LANE DISCIPLINE

Patrick Shiroishi is a Japanese-American multi-instrumentalist & composer primarily based in Los Angeles, whose 2021 album Hidemi was one in every of our favorites of the yr. A prolific collaborator, Shiroishi may also be heard in numerous duos, trios, and bigger ensembles, together with the quartet Fuubutsushi, one other group that has been in regular rotation at ACL. In this episode, we reminisce about elementary college live performance band and Third Wave ska, focus on his introduction to numerous modes of improvisation, and discover his love of black steel. Shiroishi additionally unpacks the significance of household historical past and ancestry to his work, notably in opposition to the current rise in anti-Asian racism. And as reside performances choose up once more, he seems again on how the pandemic turned him into an unlikely proponent of on-line collaboration.

Episode 23: HOMEWORK

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Interview recorded between Los Angeles and Montreal, January 2022
Produced and combined in Montreal, March 2022

SP* at Anchor

With 9 tracks clocking in at beneath 26 minutes, Hidemi shows a powerful vary of emotion and sonic exploration. [Read our review.] Shiroishi tells me he’d been working with among the horn elements that may change into Hidemi for fairly a while, intending them maybe for a collaborative work. Maybe subconsciously, he held again, figuring out the path the composition would soak up processing his household’s experiences within the focus camps that housed Japanese-Americans throughout WW2. The result’s Shiroishi’s most private and through-composed solo work but,  usually dense multi-layered elements from no fewer than 5 horns (soprano, alto, tenor, baritone and C-melody). At instances unfastened and cacophonous, at others tuneful and cautiously gesturing to a extra hopeful future, the transient runtime belies a density of expressive energy. Named after his paternal grandfather and namesake, the quilt of the album depicts Shiroishi’s father and grandfather.

Family has lengthy been mirrored in Shiroishi’s music. His first solo file, black solar sutra (2013), was devoted to his grandmother, whereas white solar sutra (2014) was devoted to his maternal grandfather in Japan. His paternal grandparents have been confined on the camp close to Tule Lake, California, and Shiroishi has explored this historical past as a musician and exercise, elevating consciousness about this usually suppressed interval of American historical past, an engagement that felt all of the extra pressing through the Trump administration and the rise in racist assaults on Asian American and Pacific Islander communities through the pandemic.

Shiroishi discovered himself unable to play sax for a number of months through the 2020 lockdown, however collaborating with M. Sage in a brand new distant ensemble helped reinvigorate his creativity. In 2019, Sage had launched a piece by a nonet of Shiroishi’s on his now-defunct label Patient Sounds. The consequence was Fuubutsushi, a quartet consisting of Sage, Shiroishi, Chris Jusell, and Chaz Prymek, who finally recorded one seasonally-inspired file per quarter over the course of a yr, conveniently collected in an enthralling boxset as Shiki, launched on Sage’s new label, Cached Media. Shiroishi often sings in Japanese, and subtly incorporates samples from documentaries  of Japanese-Americans recounting their experiences within the camps. The music varies tremendously throughout their recordings, however the have an effect on is mostly soothing and contemplative, a looser, up to date American tackle the ECM aesthetic. In addition to crucial reward from shops as various as Pitchfork and Men’s Health Magazine, Fuubutsushi additionally garnered an enthusiastic reception from Shiroishi’s father, who was apparently much less moved by Descension, Shiroishi’s effects-driven tackle black steel saxophone.

A prolific collaborator in addition to solo artist, Shiroishi has produced a powerful vary of releases over the previous decade. His work actually got here onto my radar after he was featured on Tone Glow in early 2020.  His current albums at the moment demonstrated this excessive versatility, even simply confining ourselves to solo albums. The aforementioned Descension is a fully blistering tackle shredding for solo tenor sax, elevated by Felix Salazar‘s even handed microphone approach and mixing. Eye for and Eye feels dry against this, a deep exploration of solo sopranino sax, pushing the instrument to its outer reaches. And then Benkyou, a piece written for him by Wandelweiser composer Radu Malfatti, on the alternative pole, consisting of sustained notes separated by lengthy intervals of silence.

But once more, Shiroishi is a multi-instrumentalist, and whereas he has a many years lengthy affair along with his alto saxophone, his work is on no account confined to being a horn participant. Recent work has seen him contribute piano, guitar, glockenspiel, discipline recordings, results, and vocals, whereas cultivating an identification as a composer that transcends instrumentation. As a youngster, he was determined merely to make music, taking part in bass in a Led Zeppelin cowl band earlier than forming a math rock group with associates in faculty. He joined the Zeuhl band Corima for 2 albums, QUETZALCOATL (2012) and AMATERASU (2016), an expertise which knowledgeable the complexity of his later compositions. He would additionally be part of Los Angeles’s stalwart progressive rock group Upsilon Acrux for his or her 2015 LP, Sun Square Dialect, which options Shiroishi’s collaborator Dylan Fujioka on drums.

A prolific collaborator, Shiroishi’s follow had been more and more transferring in direction of reside improvisation. Thus the success of working remotely with Fuubutsushi initially got here as a shock. With a brand new pandemic-friendly workflow established, many distant collaborations have adopted since, together with with claire rousayCamila Nebbia, and Noel Meek. Nonetheless, Shiroishi was glad to have the ability to return to reside music in 2021. Fuubutsushi, whose 4 members had by no means all been collectively on the similar time, not to mention carried out collectively reside, have been lastly capable of do each in November 2021 on the Columbia Experimental Music Festival.

