“As I sit here
Waiting and wanting
Surrounded by the ambient blur of the city lights
Waiting at a stop sign
Wanting to go beyond.”


It is exactly this longing to go beyond, beyond the solitary musical journey, that brought these two very gifted artists from Kyoto to cross each other’s’ paths. Marihiko Hara and Masumi Muranaka (Polar M), the 2 seasoned musicians from Kyoto, after 10 years of admiring each other works, decided to take on a voyage together, and sailed beyond the charted territories of their music. And thus, the beautiful result from this wonderful voyage - a special collaboration album entitled “Beyond”, was born.

In this album, both artists went beyond their own borders, over their perceived views, across existing ideas and ways of thinking, to allow their emotions to flow freely in the music making process. As a result, Marihiko, with his gorgeous piano touches, and Masumi, with his heart-felt guitars, jointly crafted the 10 delicate, and breath-takingly beautiful music pieces.

Traces of elegant post-classical, sweet-sounding folktronica, dreamy ambient, and even blue-ish jazz, can be found in this sound-rich album, with all elements masterfully blended together to create an exquisite music listening experience. Piano melodies that drifted in like fireflies at night, layers of guitars that painted the backdrop soundscapes, drips of tiny electronics, spaces between the notes…. The exquisiteness in music that created by Marihiko and Masumi’s wonderful talents are simply beyond words.

Mia Cabalfin, the renowned contemporary dancer from Philippines, who befriended the artists when they composed the music for her residency performance in Kyoto in 2012, lent her beautiful voice in spoken words for 3 amazing tracks. The album is mastered by Tokyo’s renowned musician and sound engineer, Chihei Hatakeyama, and features photos by prominent Japanese photographer Marisa Shimamoto, and designs by Itsuka Sato of sonihouse.

http://www.mu-nest.com/release-info.php?f=mnc014





Leaves / Marihiko Hara & Polar M

"The End Isn't the End" in which the tapestry woven by the arpeggio of the guitar spreads in the space like a constellation, this song was commissioned by The New York Times and was made for the documentary film below. 

nyti.ms/2pAesVo
https://vimeo.com/298466006

Motohiro Nakashima hails from Fukuyama, a city near Hiroshima. Noted for his fingerstyle guitar, and an experimental, ambient approach to making music, Nakashima debuted from Lo Recordings (Thurston Moore, Susumu Yokota, Luke Vibert) and has three albums from several labels.
Gathering The Light is his most personal work to date. Combining fingerstyle guitar and ambient instrumentation for emotive minimalist soundscapes, the album illustrates the universal search for light in the darkness, beauty in melancholy.

Motohiro Nakashima - The End Isn't the End

[ totokoko 038 ] shayou - gleam of midnight

download this album for free here!
totokokolabel.com/releases_038

track list

01 snow at the beginning of spring 
02 Thoreau dances  
03 gleam of midnight 
04 old memory 
05 light of a stove 


[ totokoko 038 ] shayou - Thoreau Dances

Limbo (Shuzhen's In Limbo Remix)

Marihiko Hara + Nao Tsuda 
“Stella ‒ Music for Writing Letters”

--
Buy:  PAPIER LABO. (https://papierlabo-store.com/items/641bf5619025330029164897)
Buy: night cruising (https://nckyoto.thebase.in/items/72213198)

LETTER SET: https://papierlabo-store.com/items/641c0931a18e8d002a0964e9

----
“Stella ‒ Music for Writing Letters” is music created for people who write letters. Its origin was the installation work “7 + 1 / Look up at the Stars; Dawn of a New Day” (At Noseden Art Line Festival 2021) by Marihiko Hara, musician and Nao Tsuda, photographer. <Stella>, a Japanese-style room with a good mountain view for writing letters, was located at a venue of the art festival. There the music was presented with writing paper, envelopes and post cards made exclusively for that occasion. The <Stella> project began during the covid- 19 pandemic as a place of comfort for people who couldnʼt meet loved ones. Later the music was recreated and we have come to release it.

