Search - Maro Kawabata :: Carolina Blue

There is power in Bill Monroe?s music, but even he probably had no idea that in 1974 it would have life-changing effects on young Maro Kawabata, watching him on Japanese television, or that it would launch Maro on a quest for musical meaning and excellence. Maro?s story is one of persistence and determination, leading him to school in the United States, back home to Japan where he met and married his American bride, Sandra, and then to return to the USA to raise his family in the midst of his musical Odyssey. Now an Ohio resident, you can hear Maro?s commitment to heart-to-heart communication through music here on CAROLINA BLUE, the CD that is the culmination of a lifetime of thinking, planning, refining and sharpening his musical ideas and skills. To bring his vision to light Maro has called on several gifted musicians for assistance; some are friends he has known from his travels around the country, while others are people whose talents he has admired, but whom he never met until first getting together for the recording sessions. His list of friends and pickers is impressive, indeed: Bobby Hicks, Sammy Shelor, Keith Little, Ron Stewart, Missy Raines, Jim Hurst, Butch Baldassari, Kazuhiro Inaba, and Raymond McLain. On this CD you will hear some old music as well as some new tunes. The old ones are included because they are beautiful, certainly; but also out of respect ? they represent the underlying traditions on which Maro has based his own musical philosophy. Though they are familiar, through these sensitive performances Maro pays homage. The new tunes are here for many of the same reasons ? CAROLINA BLUE was composed as Maro was traveling through the mountains of western North Carolina, struck by the natural beauty surrounding him and the sense of the connection between that ?place? and the music in his heart. SAMANTHA was named for his daughter, who must surely be pleased to share her name with such a lovely melody.