Today the news is rapidly
spreading that jazz pianist Johnny Todd
has passed away. He is especially known in Japan as a skilled performer and
arranger based in Tokyo, but first established himself as a player in jazz
clubs in Sydney, Australia as well as Honolulu, where he worked for years in a
full-time professional role as bandleader for legendary Hawaiian popular music
artist Don Ho.
About 20 years ago I had the incredible
opportunity to frequently perform with Johnny Todd in the Tokyo area as the professional duo Jazz de Iitomo. The name of the group came from a Japanese pun meaning:
(1) we are good friends through jazz, and (2) “I think” a jazzy way is good. Jazz
de Iitomo enjoyed a lot of gigs around Tokyo: at jazz clubs,
private dinners, festivals, corporate events, and school concerts. It was
thrilling to collaborate with Johnny, whose piano-playing never ceased to
impress audiences. I did what I could to keep up as a trumpeter and vocalist,
but sometimes forgot the words or the form, and often found myself in the role of encouraging the audience to listen carefully
to Johnny’s brilliant improvisations and arrangements.
I recall a few occasions
in which we were very briefly joined by Johnny's daughter Mika, who at the time was
singing in one of the most famous commercial pop music groups in Japan, Minimoni. Although Minimoni had
become incredibly popular at that time, it seemed that Mika (a great singer) was already tiring
of the demanding lifestyle of stardom, and sometimes wished she had more chances
to sing quality music and just enjoy being a normal teenager. Johnny was very
supportive of her career, and had become fluent in Japanese and fully
integrated into the local jazz scene. Johnny had a long and impressive career and I
joined him for probably only about 1% of it, but that experience was formative and mattered a lot to me.
Johnny was a great man and inspiring musician: a soft-spoken
and kind person who loved music and deeply respected Japanese culture. He was
always learning new things and willing to consider new perspectives and I am
deeply thankful to have known him. It was hard to keep in touch after I left
Japan, partly because over about 20 years I lived in so many places after that:
Moscow, Auckland, Boston, Helsinki, Bergen, but whenever I returned to Japan I
made a point of meeting with Johnny. I had hoped to see him again as Covid-19
becomes less of a hinderance to travel, but he is already gone.
Johnny made some sound
recordings, a few of which are linked above, but I am not convinced any of them fully
captured the magic that happened in live settings, especially at the end of a long night in Ginza on the very deepest of ballads or wildest of high-tempo post-bop
tunes. I played with him on one album with singer Midori Takamura, so here is a
link to Body and Soul from that album as well his original song Study in Green,
which is dedicated to our dear friend Midori (whose name means “green” in
Japanese).
Rest in peace, Johnny!
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