Piñata Music Series: Alpha Mist + Takuya Kuroda

From jazz to infinity. British Alfa Mist and Japanese Takuya Kuroda share a similar vision. The one that starts from the classics of the genre but then feeds on soul, hip hop, funk or psychedelia. Both provide a singular and recognizable language, but it can be said that the jazz of the future (and the future of jazz) passes through their hands.

Alpha Mist

The British pianist, composer and producer Alfa Mist knows how to impregnate each of his works with a very urban melancholy, rocked by the rhythm of soul, jazz and instrumental hip hop: it was not for nothing that he was a rap and grime producer when he started in The world of music. Neither jazz nor urban genres have secrets for him. A pianist who admires the work of Miles Davis and Hans Zimmer, but also that of J Dilla or MadLib, whom he began sampling in the beginning, Alfa Mist has five albums to date, the last of which is Variables (2021), who stand out among the best of that generation of new British jazz (Nubya García, Ezra Collective) that is astonishing half the world. Class, elegance and social awareness for what the (black) music of the future should be.

takuya kuroda

The Japanese Takuya Kuroda starts from jazz, obviously, but his silky and distinguished formula has always been characterized by combining soul, funk, afrobeat and a few other spices in the same discourse. Experienced in the New York scene, having collaborated with José James, Akoya Afrobeat or Badder (DJ Premier’s band) and being part of record teams with as much pedigree as Concord or Blue Note, the Japanese lands in Piñata Music Series to continue squeezing his last and seventh album, a Midnight Crisp (2022), which confirms the hybridity of his infallible alchemy in six new cuts, and also to recover other high points of his discography.