Bluegrass 45 Archives - Bluegrass Today

Remembering Josh Otsuka of Bluegrass 45

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 heavily influenced by the US occupation. Like many young people there, he was drawn by the American bluegrass and folk music broadcast on Armed Forces Radio. He came to love Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, the Stanley Brothers, and the Country Gentlemen, egged on by his older brother, Yukata, whose musical tastes had a strong impact on Josh and middle brother Akira.

The possibilities of bluegrass in Japan were made clear to Josh and Akira when Yukata’s band, The Bluegrass Ramblers, won the National Championship on the popular radio program, Battle of the College Bands, in 1965.

Starting at Kobe University in 1964, Josh studied English. During his sophomore year he formed The Bluegrass Travelers. playing banjo. At school he formed a Pop Music Club and served as its first president. Naturally bluegrass was represented. In later years there were enough bluegrass groups at the school that a separate Bluegrass Club was formed. Such clubs are quote popular with young people, and a good many bluegrass groups get started this way in Japan to this day.

A major turning point was the establishment of the Lost City Coffee House in Kobe in 1966, opened to emulate the ones in New York City during the folk music boom. Josh and Akira both spent a lot of time there, where bluegrass, old time, and contemporary folk music were played. Open jamming was encouraged, and they both learned valuable skills there, as well as meeting other young Japanese players like Toshio and Saburo Watanabe, Hsueh-Cheng ‘Ryo’ Liao, and Chien-Hua Lee. They also jammed with Shoji Tabuchi and Kenji Nozak, who was the owner of Lost City.

Akira, who has lived in the US most of his life, explained how Josh switched to guitar.

“When Shoji and Kenji decided to tour the summer of 1967, they asked us young boys to keep the music going at the Lost City, and eventually Bluegrass 45 was formed. Josh was a banjo player with Bluegrass Travelers, and that was his love, but Sab wanted to play banjo, so Josh switched to guitar and became a lead vocalist. Initially it was not a formal band, but just a fun band that played only at the Lost City.

In 1970 some of us were graduating from college soon so we recorded a self-produced and self-financed LP, Run Mountain – we thought we had to quit playing and work for living. The most important tune on the album is Take Five by Dave Brubeck and Paul Desmond. I don’t think many bluegrass people were listening to jazz back then, with the exception of Roger Sprung.

Ironically Dick Freeland of Rebel Records saw us when he came to the Osaka World Fair that year and invited us to do an US tour in 1971!!”

The guys feared that this tour would never happen, as they could only communicate with Freeland by postal mail, which was quite slow, until he returned to Japan as manager of a tour with Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys. Their show in Kobe reunited the band with Freeland, and plans were made for a US tour in June of 1971. Two days after leaving Japan they were on stage at Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Festival in Bean Blossom, IN.

Anyone who has watched the classic film Bluegrass Country Soul, shot later that summer at the Camp Springs bluegrass festival, will recall the thunderous ovations that greeted the band when they hit the stage and after each song. They had developed some very funny routines back at Lost City that translated quite well to the larger audience, especially with their questionable English.

While in the States, Bluegrass 45 recorded a pair of albums for Rebel, the second produced by John Duffey, both long out of print.

After the 1971 tour, most of the young members of the band returned to their regular jobs, though Josh and Akira put a new version of the band together to tour the US again in 1972. There they recorded a third album for Rebel.

Hiroshi Kitano shared what happened next for Josh.

“It was impossible to make a living just touring the States during the summer months, and Bluegrass 45 disbanded after the 1972 tour. Josh got a day job at a trading company, however, his love for bluegrass never went away. His fans were still hanging around the Lost City, and the owner, Kenji, encouraged and urged Josh to start anew.

So Josh recruited super pickers in the area: Ichiyo Kishimoto, a fiddler from Kyoto; Hiroshi Kitano, a banjo geek in Kobe; Hidemichi Hirai, a mandolinist who had performed with Josh in the past; and Masahiko Ito, electric and upright bass player. Masahiko was a member of the Lost City Cats who toured the US in 1973, following in Bluegrass 45’s footsteps, but he was also playing with rock groups.

They started rehearsing at Josh’s, he named the band Leaves of Grass, and they started playing out. Probably they were the first bluegrass band in Japan that featured an electric bass, and their repertoire included songs by The Allman Brothers, The Outlaws, The Eagles, and other currently popular groups. So when they appeared at the Takarazuka Bluegrass Festival, older bluegrass fans complained saying, ‘That is a rock band!’, but the young audience loved them.

For years many young bluegrassers passed through the Leaves of Grass and learned under Josh’s direction, just like Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys. It started as leaves of grass but those seeds spread out, and now bluegrass is covering all of Japan.”

Josh took a break for a while from keeping a group together, but in 1986 he reformed Leaves of Grass with himself on guitar, Shin Akimoto on mandolin, Sayuri Tsuchida Akimoto on fiddle, Hiroshi Kitano on banjo, and Bluegrass 45 bandmate Toshio Watanabe on bass.

