Jazz Articles about Sadao Watanabe
About Sadao Watanabe
Instrument: Saxophone, alto
Article Coverage | Calendar | Albums | Photos | Similar ArtistsSadao Watanabe: How's Everything

by Douglas Payne
In 1977, prolific Japanese saxophonist Sadao Watanabe began recording a series of jazz fusion albums supervised, for the most part, by pianist, arranger and GRP wunderkind, Dave Grusin. A hugely popular icon of Japanese jazz since the mid-1960s, Watanabe had already recorded four such fusion albums (in between other more straight-ahead projects) when he was offered his first American recording contract with Columbia Records in 1980.The first of only two records that came out of this arrangement was ...
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by Terrell Kent Holmes
The packed house that greeted Sadao Watanabe at NBew York's Blue Note in August, 2008 was a testament to both his popularity and the rarity of his visits to America. Now in his mid-70s, Watanabe is still an impressive alto sax man who plays with confidence and a heartwarming sentimentality. He was appearing in conjunction with the release of Basie’s at Night, a double live CD recorded in Japan in 2007, with pianist Akira Onozuka, bassist Koichi Osamu, ...
read moreSadao Watanabe

by George Kanzler
"I want to get back to basics, I want to play saxophone. I've started to love playing straight-ahead again," Sadao Watanabe said over the phone during a break in a gig at a Japanese club. The statement might be a little puzzling to American jazz fans who know Sadao (in Japan "Sadao" is as common a one-name appellation as Miles here or Pele in Brazil)--if they know him at all--as an alto saxophonist whose albums were fairly ...
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