Machiko Ozawa's JUSTADUO plus @ The Stone 10/17/08

This was different! It was awesome as well. I couldn’t quite remember what it was I wanted to see at The Stone, but I did have a mental note that I either needed to sit up front or stand. When I went in and got my favorite front row center seat I realized it was because there was going to be a tap dancer.

The duo is Machiko Ozawa and Justin Hines. They did several different songs as a duo before having anyone else join them. The percussion was vast. There were various drums, he took the bass drum from The Stone’s kit, a cowbell on the floor with a foot pedal to hit it with a stick, many blocks, and other stuff.

Machiko mainly played violin. And she played it quite well. She mainly played standing on her tap wood and had her tap shoes on for most of the time. Except for the 1 piece where she took off her shoes and socks and rolled up her pants and then put her feet in a bucket of water. She used that to make sounds as part of the music by slowly lifting her feed out of the water. It worked. Then she put her shoes and socks back on pretty quickly to do a duo with the pianist and her violin.

Before that, one of the duo pieces had Justin wearing interesting gloves that looked like they had thimbles on each of the fingers. It was a great tool to play some percussion instruments. At one point during that piece, he left the performance area and played the wall, empty chairs, and whatever else he could find on his journey around the back of the room (toward the front door). That was also the piece with the tap dancing. It was fun watching them feed off of each other. It was also interesting that a lot of the tap was done on the regular floor and she mainly played violin on the tap block. She did start the tap dance up on the block for a while, but then moved to the floor.

There were a few pieces where she brought out a cello and another violinist. The other violin didn’t play much, though, maybe for one piece. He’s not even listed.

The set was about 1.25 hours and it was awesome. It was very lively and enjoyable.

I do think it’s interesting that I haven’t heard one live horn since I’ve been back. I’m sure that will change after this weekend.

Machiko Ozawa's JUSTADUO plusMachiko Ozawa (violin, tapdance) Justin Hines (percussion) Sean Katsuyama (cello) Makia Matsumura (piano)A japanese versatile violinist and tapdancer, Machiko Ozawa will perform her original compositions influenced by wide range of music such as classical, latin, asia, middle eastern, tango and avant garde. Keep eye on her feet for a mean tap dance.