It’s been several decades since Boston-area pianist Yoko Miwa, who brings her longstanding trio to Hartford Public Library on Sunday, March 30, switched from playing classical music to jazz, but the move wasn’t as difficult as you might imagine.
Miwa, an assistant professor of piano at Berklee College of Music, was born with perfect pitch and an elephant-like memory. “I can hear every note,” Miwa told CTNow. “When I started to play the piano, I was copying everything I heard on the television or radio, before I took any lessons.”
As a college student in Japan, Miwa was making the classical rounds when she discovered ballads like Kern and Harbach’s “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes.” With her mother’s help, she found a teacher — organist and nightclub owner Minoru Ozone — who’d record himself playing snippets for Miwa to take home. She worked measure by measure, learning by ear until she’d absorbed his phrasing, note choices and sense of swing.
“I always wanted to use my abilities, but I wasn’t sure what kind of music I wanted to play,” Miwa said. “[Ozone] told me to just learn everything by ear, and it worked out because whatever I hear, I can play… I knew nothing about jazz theory, but I spent so much time just listening. Eventually, I just memorized it in my head, little by little.” When she returned for the next lesson, Ozone was blown away. “To me, that was the best way to learn how to play jazz, how to swing,” Miwa said. “People try to learn from books, but everything has to come from the ears.”
Miwa landed a scholarship at Berklee and came to America, but she’d already surpassed her peers and would gig around Boston. She developed into an assertive player and composer, with clear, dignified phrasing and a supreme sense of swing. Over the years, she’s performed and recorded with Slide Hampton, Arturo Sandoval, Sheila Jordon, Esperanza Spalding and many others.
Although Miwa intended to return to Japan, it became harder as the years went by. She records for the Japanese JVC Victor label, but her recordings rarely leave Japan. In 2011, Miwa independently released “Live at Scullers Jazz Club” with bassist Greg Loughman and drummer Scott Goulding, who’ve been with her for roughly a decade. The date includes Great American Songbook numbers, a pair of rock songs (including the Velvet Underground’s “Who Loves the Sun”) and three of Miwa’s own compositions: “Wheel of Life,” “Mr. B.G.” (a tribute to pianist Benny Green) and “Silent Promise.”
With Loughman now living in Brooklyn, N.Y., Miwa said she’s booking more NYC gigs (the was booked at the Blue Note this past weekend). She’s currently shopping around for a stateside label and hopes to record a new album this summer. Since becoming a full-time professor, Miwa has come to understand that not all of her students will learn their craft as she learned hers: solely by ear.
“I always explain how I learned how to play jazz,” Miwa said, “because everyone is curious, but unfortunately everybody doesn’t have perfect pitch. It’s difficult to do what I did, so I try to help [her students] learn in different ways… You have to remember you can’t just learn from books.”
YOKO MIWA performs on Sunday, March 30, at Hartford Public Library, 500 Main St., Hartford. Showtime is 3 p.m. Tickets are free. Information: hplct.org.