They played bars, restaurants, and other venues around Kobe and Osaka, as well as festivals, especially Toshio and Sab Watanabe’s annual Takarazuka Festival. They performed all the old Bluegrass 45 material, as well as whatever requests might be thrown their way.

Shin picks it up here…

“After the huge Kobe Earthquake hit in 1995, Josh and I started hosting a bluegrass program from radio station FMYY, which was located in the most damaged area of Nagata, Kobe. While hosting there, they started a Ragpapas’ Jugband with Tetsuyoshi Katsuki (a main character of the band who was hosting other music programs at the same station), Kanda Shusaku, and Shigeharu Sawamura. They had the honor to perform with Jim Kweskin and many famous Japanese folk legends. They made regular appearances at Yokohama Jug Band Festival, as well as TV appearances, and they were becoming well known.

Josh also performed as a solo singer/songwriter, and supported other musician outside of bluegrass.”

Bluegrass 45 reunited with all the original members in 1996, and again in 2006, and toured the US both times. They celebrated their 50th anniversary as a band in 2017 with a performance on the IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards show, and a full set at the Red Hat Amphitheater the next day in Raleigh, NC.

When Josh turned 80 on July 26, 2024, Akira created this birthday video featuring a wealth of personal photos from their childhood, and their years playing bluegrass together.

We express our deep gratitude to Akira Otsuka, Shin Akimoto, and Hiroshi Kitano, whose contributions have greatly enriched this remembrance.

R.I.P., Josh Otsuka.

Saburo ‘Sab’ Watanabe passes

Sab Watanabe Inoue, founding banjo player with Bluegrass 45, died yesterday at home in Japan. He was 69 years of age and had been battling cancer this past three years.

One of the most visible and influential bluegrass personalities in Japan, Sab, not only played banjo with Bluegrass 45 for 53 years, he was also the publisher of Moonshiner magazine, the only Japanese language bluegrass monthly available. For 37 years Moonshiner has provided news from the bluegrass world to readers in Japan, with reviews of new albums, artist profiles, and information about opportunities to hear live music.

Sab also has the distinction of being the producer for Tony Rice’s first recording project in 1973.

Together with his brother, Toshio, he had managed the Takarazuka Bluegrass Festival in Sanda City since launching it together in 1972. The brothers also operated B.O.M. Service in nearby Hyogo, since ’72. The company, whose initials stand for Bluegrass and Old-time Music, sells US and European bluegrass CDs in Japan via their newsletter and online.

US grassers will recall seeing him accept a Distinguished Achievement Award from the International Bluegrass Music Association this past September for Moonshiner.

R.I.P., Saburo Watanabe Inoue.

Bluegrass Beyond Borders: Bluegrass 45

Bluegrass 45 Reunion at the 2017 IBMA Wide Open Bluegrass festival – photo by Frank Baker

It’s a well established fact that the Japanese have long been avowed fans of American music. Akira Otsuka can attest to that firsthand. Born in Japan and currently living in Maryland, he fronts a band called Bluegrass 45, a revered internationally-known outfit that’s successfully maintained its ongoing trajectory for over 55 years.

“Japanese people appreciate all kinds of culture,” Otsuka insists. “It can be history, geography, lifestyle, food, movies, paintings, sculpture, pottery, and music. You find classical, jazz, reggae, rock, Hawaiian, country, latin, and bluegrass on the radio, on CD, through online streaming, at music stores, and at concerts.”

He cites as one particular example an annual Japanese bluegrass festival that’s been in existence since 1972. Every summer, the event draws approximately 120 bands from throughout Japan and sometimes even as far away as the United States.

Otsuka’s own interest in the idiom was spawned from his older siblings. His family had a very wide cultural perspective, given that his father was stationed in Shanghai prior to World War II. While there, he worked with people of English, French, and Chinese origin, driving a Ford by day and often going to dances at night.

“When we were growing up, my older sister Hideko was listening to Elvis, and my oldest brother Hiroshi used to listen to a lot of jazz, especially Dave Brubeck,” he recalls. “When my next brother, Yutaka, entered college, he bought a guitar, joined a country band, and started singing songs by people like Hank Williams and Hank Snow. When he became a sophomore, the country band disbanded, so he decided to form a bluegrass band since he was listening to bluegrass bands from the area.”

His other brother Tsuyoshi had been playing violin since elementary school, but when he began listening to bluegrass like his brother, he switched to banjo. Akira was handed a mandolin, and soon after the Otsuka boys formed a trio featuring guitar, banjo and mandolin.

“Our first influences included Bill Monroe, Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs, Stanley Brothers, and Reno & Smiley,” Otsuka says. “A few years later we started listening to more urban sounding bands like Country Gentlemen, Dillards, and Greenbrier Boys.”

