To celebrate the opening of its spanking-new Xinyi branch across the street from the Warner Village complex, Shin-Kong Mitsukoshi will hold the "Enjoy the New Life" series of 29 jazz concerts, with practically all the major local jazz groups performing through next month.
In step with the major trends in live jazz, the line-up leans heavily toward Latin and fusion jazz, with some more traditional jazz styles thrown in for good measure. Opening the series on Tuesday night will be the Roberto Latino All Star Big Band, led by acclaimed Paraguayan guitarist Roberto Zayas. Performing a wide range of musical styles from classical, folk and pop to Latin American music, Zayas has lived in Taiwan for 20 years. He first performed regularly in cultural centers around the country, and soon started collaborations with local musicians on over 200 albums and last year accompanied opera tenor Placido Domingo at his concert at the National Theater.
PHOTO COURTESY OF SHIN-KONG MITSUKOSHI
Zayas' Barrio Latino band has gained a considerable following by performing at various embassy functions, business organizations and government events over the past 10 years. On Tuesday the group will perform an hour of Latin jazz, pop and modern jazz.
Lee and Taira will perform their second show in the festival next Friday with their own band Pianissimo Jazz Trio, with pianist Jeremy Leber, who was behind hits by local pop singers like A-mei (
On New Year's Day, Metamorphosis, one of the few Taiwanese jazz bands that are strong on original compositions as well as Swing and be-bop standards, will give two performances. Apart from their regular live performances at Blue Note, the band has participated in many of the department store's previous celebrations.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby