Interview: #009 - U-zhaanの“いま欲しい5枚” - ELLA ONLINE (2025)

"WHAT'S IN YOUR CART?" is an interview series where we invite record-loving guests to choose '5 Records They Want Right Now' from the ELLA ONLINE STORE lineup.

This time, we’re joined by U-zhaan, one of Japan’s leading tabla players. Known for expanding the possibilities of the tabla beyond Indian classical music, U-zhaan brings his unique sensibility to collaborations across a wide range of genres. Where does this openness and creative flexibility come from? Through his selection of five personally meaningful records, we get a glimpse into the source of his deep musical passion. In the second half of the interview, we shift the focus to all things India — from the local music scene to the topic of curry, U-zhaan shares a wealth of stories only he can tell.

Interview & text: Mikiya Tanaka (ELLA RECORDS)
Photo: KenKen Ogura (ELLA RECORDS)

Interview location: ELLA RECORDS VINTAGE
Furniture design & production, Interior coordination: "In a Station"
Special thanks to: Satoshi Atsuta

U-zhaan “5 Records I Want Right Now”

①The Beatles / Rubber Soul（1965）Mono/UK original

②Miles Davis / Someday My Prince Will Come（1961）Mono/US original

③Grant Green / Idle Moments（1965）Stereo/US original

④Ravi Shankar/Ustad Ali Akbar Khan with Alla Rakha / In Concert 1972（1973）JPN original

⑤clammbon / JP（1999）First vinyl release in 2019

Interview Part 1: U-zhaan and Record

━━Can you tell us about how you first got into records?

U-zhaan:I only bought one record when I was a kid. That’s because our family adopted CDs really early. I think we already had a CD player at home when I was in first or second grade. So after that first record, I only bought CDs until I got to university. The first record I ever bought was a 7-inch single of "Ora Tokyo sa Iguda" (1984) by Ikuzo Yoshi. My grandparents, who lived in Tochigi Prefecture, bought it for me.

━━How often do you visit record shops?

U-zhaan:I don’t often go to record stores alone with the specific intention of buying records, but a lot of my friends are into vinyl, and I do enjoy stopping by record shops when I’m touring in different cities. So on average, I probably go about once a month.

━━Do you have a favorite record shop?

U-zhaan: Hmm… I’d say Rerereno Record in Kawagoe. I don’t go there all that often, but since it’s a local shop, I do feel like I want to support it as much as I can.

━━ Since you don’t buy records regularly, what kind of moment makes you want to buy one?

U-zhaan: For example, in 2023, my teacher Zakir Hussain and the guitarist John McLaughlin released This Moment, a new studio album with their band Shakti—their first in 46 years. When I found out it was coming out on vinyl, I got super excited. I mean, buying a new release from an artist you love on LP—it feels like a dream, right? And the record itself was a purple-colored vinyl, which made me even happier. So yeah, when an artist I really love puts out a record, I definitely feel like I have to buy it.

━━Do you mostly listen to music via streaming these days?

U-zhaan: I actually listen more to music I’ve imported myself onto my Mac or iPhone than to streaming. It’s not that I dislike streaming or anything like that—it’s just that I often listen to music that isn’t available on streaming services. For example, recordings from my tabla lessons, or old Indian music that was only ever released on cassette and probably never will be streamed. Of course, when something is available on streaming, I listen to it there like anyone else. It’s super convenient.

━━On the other hand, are there any types of music that make you think, “This is something I want to hear on vinyl”?

U-zhaan: Music that was made with vinyl in mind is definitely more fun to listen to on vinyl. Like recordings from before CDs existed. That might not apply as much to music made after the digital era began, but even with my own solo album Tabla Rock Mountain (2014), and with Tanoshimi (2021), the project with Tamaki Roy and Chinza DOPENESS, I made sure to structure the length of the albums with vinyl in mind right from the start. I arranged the tracklist thinking in terms of Side A and Side B. I just really don’t like the idea of having to change the track order or cut songs due to time constraints when it comes time to press it to vinyl.

━━How many records do you own right now?

U-zhaan:Hmm… maybe around 500? I have about 100 at the place I live now, and the rest are at my parents’ house.

━━What kind of genres make up your record collection?

U-zhaan:About half of it is Indian music. The rest includes records I kind of “inherited” from my dad without asking—like The Beatles and Japanese folk music. Other than that, I have a lot of records I bought at a store called Da Capo that used to be in Kawagoe about 20 years ago. The owner, Mr. Shimizu, would bring back obscure American rock records, and I’d just buy whatever he recommended, even if I didn’t really understand them. Honestly, aside from The Beatles, I never really got into rock. In middle and high school, I kind of pretended to be into it, but I didn’t really get it.

━━Was it your dad who got you into The Beatles?

U-zhaan：Yeah. I listened to a lot of CDs from his collection, but The Beatles really stood out. I even joined their fan club. I used to look forward to reading the newsletter they sent every month. One of the perks of the club was that you’d get priority tickets if any of the members came to Japan, but none of them ever did… so I ended up quitting. Then right after I quit, both George and Paul came to Japan!

