detonation. In the case of an explosion above the ground, ''ground zero'' is the point on the groun ...

from 1994 to 1997. Uchihashi also plays

daxophone The daxophone, invented by Hans Reichel, is an electric wooden experimental musical instrument of the friction idiophones category. Etymology The ''dax'' in ''daxophone'' is derived from the German word ''Dachs'', meaning "badger" and refer ...

, and in addition to his role as a free improviser, Uchihashi has been the musical director for Osaka

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...

group

Ishinha Ishinha (維新派) is an Osaka-based Japanese theatre company. Its name means ''revolutionaries'' or ''reformers'', from ''ishin'' (revolution, 維新) and ''ha'' (school or group, 派). History The company was founded in 1970 by Yukichi Matsum ...

, has held improvisation workshops (a project known as New Music Action) in various cities in Japan, as well as

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population ...

, and currently in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

also. Uchihashi has set up his own record label,

Innocent Records Innocent Records was a pop record label created to cater to for EMI's Virgin Records more pop oriented acts. Following the success of the Spice Girls, Virgin Records decided to delve into the pop market. In doing so they poached Hugh Goldsmi ...

a.k.a. Zenbei Records, had held a music festival annually since 1996

Festival BEYOND INNOCENCE A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival con ...

References

External links

Kazuhisa Uchihashi's web site
at

Improvised Music from Japan Improvised Music from Japan is a website and record label. The website was originally known as ''Japanese Free Improvisers''. As its name suggests, it concentrates on Japanese and Japan-based improvisers, particularly free improvisers. In Dece ...

Japanese guitarists Free improvisation Living people Year of birth missing (living people) {{guitarist-stub