山中 良之
和歌山県生まれ｡京都在学中､ジャズに出会い､市川 修(p)カルテットでデビュー。

'78,'98,'99,01'年渡米。井上 智(Gt)、ケイコ･リー､HARMAN FOSTER、JIMMIE SMITH､JUNIOR MANCE,BARRY HARRIS, JIMMY SCOTT,EARL MAYなどと共演。ペンタトニックレコードより「DREAMIN'」米オリジンレコードより｢GREAT TIME｣,｢WITH BARRY HARRIS TRIO｣などのリーダー作を発表している｡

NHKセッション５０５には毎年出演。
'99'03 スイングジャーナル誌読者人気投票テナーサックス部門3位｡「DREAMIN'」アルバム部門4位 。日本を代表するテナー奏者。太く暖かいトーンで海外にも多くのファンをもつ。

現在、首都圏のJazz clubにて活動中。2000年春 ジャズシンガーJIMMY SCOTT来日公演で共演。サックス教本はほとんどがベストセラー。サックスレッスン も行っている。

教則本、レッスンの詳細は各ページにて。mail to me

070-5555-9229

Yoshiyuki Yamanaka first started seriously playing the tenor saxophone while in college.
He did well enough in his informal studies that he soon got his first series of gigs as a professional jazz musician with Osamu Ichikawa's quartet and Satoshi Inoue's quartet.

Over the past several years, he has played with some finest jazz musicians--e.g.Keiko Lee, Barry Harris,Jimmie Smith, Jimmy Scott, Harman Foster,Earl May and others--and has toured NYC('78,'98,and'99',01) with gigs at some jazz clubs. His releases on album/CD from Pentatonic Records and Origin Record include the much respected "Blue Rouse","Here's the Song" and the better known "Dreamin'",and "Great Time" which was selected as the fourth best album in the reader's popularity vote for Swing Journal '97. He was selected as the third best tenor saxophonist in the same vote in '99.

Behind the his success story, he has put much effort to develop and establish his music style. He first tried to emulate John Coltrane as many tenor saxophonists do.
However, in some time, he felt a limit of his music to express what he wanted to express. He looked back the history of jazz tenor saxophone players from Lester Young and studied thier music.
During the study, he was inspired by music by Charie Rouse,Hank Mobley,Stan Getz, Zoot Sims and Joe Henderson.

Finally, he has established his own warm and cool music style.

Thomas J.Haslam

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