Nevertheless, their influences were culled carefully. There was no internet, DVD, YouTube, or even an instructional books for ready references. “LPs were expensive, especially imported LPs,” Osaka recalls, “We didn’t want to scratch the LPs, so we used to tape them to open reel tapes and slow down to half speed so we could copy the notes.”

Regardless, the timing was right. It was the mid ‘60s, the height of the folk boom both at home and abroad.

“There were concerts almost every other week somewhere nearby and they featured modern folk groups, in the style of the Brothers Four, Kingston Trio, and Peter, Paul and Mary style, and country bands singing Hank Williams, Buck Owens, and Kitty Wells songs, as well bluegrass bands,” Otsuka remembers. “These concerts were held in large halls and they were well attended. Most of the bands were made up of college students, and the bands helped with the ticket sales. The audiences were generally well-educated, since many of them were friends of the bands.”

Eventually the brothers expanded their ranks and adopted a new name, Bluegrass 45, taken from the song Train 45, the Colt 45 pistol, and 1945, the year Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs joined Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys and defined a genre. The group toured the States for three months in 1971 and four months the following year. “We had a base camp in Washington, DC and even played at the Grand Ole Opry,” Otsuka recalls. “We performed festivals and venues in Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Kentucky, Indiana, Rhode Island, Toronto, Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia. We were an opening act for Conway Twitty and Lorretta Lynn for a ten day tour. In September 1971 at the Richmond Coliseum in Virginia, Roy Acuff, Conway Twitty, Bluegrass 45, and Merle Haggard played, in that order, then that night we opened up for Jerry Lee Lewis in Alexandria, VA.”

Bluegrass 45‘s recorded legacy began with a self-produced album, Run Mountain, in 1969. It was shortly after that that Dick Freeland, then owner of Rebel Records, heard the record, saw the group perform in Osaka, and subsequently invited them to come to the States for that first U.S. tour. He offered the band a record contract, and they went on to release three albums for his label. An earthquake that hit their home disrupted their progress in 1995, but they managed to do another tour in 1996 and subsequently released a live CD to cap their recorded output.

These days, Otsuka lives in the States and busies himself with his own projects, while the rest of the band remains in Japan. However they still get together for occasional reunions, including a 50^th anniversary tour that took place in 2017. In addition, over the past four years, a film crew from Nashville has been following the group and there’s hope the footage will eventually emerge as a full length documentary about the band.

Consequently, when asked why he believes bluegrass boasts such universal appeal, Otsuka can offer his own personal perspective.

“It’s funny you asked that question,” he says. “Bluegrass is an American art form and I’m Japanese. But, it’s much bigger than that. Bluegrass is loved by coal miners in Kentucky and West Virginia, a left-wing hippie in San Francisco, 10 year-old farm helpers in the Ozarks, right-wing NRA lawyers in Washington DC, moonshiners in North Carolina, Irish Fishermen, banjo makers in Czechia, businessmen in Tokyo, woodmen in Alaska, Korean high school students, and French chefs. It’s a very wide range of people representing different age groups, political viewpoints, and demographical distances.”

Bluegrass 45 provides the proof.

Bluegrass 45 – 50 Years On

“More than a band, these six friends from Kobe, Japan, have shared 50 years of friendship, musicianship, and a passion for music that has promoted and championed bluegrass as a culture, genre, and lifestyle all over the world.” So says Robert H. Dyar Jr, the Producer and Co-Director of the forthcoming documentary film featuring Bluegrass 45.

The extroverted guitar player Tsuyoshi “Josh” and his older brother Akira Otsuka (mandolin); two other brothers Toshio (bass) and Saburo Watanabe (Inoue) (banjo) and; Chien-Hua Lee; and Hsueh-Chieng “Ryo” Liao – who, like Chien-Hua Lee, is from China – as Bluegrass 45 have grown into an international phenomenon. That the six have maintained relatively good health and that only one member – Akira Otsuka, who resides in the USA – has become detached is remarkable.

2017 was the 50^th anniversary of the formation of Bluegrass 45.

Akira Otsuka shares a bit of information about the environment that nurtured the talented musicians of the day …

“Kobe, Japan, is located about 250 miles west of Tokyo and is one of the biggest port towns in Japan. A tiny coffee house called Lost City in Motomachi section of downtown Kobe, was modelled in mid-1960s after New York City coffee houses by a Taiwanese gentleman Guo Guang-sheng. A second owner, Kenji Nozaki, was an excellent singer and banjo player who, in addition to running the coffee house, used to entertain the patrons. A fiddle player who often accompanied Kenji was Shoji Tabuchi, now a big star performing in Branson, Missouri. It was a bluegrass paradise, if you like, – they had a large collection of LPs and tapes that you could request and there were a banjo and a guitar hanging on the wall. You could spend few dollars on coffee, soda or beer and hang out for hours talking to new found friends about Bill Monroe, picking a few tunes or listening to live bands.”