That pageant pursued a laudably broad curation technique, with some impressed pairings which converse effectively of Shiroishi’s personal vary as a performer. Fuubutsushi carried out with cellist Clarice Jensen, whereas Shiroishi carried out a solo set opening for New York’s best hip-hop duo, Armand Hammer, whose Alchemist-produced Haram was simply my most performed file of 2021. Shiroishi joined Fuubutsushi bandmate Chaz Prymek, and drummer Thom Nguyen for a reside radio broadcast. Despite all this, Shiroishi is most excited to gush about assembly black steel band Yellow Eyes and at last seeing them carry out after a decade of super-fandom.

Isamu Noguchi, Playground gear for Ala Moana Park in Honolulu, Hawaii (1939)

Shiroishi has completed his homework. At coronary heart, he’s a lover of music who deftly weaves a plethora of traditions into his work. You’d be exhausting pressed to search out one other instrumentalist who can so convincingly transfer from black steel to Wandelweiser. His method to music has been affected by his encounters with improvisation (American, European, and Japanese), growing a delicate ear and confidence as improvisor and composer. We enthusiastically await every new launch as he continues to develop sturdy ideas and new musical concepts.

Just final month, Shiroishi launched a brand new collaboration with Fujioka, in response to the brutal homicide of Christina Yuna Lee. As with their earlier collaboration, all proceeds go in direction of Asian Americans Advancing Justice. As that is revealed, Shiroishi has simply set off on tour supporting Sumac all through the southwest, so examine these dates if you’re within the space.  Thanks a lot to Patrick for the interview.

LINKS
Patrick Shiroishi
Bandcamp
Fuubutsushi
Felix Salazar

 

TRACKLIST
ARTIST – “TITLE” (ALBUM, LABEL, YEAR)

Patrick Shiroishi – “nerves of human life” (black solar sutra, Weird Cry Records, 2013)

SP INTRO

Patrick Shiroishi – “眼には眼を”[excerpt] (Eye For An Eye, Armageddon Nova, 2020)

Skankin’ Pickle – “Turning Japanese” [flip] (Sing Along With Skankin’ Pickle, Dill Records, 1994)

Deerhoof – “The Perfect Me” (Friend Opportunity, Kill Rock Stars, 2007)

Blonde Redhead – “Misery is a Butterfly” (Misery is a Butterfly, 4AD, 2004)

Patrick Shiroishi – “Tomorrow Is Almost Over” (Descension, Thin Wrist, 2020)

John Coltrane – “Ascension I” (The Major Works Of John Coltrane, GRP, 1965/1992)

Corima – “Amaterasu V” (Amaterasu, Soleil Zeuhl, 2016)

Upsilon Acrux – “Old Dusk Seas: Odyssey” (Sun Square Dialect, New Atlantis, 2015)

Patrick Shiroishi – “To Kill A Wind-Up Bird” (Hidemi, American Dreams, 2021)

Patrick Shiroishi – “by no means once more is now” (i shouldn’t have to fret when my dad and mom go exterior, 2021)

Patrick Shiroishi  Rob Magill Duo  – “Picture Paintings” (Eyes within the Dirt, Weird Cry, 2018)

Patrick Shiroishi – “What Happens When People Open Their Hearts”  (Hidemi, American Dreams, 2021)

John Coltrane & Rashied Ali – “Saturn” [1967] (Interstellar Space, Impulse!, 1974)

Thomas Ankersmit, Taku Sugimoto, Nakamura, Akiyama “Untitled” (Meeting at Off Site Vol. 1, reset, 2002)

Patrick Shiroishi / Radu Malfatti – “Benkyou” [excerpt] (Benkyou, B-Boim Records, 2020)

Patrick Shiroishi / Radu Malfatti – 勉強 [excerpt] (勉強, 2019)

M. Sage & Patrick Shiroishi – Valley Candle (Wants A Diamond Pivot Bright, 2021)

Fuubutsushi – “Good Sky Day” [excerpt] (Good Sky Day, Longform Editions, 2021)

Patrick Shiroishi & claire rousay – “Brushed Too Hard” (Now Am Found, Mended Dreams, 2021)

Armand Hammer & the Alchemist [verse: billy woods] – “Robert Moses” (Haram, Backwoodz, 2021)

Black Swan – “Descension” (Redemption, Ethereal Symphony, 2013)

Yellow Eyes –  “Cathedral” (Silence Threads The Evening’s Cloth, Sol Y Nieve, 2012)

Patrick Shiroishi & Camila Nebbia – “el espacio entre el lenguaje / 言語の間” (The Human Being as a Fragile Article, 2021)

Chris Williams – “Live” [excerpt] (Live, 2022)

Patrick Shiroishi & Noel Meek – “Throw Away Your Books, Rally within the Streets” [excerpt] (Throw Away Your Books, Rally within the Streets, 2021)

Patrick Shiroishi & Dylan Fujioka “within the body of incarceration” (No​-​No 2 / のの 二, 2022)

Patrick Shiroishi – “Beachside Lonelyhearts”  (Hidemi, American Dreams, 2021)

Patrick Shiroishi – “Be a Lion, I Will Still Be Water (Sparrow’s Tongue, Fort Evil Fruit, 2018)

Patrick Shiroishi – “the soothing thought that spring from human struggling” (White Sun Sutra, 2014)

LTJ – “All My Best Friends Are Metalheads” (All My Best Friends Are Metalheads/The Disintegrators 45″, Fueled by Ramen, 1999)

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Sound Propositions is written, recorded, combined, and produced by Joseph Sannicandro.

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