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Private/Public

Masakatsu Takagi is a pianist, composer and film-maker who has accumulated an extensive discography  over the last twenty-one years. My only window overlooking that body of work is Private/Public, a live album comprising highlights from a series of concerts given in Tokyo in October 2006, and released the following spring. I aquired it during my phase of ordering CDs from amazon.co.jp. I'd previously obtained discs by the singer UA and the percussion duo OLAibi, both contributors to the ensemble here, and I'd probably found this album when searching for other recordings of theirs.

The music is mellow and melodic, arguably a kind of contemporary easy-listening. One might call some of it chamber-pop. Some tracks resemble soundtrack cues, and, indeed, a couple of the pieces were apparently composed for use in TV commercials. There are classical music flavours too, with the vocals in a few of the songs backed by piano and string quartet. The opening track, 'Ceremony' begins arrestingly with a single chanting female voice, acapella, joined in turn by a second, and a third voice, then by Masakatsu's piano. 'Girls' is a charming solo piano piece. 'Exit/Delete' features lyrics by David Sylvian.

Despite its being recorded in October, it's always seemed a summery record to me, and I'm most likely to play it on a warm summer evening. It's a beautifully-packaged album, with the disc stowed inside the back cover of a jewel-case-sized, cloth-bound 48-page hardback book containing all the credits & lyrics, perfomance photographs and video-stills.

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