Prior to that these baby boomers had little cultural activity to enjoy as World War II in Japan only ended a little over a year before Toshio Watanabe was born.

Over time there was an influx of American GIs who enjoyed the music played on the American Forces Network radio. Together they brought traditional American music to the islands, as well as pop and jazz music, introducing the music of the likes of Bill Monroe, the Stanley Brothers and Flatt & Scruggs as well as several other notable American entertainers, Loretta Lynn, Merle Haggard, Roy Orbison and Dave Brubeck included.

Akira Otsuka picks up the story …

“There were 10 or so high school and college kids hanging at the Lost City club who were serious about music that the Americans introduced to the Japanese. By 1966 Tsuyoshi (Josh) and Toshio Watanabe and I were there regularly, and used to back up Kenji and Shoji or sometimes played on their own. Then Toshio’s younger brother Saburo Inoue started joining only during weekends because he was still in high school, and his home was a 45 minutes train journey away from Kobe.”

Schools provided other avenues for musical development, as Akira relates ..

“Many colleges and universities in Japan had a pop music club. They might have a rock band, jazz (could be a full orchestra or modern jazz quartet), Hawaiian, latin, country, modern folk and/or bluegrass music. When a senior member graduates, a freshman or sophomore will step up and join, so a band can last a long time. My older brother, Yutaka, joined a country band when he entered Momoyama Gakuin University (in Osaka) in 1962. They disbanded in a year but by the time he was sophomore, he had found and liked bluegrass music and formed the Bluegrass Ramblers. The first one he recruited was a freshman Mitsuo Shibata, who played mandolin. Then he found another freshman who was an excellent violin player. Since Josh could play fiddle, Yutaka asked Josh to teach this new violin player, Shoji Tabuchi.

After Yutaka left the band, the Bluegrass Ramblers entered a prestigious contest; the Battle of College Bands, where many bands of different kinds of music competed and broadcast over the radio. They won the national championship. Liao and Lee joined the Bluegrass Ramblers in 1966.”

Akira remembers the later events that led up to the formation of Bluegrass 45. According to his diary ,on April 1, 1967, Shoji brought Liao to Lost City and introduced him to Otsuka and Watanabe brothers and on May 21, 1967 Lee first played at Lost City. …

“Early in the summer of 1967, Kenji and Shoji decided to visit US for several months, and they asked us boys to keep the music going at the Lost City. So many nights we played – sometimes Bluegrass Ramblers had a gig so only Otsuka and the Watanabe brothers would play, sometimes without me – but it didn’t matter because we didn’t need to have tight arrangement. We were just having fun.

When a US Navy ship or a cruise ship arrived, we used to take flyers to the piers and handed them out as people get off the ship. The flyers read “Live Country music – come on in and have a ball at Lost City”.

Liao and Lee were officially with Bluegrass Ramblers so it was their priority.

Josh was playing banjo in his Bluegrass Travelers at Kobe University – he was the band leader.

Akira started at Kansei Gakuin University and joined Hickory Hollows there in 1968.

Toshio and Sab didn’t belong to the pop music club in school, but they often freelanced and visited Lost City frequently.

Initially we were not called Bluegrass 45. Because four members belonged to their college bands, we were kind of an unofficial band. However, if Liao and Lee learned a new song with the Bluegrass Ramblers, Bluegrass 45 could do it right away so we had a much wider repertoire than most of college bands.

Another thing I want to point out is that we were trained in a unique environment. College bands would rehearse say 10 songs over and over so that they could play at concerts or parties, and they were really good at these 10 songs. On the other hand, Bluegrass 45 were entertaining drunken sailors from southeast Asia, US servicemen, cruise ship tourists from Europe, and Japanese walk-ins at Lost City. We would do requests even when we didn’t know all the words or we were not too familiar with the songs – that was a good training ground that other college bands didn’t get. Also, we were not as scared as other bands about playing in front of foreigners.”

Bluegrass 45’s first recording, Run Mountain (released in Japan in 1970) came to the attention of David Freeman of County Sales.

During that same year the band appeared at Expo ’70, the World’s Fair event that took place in Osaka, over the summer. Also in Japan at that time was Rebel Records boss Dick Freeland whose records were sold under licence in Japan by King Records of Japan. The people at Japanese King called Kenji Nozaki, who had been back from the US by then, and asked him to take care of Freeland and his family so Josh Otsuka took them to the exposition.

Subsequently, Freeland went to the Lost City coffee house to see Bluegrass 45 play there, and to meet them. This meeting led to Freeland arranging a tour of the USA for the band; this took place beginning mid-June of the following year, 1971. Bluegrass 45 performed at festivals at Bean Blossom, Berryville, Gettysburg, and Camp Springs; on the Grand Ole Opry, at the Red Fox Inn, and in Toronto, Canada; and then at a few concerts in Virginia and one in Philadelphia.

