"It's actually getting more overseas interest than local. It's a good way to get more work and get my name out and its cheap." (Laughs)
What led you and Andrew Dubber to set up Tap Records?
"We'd just done a high school's tour with the first band I had, Jazz In the Present Tense and thought it would be an opportune time to record an album. So we went into the studio. I didn't know anything about the recording industry, how to release things or anything else. I brought Andrew in to help engineer and produce it. We were talking and thought, hell, why not put together our own label. So initially it was a vehicle for Jazz In The Present Tense to get released, but now with the Manifesto Compilation and trumpeter Kim Paterson's new album, we're trying to develop it as a quality, high integrity New Zealand jazz label."
You studied in Japan with famous jazz pianist Junko Onishi. Where else did you study?
"I did classical piano from about age four in Auckland, then started dabbling with jazz myself. My big brother was getting into jazz, that was an influence and Dad played records. Then I was on exchange in Japan for a year in high school and got in touch with lots of Japanese jazz musicians. I spent one year in Boston at the Berklee College of Music (internationally renowned contemporary music school). There hasn't been a lot of formal study, but I think this music is more about living, experiencing and doing it."
Did you grow up in a musical family?
"My eldest brother is very musical. My parents don't play but my mother's mother is a very accomplished traditional Japanese singer, and my dad's father and his grandfather were both very musical. So I guess the lineage is there, but I really think its more to do with good nurturing."
This is a kind of silly question so I've kept it for the last. I've heard stories about the Dragon Bar and its patrons, (like Greg Johnson and Paul Casserly.) Do you go there?
"Never been there (laughs). I haven't really had much to do with the rock and pop scene here until recently, just working on this new album and talking to various people about it so who knows maybe I will end up there! It seems to be the "Unofficial Official Hang-Out" for those kinds of people. Kind of along those lines I've been having a lot of fun, like, cos I'm working with a lot of DJs now through the drum and bass project and it's a whole scene I'd never checked out before . . . ."
