Maro Kawabata is a bluegrass musician, born and raised in Japan, but who lives now in the United States.
It was as a child in Japan that he first heard the music of Bill Monroe, the music that marked him forever as a follower of the bluegrass way. After attending college in the US, Maro returned home where he met and married an American woman. The music called again, bringing him to Canada to perform, with Maro and his wife, Sandra, ultimately settling in Ohio.
An album featuring Kawabata, Sunset Drive, was released in 2010 and he has made occasional musical privileges back to the land of his birth to share his own brand of bluegrass with devotees in Japan.
He is there now, in fact, finishing up a 2 week tour with some notable musical friends here in the States, Don Rigsby, Terry Baucom, Rickie Simpkins among them. Cindy Baucom, who is playing bass on the tour, sent along a number of photos that capture the fun they would seem to be having.