At Camp Springs, filming there captured Bluegrass 45 while playing Mocking Banjo, in part playing all their instruments behind their heads, in the film Bluegrass Country Soul.

The working relationship with Freeland led to the band recording for Rebel Records producing two albums initially.

They returned to America in 1972 and recorded two further albums for Freeland; only one of these was actually released. They played at several festivals during a tour that lasted 16 weeks approximately.

From 1973 to 1995 the band members were heavily involved in domestic responsibilities. However, a tragedy in the form of the Great Hanshin earthquake struck the centre of Kobe in January of ’95, killing 6,000 people and destroying many homes, including those of several members of Bluegrass 45. The event prompted a reunion of the band.

In 1996 they toured Japan and the USA with prestigious dates at the Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia, at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, and the IBMA’s World of Bluegrass in Owensboro, Kentucky.

Also in 1996 Bluegrass 45 released a CD Once Again from Kobe, Japan, recordings from a concert performance, and a movie That’s the Time, produced by Kosei Yoshida.

In 2006 they were invited back to play at Bean Blossom, remembering their first United States festival appearance in 1971, and they performed at ROMP (River of Music Party) in Owensboro. In 2012, to celebrate its 45th anniversary, they appeared at Wintergrass in Seattle, and in November they performed nine shows in Japan, visiting eight different cities in 12 days.

This past September and October (2017), Bluegrass 45 celebrated their 50^th anniversary as a band with several dates in the USA, including a performance at the Red Hat Amphitheater in Raleigh, North Carolina as part of the IBMA Wide Open Bluegrass events, and at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum in Bristol, Virginia.

Bluegrass Today asked each member to share some thoughts about the longevity of Bluegrass 45 and look back those 50 years.

Akira has an individual slant on what it has meant to play in a band in 1967 and then play in the same band 50 years later ….

“50 years – that is a long time. Cars don’t last that long. Some animals don’t live that long. A house will crumble down. Marriages and relationships will break up. Technological and medical advancement have been amazing. Friends move away and lose touch…

Bluegrass 45 started in 1967 and we celebrated our 50th anniversary this year with a US tour. We were never a full time or professional band. I moved over to the States in 1973 so we play only occasionally when I visited Japan. The total number of gigs we played in 50 years can be less than a professional bluegrass band plays in one year.

Then what’s the big deal about 50 years? Well, all six original members are not only alive but travelled 7,000 miles to Raleigh, North Carolina, last September and played on the stage of Red Hat Theater – to me, that is amazing.

A Japanese band with average age of over 70, plays Salty Dog Blues with Jerry Douglas’ Earls of Leicester at the IBMA Award Show and gets a standing ovation – that’s amazing.

We visited Carlton Haney’s Bluegrass Park in Camp Springs, North Carolina. We went through trees, bushes and poison ivy to find the rundown stage and played few tunes. The very stage we played Fuji Mountain Breakdown and Mocking Banjo in a movie Bluegrass – Country Soul 46 years ago!

We are very fortunate that everybody got home safely after the tour, and it’s hard to believe but we are still talking to each other – that’s just amazing.” 🙂

Toshio speaks of the ties that bind …….

“It was a quick five decades to me.

To fill the space when Kenji Nozaki (banjo) and Shoji Tabuchi (fiddle) left small coffee house in Kobe, Japan, to US to play music in late 1960s.

Through the years we were not full-time band but six of us enjoyed playing music on and off.

All members have different taste and ideas to bluegrass music but when we get together, it has generated Bluegrass 45 sounds.

We kept good friendship with all the band members and good supporting friends as well as music pioneers in Japan and even overseas.”

Sab also think that half a century isn’t long but is very philosophical about life and what made the Bluegrass 45 sound …

“50 years ain’t that long for fun-making band.

After 25 years since our US tour in 1971, we reunited in 1996 right after the Great Hanshin Earthquake which killed over 6,000 people in this modern city, Kobe. I saw the truth of ‘Everything Changes, Nothing Ever Stays the Same,’ what Buddha said. It was a tragedy. I never thought I’m going to experience in my mid-40s. It was a shock. I knew family, friends and music is my life but I found more clearly that I wanted to play. I think everybody of the 45 thought same.

I’m one of the very few guys who makes living with bluegrass in Japan. It’s impossible to make a living with playing bluegrass in Japan but publishing a magazine and selling CDs. I saw my friends in US are getting big in the 1980s and 1990s. …like Sam Bush who always introduce us to friends ‘these guys played Take 5 in 1971!’ or Jerry Douglas, who saw us at Berryville when he was 14 or so… I learned a lot through US musicians to be free.

