OCARINA

What image would you have about ocarinas?

Healing & slow music?
Rustic tone color?

Now I would introduce "breath" which is the music duo of Satoshi Ōsawa 大沢聡 (ocarina player) & Masato Kobayashi 小林真人(keyboardist). Their music goes well over the category of common ocarina music. It is energetic, romantic, much expressive, mellow, latinized.... The first thing to do is try to listen their music.

"breath ocarina concert" on YOUTUBE, recorded & shot at Fujinomiya city welfare hall 富士宮市福祉会館 in October 25th, 2008 (The original of "Jōnetsu Tairiku 情熱大陸", played here, was made by Taro Hakase 葉加瀬太郎 in 1998 as the 35 second opening theme of TV program "Jōnetsu Tairiku" and the full version is included in "image イマージュ" which was released in 2000).

The birth of "breath" in 2007 was prefaced by the fact that they played opposite each other twice in 2006. They holded the first recital at at Suntory Hall and released the first album "breath – Subete wa, Kono Shunkan kara すべては、この瞬間から -" in March 2007. After playing in South Korea & China in October of the year, they released the second album "Kibo no Hikari 希望の光 - The First breath*" in November. In April 2008, the CD single "Dear Wind" was released.
*"Kibo no Hikari 希望の光 - The First breath" (You can buy the CD from the left link.)

Satoshi Ōsawa was born in Fujinomiya city, Shizuka Pref in 1971 and now lives in Yamanashi city. He'd learned saxophone at the Kunitachi College of Music, but had suffered from severe temporomandibular joint disease in school and had to give up to play it. Then he entered the world of welfare and stumbled on music therapy & ocarina there. Until now he's released some solo albums.

Masato Kobayashi was born in Yamanashi city in 1972 and also learned at the Kunitachi College of Music. What's interesting is that he was 17 years old when he started to play the piano and had been gone on rugby, soccer & cinema until middle school age. Until now he's participated in concerts and recordings of various artists(WaT, Katsuyuki Tsukui 津久井克行...etc) as a support musician.
.Masato Kobayashi's site on "Myspacemusic" (You can listen to his music)

・breath's official web site
・Official web site of Satoshi Ōsawa
・Official web site of Masato Kobayashi
・"Ocarina OSAWAismっ！" Official blog site of Satoshi Ōsawa
・"ピアノ弾き、小林真人のblog" Official blog site of Masato Kobayashi
(All these sites have only Japanese versions)

***** Reference data *****
The web site of UTY's TV program "Ongaku no Kaze おんがくのかぜ"