Akira Otsuka

Mandolinist and photographer Akira Otsuka and Gary Kopp have spent a great deal of time putting together this tribute to the great John Duffey, co-founder of both The Country Gentlemen and The Seldom Scene. It includes audio from a get-together

Josh Otsuka, founding guitarist with breakout Japanese bluegrass band, Bluegrass 45, died at his home in Kobe, Japan on January 26. He was 80 years of age. Born Tsuyoshi Otsuka on July 26, 1944, he grew up in a post-war Japan

Akira Otsuka with DCBU President Carolyn Eyerly and his 2023 Washington Monument Award Celebrated capitol area mandolinist, photographer, and producer Akira Otsuka was presented with the 2023 Washington Monument Award by the DC Bluegrass Union on October 29. Born in Japan, Akira

Charlie Waller recording with The Country Gentlemen at Track Recorders - photo © Akira Otsuka Here is another gallery of photos Akira Otsuka took at Track Recorders in Silver Spring, MD during the late 1970s. These are of the Country Gentlemen tracking

Southbound at The Birchmere circa 1979 - photo © Akira Otsuka Akira Otsuka, noted bluegrass mandolinist and photographer, has shared another of his archival photo galleries with us. This time we have his images taken in 1978 of Southbound recording at

Deb Shuffler Corley, Jennie Shuffler Brittain and George Shuffler at Track Recorders - photo © Akira Otsuka Akira Otsuka has shared another of his galleries of archived photographs from the 1970s, this time of George Shuffler and his family recording at

Here is another gallery of archival photos taken by Akira Otsuka, this time during the recording sessions for Jimmy Arnold's Guitar album for Rebel Records. Arnold was a bluegrass musician of unusual virtuosity, who blazed like a supernova over a short-lived

Many bluegrass lovers know Akira Otsuka as a brilliant mandolinist, something he has pursued from the time he was a young man in Japan, through his later life here in the United States. Fewer know that he is also a

Ralph Stanley, Jack Cooke, and Roy Lee Centers in Japan (1971) - photo © Tsutomu Otsuka Fred Robbins has added another valuable collection of historic photographs to his online archive. This latest is a series of images from the 1971 visit to

Boone Creek at Watermelon Park in Berryville, VA 1977 - photo © Akira Otsuka Fred Robbins, one of the premier archivists in bluegrass music, has added a collection of photos taken by Akira Otsuka to his vast online repository of images