I loved to play bluegrass in its traditional way. Josh and Akira love to play more modern way. I love Flatt & Scruggs, they love Country Gents. My buddies, Mr. Liao and Mr. Lee are still my best friends since we met in 1967. What the heck! I have friends who know me when I was in the teenager. We played at very tiny club called Lost City in Kobe for sailors and the soldiers who came to Kobe for vacation from Vietnam in the late 1960s. We never rehearsed for the show. We played whatever those drunken people enjoyed… and sometimes young soldiers cried when we play old Appalachian songs and tunes.

When we got together after the tragedy earthquake, I know I love to play bluegrass again. Not like Sam or Jerry but to have fun to myself. We made an album and we did US tour in 1996. That was so much fun. In 2017, we celebrated our 50th year with same six members when we started in 1967. We are not serious working band, but we are serious for having fun for the audience and for ourselves.

We’re getting old and seeing ‘Everything Changes, Nothing Ever Stays The Same.’ But the music we love is the same….. bluegrass! We did it right, I believe.”

It is Lee who comments on the considerable good fortune that the members have had in staying in good health for so long. Given the Kobe earthquake that is indeed remarkable ….

“The first thing comes to mind when I look back on our 50th anniversary tour is the fact that it is just amazing we had been healthy enough, even though some of us do have some health issues, but still we have continued performing together all these years. This is with all original six members that started when I was 19 years old!

After graduating from college, we could have moved away from our home base of Kobe because of work or whatever the reason is, but [with the] exception of Akira, we somehow managed to stay in Kobe and its neighbouring towns. So that was the main reason that enabled us to keep in touch and continue the band. Having two sets of brothers could have been the second reason even though it is possible for brothers going separate ways.

My most favorite memory is the time I spent with these boys at the Lost City coffee house in Kobe when I was in college. In 1971, I was studying in Taiwan so I could not join the US tour with the boys. Therefore, when we went to IBMA in Owensboro, Kentucky, in 1996 with all six members, it was such an experience that I will not forget the rest of my life.”

For Ryo music was no less important in his life then as it is now and will be in the future …..

“In 1966 when I started my freshman year at Momoyama Gakuin University in Osaka, my intention was to join a rock band and play an electric guitar. However, Shoji Tabuchi (now a big star in Branson, Missouri) who was a senior at that time, found out I took classical violin lessons while in elementary school and asked me to replace him in Bluegrass Ramblers when he graduated. I was not a good violin student and had no idea what bluegrass was, but I couldn’t refuse a request from the scary senior member, and I started my fiddling life.

Shoji used to play at Lost City, which was located only 10-minute walk from my house. As Shoji was planning to visit the US for several months after his graduation, he asked me and my band mate/guitarist Lee to keep the music going at Lost City

There I met Sab Inoue who would come in every weekend and he started showing me in-depth bluegrass knowledge. That was my first association with the Bluegrass 45.

50 years later, I still love rock and jazz and play those gigs with my fiddle. However, opposed to fiddle’s high-end sound, I recently started playing bass and began singing lead vocal. In addition to that, I am challenging an alto sax my friend left me!

I decided that if I find something I’d like to try, then now is the time to start – it doesn’t matter how old I am. I’m planning to keep that spirit and stay young and fresh.

I will keep playing – mostly bluegrass and some other – and there’s no doubt music will be the main focus the rest of my life.”

Band leader and driving force for Bluegrass 45, Josh speaks of his influences and the sense of gratitude for the music that has brought him so many wonderful experiences …..

“I formed a pop music club in Kobe University in my sophomore year, 1965, and I played banjo with Bluegrass Travelers that I started, but I also wanted to play guitar and sing lead. That chance came up when I started playing with my brother Akira, the Watanabe brothers, Liao and Lee at Lost City coffee house in 1967, and that was the beginning of Bluegrass 45. However, I never dreamed that the group would last 50 years.

Of course I loved bluegrass including Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, Stanley Brothers, Country Gentlemen and others very much. However, a few years prior to our US tour in 1971, I started looking for ideas to create our own sound in addition to copying regular bluegrass songs. So, I started searching other kind of music that we could adopt into bluegrass music. I took classical violin lessons while in elementary school so I started with classical music, then jazz, rock, pop and even Japanese songs to see if they could be converted to bluegrass. I thought we could get audience attention if we perform songs familiar to them, even when they were not bluegrass fans.

When we did the US tour in 1971, it was an amazing experience to share the stage with musicians that we used to listen to and we respect. Especially the fact that John Duffey was kind enough to produce our album, is unbelievable and I will never forget it for the rest of my life. His approach to music, his creativity, originality and innovation were so immense that it made such an impact on me forever.

I felt very fortunate that Bluegrass 45 is still together after 50 years and that we performed again in the States this year. My purpose of getting on stage is to connect with people – this year I have never felt happier and stronger (but sometime harder) while trying to connect with people.

I’m planning to keep playing music no matter what. From the bottom of my heart I’d like to thank all the people who supported the 45 all these years.”

