Gerald Oshita

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Gerald Oshita (* 1942 in Idaho ; † 1992 ) was an American jazz and improvisation musician ( saxophone , shakuhachi ), composer and sound engineer. He is considered one of the pioneering musicians in the development of Asian American jazz .

Live and act

Oshita, who was of Japanese descent, lived in the San Francisco Bay Area . In addition to the more common soprano , alto , tenor and baritone saxophones , he also played less common woodwind instruments in extreme frequency ranges such as the double bass sarrusophone and Conn-o-sax . First he worked in the field of blues rock with Mike Bloomfield and Nick Gravenites as well as with Southern Comfort , then in the late 1960s in a trio with Rafael Garrett and Oliver Johnson .

Oshitas referred to elements of jazz as well as contemporary classical music in his later works; often partially or completely improvised. In the mid-1970s, he recorded in Tokyo with the Japanese Jam Rice Sextet and the trio of Yosuke Yamashita . Since 1979 he has played in California with Roscoe Mitchell and Thomas Buckner in the Trio Space . As a sound engineer, he worked for Richard Teitelbaum and Roscoe Mitchell at times .

In 1994, the Gerald Oshita Memorial Fellowship was established by an anonymous donor in memory of Oshita. The scholarship was awarded annually, later every two years, to a composer with Asian, African, indigenous or Latino roots.

Discographic notes

  • Jam Rice Relaxin ' (Frasco 1976, with Toshinori Kondō , Akira Sakata , Yosuke Yamashita, Hideaki Mochizuki , Shōta Koyama )
  • Roscoe Mitchell and the Sound and Space Ensembles ( Black Saint , 1983)
  • Space An Interesting Breakfast Conversation (1750 Arch Records, 1984)
  • Space New Music For Woodwinds And Voice / An Interesting Breakfast Conversation (Mutable Music, 2000; rec. 1981)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b George E. Lewis A Power Stronger Than Itself: The AACM and American Experimental Music University of Chicago Press 2008, p. 189
  2. ↑ Brett J. Esaki Enfolding Silence: The Transformation of Japanese American Religion and Art under Oppression Oxford University Press 2016, p. 140
  3. ^ Djerassi Resident Artists Program
personal data
SURNAME Oshita, Gerald
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz and composition musician, composer and sound engineer
DATE OF BIRTH 1942
PLACE OF BIRTH Idaho
DATE OF DEATH 1992