Nana Yamakawa

Nana Yamakawa was born in 1976, 7th of January in Tokyo, Japan. She learned how to play the piano, singing and scat from her father who is active musician. Her father, Hideaki Yamakawa, pianist, vocalist, vocal trainer, composer and arranger, has owned a jazz bar in central of Tokyo for 20 years. That jazz bar called "Klavier", has a grand piano and nice space for a band, has live music on every Saturday. Her father taught her joy to be creative and free from old school, jazz standards by approaching with rhythm, scat, improvisation, using words/ lyrics effectively. She performed at her parents' jazz bar with many local musicians as her home ground and also jazz bar called "Manhattan" which has live shows every night. Both bars are located in Asagaya. They are main leader of a big jazz annual event aka "Jazz Street". That event involved a local government. Music is every public spaces … in hospital, shopping arcade, café, restaurant, bus terminals, a big stage in front of Asagaya station. She was involved with that jazz festival every year. After her graduation from college and three and half years working for a company in Japan, she decided to pursue her career as a vocalist. She was a student of Yamaha Music Square in Dogenzaka. She entered Asakusa Jazz Vocal Contest in 2003. She came to New York. She entered Brooklyn Queens Conservatory of Music in 2004 and majored Jazz Vocal. She studied vocal with Sanni Orasma , Flossie Wilson, Monika Heidemann. She also took piano minor, R&B, African drum, opera, composition and jazz arrangement. She participated in master classes with jazz legend Shiela Jordan and Mark Murphy. Private lesson from Sachal Vasandani who is remarkably successful singer in N.Y.. Currently she lives in New York, work on her original songs for her album and performs at many restaurants such as Blue Owl, Stanford hotel lounge, Mezzo Mezzo, Go Wasabi, Creole, Notaro, Cleopatra’s Needle and so on. I edited my profile with Thomas Myspace Editor V4.4 (www.strikefile.com/myspace)