Discography:

Run Mountain (Down Home DH 4501, released in 1970)
Bluegrass 45 (Rebel SLP 1502, 1971)
Caravan (Rebel SLP 1507, 1971)
In the Morning (Rebel SLP 1516, 1973)
Once Again from Kobe, Japan (Matrix MO 17196, 1996)

Also, there are three bootleg albums

DVD That’s the Time (Red Clay Records Red Clay RC-01V)

Toshio Watanabe Fiction Twins (Red Clay RC126)

Akira Otsuka First Tear (Patuxent Records CD-231)

Bluegrass Today acknowledges the help, with grateful thanks, of Akira Otsuka, without whose assistance this tribute to Bluegrass 45 would not have been completed.

Thanks are due to Gary B Reid also.

Bluegrass 45 plays the Capitol area

Bluegrass 45 with Kitsy Kuykendall and Tom Grey at the Drum and Strum (10/7/17) – photo by Jeromie Stephens

Ace music photographer Jeromie Stephens was on hand this past weekend for the last two US shows by Bluegrass 45 on their 50th Anniversary Reunion Tour. Both were held in the general vicinity of the US Capitol, at the Drum and Strum in Warrenton, VA and at the home of Sully Stephens in Maryland.

The 45 are now headed home to Japan after a momentous trip to the states that included concerts at the World Of Bluegrass in Raleigh, NC.

45th Takarazuka Bluegrass festival in Japan

Saburo and Toshio Watanabe celebrated their 45th anniversary hosting the Takarazuka festival in Sanda City, Japan this past weekend. The pair have run B.O.M. Service (Bluegrass and Old Time Music) in the nearby city of Hyogo since 1972, selling American and European bluegrass CDs via newsletter and online. Sab also publishes a popular Japanese bluegrass magazine, Moonshiner.

Both were members of the iconic band, Bluegrass 45, who became a huge hit in US bluegrass circles when they toured here in the 1970s. Natural entertainers, the then young lads won over American festival audiences with their enthusiasm and their humorous play on the cultural differences between our nations. Plus, they could really pick!

Toshio offered this brief description of the festival, along with a couple of photos.

“We had near 120 bands and friends get gather for 4 days from all over Japan, Korea, Australia US, etc. It looked like a big pickin’ party and the Bluegrass 45 did a reunion. Noam Pikelney appeared informally as well.”

He also shared this video of 55 different banjo players trying to play Foggy Mountain Breakdown with one hand on their instrument and the other on the picker’s to their left. Fun!

2017 will be the 50th Anniversary of Bluegrass 45, and Toshio says that there will be a new album and a documentary film, plus tours in Japan and the US.

The Fiction Twins – Toshio Watanabe

The popularity of bluegrass music in Japan is a subject well known and widely discussed among US and European grassers. Since the postwar occupation of the island nation in the late 1940s, the Japanese have warmed to many aspects of American culture, with baseball and bluegrass being two visible examples.

Toshio Watanabe has been prominent in the bluegrass scene since 1970 when the music of The Bluegrass 45 first came to the attention of US fans. But he’s been playing and studying the music of Bill Monroe since first hearing the Monroe Brothers on the radio as a boy in Japan.

Despite a life dedicated to bluegrass, and participation in numerous recordings over the past 40 years, Toshio has just now released his debut solo project, The Fiction Twins. And it really is a solo project. Toshio plays and sings all the music in this set of Monroe Brothers-style duets, and he created the CD artwork and packaging as well.

The titles will be familiar to anyone who cherishes this sort of pre-bluegrass music: My Long Journey Home, Maple On The Hill, Little Annie, Will The Roses Bloom, Weeping Willow Tree among them.

Here’s a taste of a couple tracks…

The Fiction Twins is available from Red Clay Records in Japan, and in the US from County Sales.

Bluegrass 45 renion tour in Japan

Back in the early 1970s, a talented young Japanese band caused quite a sensation at festivals here in the US – and not simply for what was then the novelty of a foreign band playing bluegrass. Calling themselves Bluegrass 45, these five skinny kids from the southern port city of Kobe showed that not only could they play and sing Mr. Monroe’s music with skill and passion, but that they could entertain a crowd with the best of them.

Now, 45 years later, the original band members are planning a November reunion tour in Japan, hitting 8 cities in 10 days. On the tour will be Josh Otsuka on guitar, Akira Otsuka on mandolin, Toshio Watanabe on bass, Saburo ‘Sab Watanabe’ Inoue on banjo, Hsueh-Chieng ‘Ryo’ Liao on fiddle, and Chien-Hua Lee on guitar.

Akira tells us some of their US fans may not recognize all of those names.

“These are the original six members from 1967 performing next month.

When we came to the States in 1971, Mr Lee was studying in Taiwan and he couldn’t come with us.