Stella ‒ Music for Writing Letters | B - 1 "Mille Regretz” by Josquin des Prez (Excerpt)

Flags And The Gate

Taken from the album 'niji', to be released worldwide on December 24, 2015 on Kitchen. Label

Order on 3CD here: 
http://www.kitchen-label.com/ki017-ironomi-niji/

Tracklist: 
1-1 風草 (Feat. 沢田穣治)
1-2 茜空 (Feat.今西玲子)
1-3 水藻 (Feat. hofli)
1-4 紫陽花 (Feat. ASPIDISTRAFLY) 
2-1 光旅 (Feat. haruka nakamura) 
2-2 舟月 (Feat. ARAKI Shin)
2-3 睡蓮 (Feat. Rie Nemoto) 
2-4 楓 (Feat. Coupie)
3-1 朝靄 (Feat. 中島ノブユキ) 
3-2 碧空 (Feat. 内田輝)
3-3 箒星 (Feat. 沢田穣治)
3-4 日向 (Feat. haruka nakamura)

Following 2010’s release of the Kitchen. Label classic “sketch”, ironomi returns with their long awaited seventh album, a 3CD 164 minutes collection entitled ‘niji’ (English Translation: Rainbow). Joining pianist Junya Yanagidaira and programmer Yu Isobe are a stellar line-up of their most loved collaborators and contemporaries. In ‘niji’, the record is marked by the same tranquility and fleetingness of their sound but also offers a slight departure from the traditions of ironomi’s previous recordings with the addition of other instruments (Saxophone, Contrabass, Koto, Violins etc) contributed by the guest musicians on each of the 12 tracks - Featuring Nobuyuki Nakajima, Jyoji Sawada (Choro Club) as well as members of the Kitchen. Label family ASPIDISTRAFLY, haruka nakamura, ARAKI Shin, Akira Uchida, Rie Nemoto among many others.

ironomi has a sound which is almost enigmatic to describe. One could listen to their albums on an ambient level and just let the music flow through. Or one could listen closer and find a detail in the sound that is intricate and palatable. ironomi’s impressionistic ripples of piano fragments generate the cumulative feel of a gently flowing river or the shifting play of light through the leaves of trees. ironomi is like nature, a sound of nature that has existed from the beginning and free from any judgement.

The duo’s music is distinctively less about conventional compositional structure than it is about the creating and sustain of mood. For each of the recordings in ‘niji’, improvised sessions were recorded and the best takes were kept intact with very minimal post production. The works showcase ironomi’s capacity to construct compelling music in real-time, their melodic-harmonic imagination as an improviser and ability to consistently find and shape new forms with each of their collaborators also sharing the same strong sense for the dialectics of sound and silence. A wishful charm imbues this entire recording of pieces which, though not written together, seem to have been predestined for each other in this album.

The latest album is highlighted by almost 40 minutes worth of music recorded together with haruka nakamura on classical guitar, whom he had spent his early formative years touring and collaborating with the duo on numerous occasions. In the collaboration with April Lee and Ricks Ang of ASPIDISTRAFLY, voices are striving to be heard and a song was unexpectedly born from the improvisational session. The result is perhaps the most strongly lyrical piece of ironomi’s releases to date.

“niji” is available on 3CD and digital formats on 24th December 2015. The physical CD copy comes in a customised letter-pressed folio. The cover is designed with a unique holographic foil which cause a refraction that creates constantly changing light reflections and prismatic colors. All linking back to the symbolic representation of the miraculous hues of ironomi’s sound world, trapping the listeners in a peaceful space of pure sound and sonic allusions.

Released & distributed by Kitchen. Label
Ⓟ & © 2015 Kitchen. Label

MORE INFO:
www.kitchen-label.com

KI-017 ironomi - niji (Album Excerpts)

start again

music : Junya Nishimura（jun)
add no11room
song melody & words & photo：no11room

波の音を描く描く
岸辺にはきみのかげ
夜の海は闇より深く
深く

遠くの街の光を眺めていた 
いつまでも 寄せてはかえす　
重なる呼吸の音

この思いを深く沈めることもできず
ありのままを受け入れる
優しさは きみが教えてくれた

遠く音は途絶え
夜は姿変え
きみのいない海

それでも光は生まれ

far add no11room

Namaste

tobira - fuji (at Leaf)

mü-nest, where our daily music nests.
[ mü-nest（ミューネスト）が丁寧に作り上げたストレス解消プレイリスト。「聴く」をクリックして自宅で快適な音楽空間を作ろう。Check out our popular Spotify playlist 𝗠𝗨𝗦𝗜𝗖 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗛𝗢𝗠𝗘: https://urlgeni.us/spotify/musicforhome ]

Leaves / Marihiko Hara & Polar M

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