When we returned to the States in 1972, Josh and I had to get three new members, Takao Koba (bass), Kouji Takada (fiddle) and Haruo Kurokawa (banjo). We’re hoping all these members will join us somewhere during the tour.”

He also provided this brief history of Bluegrass 45.

Kobe and Yokohama are the two biggest port towns in Japan. European and American cruise ships, US Navy battle ships and Asian freight liners would come in and it was common to see foreigners on the streets all the time.

In the mid ’60s, there was a small coffee house called Lost City in the middle of downtown Kobe. The first owner was a big old time music fan, and he named it after the New Lost City Ramblers. It was the place to hang out if you were a folk, country or bluegrass fan.

The second owner of Lost City was Kenji Nozaki, and he was a wonderful banjo player who could sing very well. He saved up enough money and he decided to visit the States with his fiddling friend, Shouji Tabuchi in 1967. But he didn’t want the music to die at the Lost City so he asked young college and high school kids who were hanging out there to keep the live music going. There were 15-20 kids playing there but eventually six diehard bluegrassers became the house band. They were brothers Josh and Akira Otsuka, Toshio and Sab Watanabe (also brothers) and two Chinese boys (Liao and Lee). Later on we named ourselves Bluegrass 45.

There were probably 100 bluegrass bands around at that time in Japan, but most of them were in college and they were well rehearsed for concerts and school events. On the other hand, the Bluegrass 45 were entertaining drunken sailors week after week at Lost City, and were trying to learn English from native speakers instead of Japanese English taught in a class.

In 1970 Dick Freeland, who owned Rebel Records at that time, came to visit the Expo in Osaka. He was invited to the Lost City, where he met and had a chance to listen to the 45. He liked what he saw and he invited the band to the states the following year. As I mentioned before, Mr Lee was in Taiwan at that time and he couldn’t join us, but the rest of the band was flying to the US in June of 1971.

The very first gig was Bean Blossom, which was called the first International Bluegrass Festival later on because of the 45 and the Hamilton County Bluegrass Band from New Zealand. That summer the 45 performed at the Country Gentlemen’s festival in Webster, MA, Carlton Haney’s festivals (Berryville, VA, Gettysburg, PA and Camp Springs, NC, where the film Bluegrass Country Soul was shot), a contest in Callaway, Md, Grand Ole Opry, numerous country shows (opening for Loretta Lynn, Conway Twitty, Merle Haggard, Jerry Lee Lewis, etc), Red Fox Inn in Bethesda, MD, Fiddler’s Green in Toronto, and recorded two LPs for Rebel Records before the band went home in September. The second album was produced by John Duffey, who would start the Seldom Scene just two months later.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxnWkPjwSYQ

In 1972 Toshio and Sab started BOM (Bluegrass and Old Time Music) Services to sell American LPs in Japan (copied the business model from David Freeman’s County Sales), started their own Takarazuka Bluegrass Festival, and later on established their own recording company, Red Clay Records, which released many albums including Tony Rice’s first album and New Tradition (Jimmy Gaudreau, Keith Whitley, Jimmy Arnold and Bill Rawlings). Sab also started a monthly bluegrass publication, Moonshiner.

Josh and I toured the states again in 1972 with three new members, but disbanded after the tour. Josh got a day job while I moved to the US and joined Cliff Waldron’s the New Shades of Grass.

Since then we’d done a reunion gig or two every time I go back to Japan, and the band did tour to the states few times.”

Toshio and Sab received an Award of Merit from IBMA in 1995, and Moonshiner magazine was their Print Media Personality of the Year in ’98.

Akira’s solo project, First Tear, was released earlier this year. He has been an active musician here in the US this past 40 years, logging recordings or stage appearances with Jimmy Arnold, Peter Rowan, Bill Kirchen, Bela Fleck, Al Petteway, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Bill Emerson, Tony Rice, Nils Lofgren, Eddie Adcock, Jethro Burns, Seldom Scene. He also appeared in the film Head Of State with Chris Rock in 2003.

Josh is now retired and performs mostly for fun, primarily in a jug band, while Liao and Lee work together in Japan.

Here is their schedule for the reunion tour.

11/16/12	7:30	Rokkoman Hall, Kobe, HyogoKobe	Jakajaka Bluegrass Special
11/17/12	7:00	Fujisawa Roudoukaikan Hall Fujisawa, Kanagawa	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/18/12	4:00	Rocky Top Ginza, Tokyo	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/19/12	TBA	Little Village Nagoya, Aichi	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/22/12	7:30	Another Dream Osaka, Osaka	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/23/12	2:00	Takarazuka Nishi Kouminkan Takarazuka, Hyogo	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/24/12	TBA	Asakura Kouminkan Asakura, Ehime	The Bluegrass 45 ’45th Anniversary’
11/25/12	5:30	Bunka Plaza Galleria Kouchi, Kouchi	‘World Music Night’

Though there are no solid plans, there is talk of another studio album. Let’s hope that happens soon.