━━Is your favorite Beatles album the one you picked for today, Rubber Soul?

U-zhaan: I personally like their later albums more, like Abbey Road (1969) and the White Album (1968)—pretty much anything from after Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967). I first got into The Beatles in elementary school when I heard Sgt. Pepper’s…. At the time, I thought, “What a ridiculously long band name.” The spine of the CD had it written out in full katakana, so I honestly thought that was the name of the band.

━━The later Beatles era included a strong Indian influence—did that part have any effect on you?

U-zhaan: Not at all back then. In fact, I used to skip George Harrison’s Indian-influenced songs. They felt kind of strange and even a little scary, and I didn’t really want to listen to them repeatedly. Of course, I don’t feel that way anymore. I think they were experimental and interesting, and the way they used tabla and sitar was actually really effective.

━━What got you into jazz in the first place?

U-zhaan: It all started with Louis Armstrong. I was in the school brass band in junior high and played an instrument called the euphonium. When I heard Louis Armstrong's trumpet, I was like, "Whoa, this is so cool!" That’s when I started getting into jazz. At the time, you could buy CDs of jazz legends for about 500 yen at places like home centers. I would pick those up and listen to them. One day, I came across Miles Davis by chance, and it completely blew me away. It was the first time I’d heard a muted trumpet, and I was shocked that a sound could move me so deeply.

━━So among all the jazz artists, Miles was the one you got hooked on the most?

U-zhaan: Yeah, that’s right. It’s not like I only liked Miles, but I always thought he was cool — and I still do. Also, back then, I loved reading books just as much as I loved jazz. So I’d read all kinds of books about jazz, and no matter which one it was, Miles would always show up as the most important figure in jazz history. Maybe that kind of written information also nudged me toward becoming a Miles fan.

━━A jazz lover and a bookworm — sounds like you were quite the humanities kid.

U-zhaan: I read so much that I ended up knowing all sorts of trivia that wasn’t directly related to listening to jazz — like the proper recipe for a martini. There’d be lines like, “A martini should be as dry as possible,” but that doesn’t mean anything to a junior high kid who hasn’t even had beer yet! Still, I’d soak up all this useless knowledge. Back then, I had this illusion that everything jazz people wrote was automatically cool. I even read the biographies of jazz musicians. Have you ever read Miles’ autobiography*?

*“Miles: The Autobiography I & II” – originally published by Takarajimasha in 1990, reissued in 2015 by Shinko Music as “Miles Davis Jiden”

━━It’s amazing, isn’t it?

U-zhaan: Yeah, it’s insanely good. And it really makes you think, “No matter what happens, I’m never going near drugs” (laughs). It goes on and on about how dangerous drugs are and how they never do anyone any good. The stuff about Charlie Parker is especially heavy. It makes you feel like, “If only he hadn’t gotten into drugs…”

━━What are your favorite Miles Davis albums?

U-zhaan: If I had to pick five, I’d say Someday My Prince Will Come and ’Round About Midnight, which I mentioned earlier. Then Relaxin’ (1958), Kind of Blue (1959), and the last one would probably be Doo-Bop (1992). I mainly like his early sound, but I think it’s amazing that his final album was a collaboration with a rapper. It shows he was facing forward right up to the end — and honestly, it still sounds cool even today.

U-zhaan: Speaking of Miles, not too long ago I came across a jazz café called Miles in Setagaya Ward and decided to check it out. It looked like a really old place, and there was this elderly man, probably close to 80, quietly running the place. He asked me, “Do you have any requests?” So I asked him to play Someday My Prince Will Come. I figured, since the café is called Miles, I ought to request my favorite Miles Davis album. The sound of Miles blasting out of these worn-out speakers was absolutely amazing, and I thought, “I’m definitely coming back here regularly.” I even went ahead and bought a bottle of expensive whiskey for the place. Then, working up a bit of courage, I asked the owner, “So, which Miles album is your favorite?” To which he replied, “Well, actually, this used to be my sister’s café. I don’t know anything about jazz myself.” I was totally stunned — I’d just bought a bottle! But later, I looked into it and found out that the café had originally closed down after his sister passed away. But because the regulars begged him to keep it going, he reopened it — even though he had no interest in jazz — just to honor her memory and the community. I was really touched by that.

━━Is there a particular genre you're currently exploring or really into these days?

U-zhaan: To be honest, over the past few months, I haven’t really been in the mode of digging into new music in various directions. In December of last year, my teacher, Zakir Hussain, passed away. Since then, I’ve been almost entirely listening to his performances. I’ll never get to see him live again, and there won’t be any new releases from him. But I realized I already have more recordings of his performances than I could listen to in a lifetime. So I’m thinking, “If I don’t listen to them now, when will I?”

━━Has the way you listen to or hear his music changed since his passing?

U-zhaan: Yes, it has. Zakir Hussain-sensei was both my teacher and someone I looked up to from a distance, like an idol. Of course, that hasn’t changed, but after his passing, I began to feel something different — a strange sense that he’s always close by. His death is incredibly sad, and I still can’t believe I’ll never see him again. But at the same time, there are moments when I feel him even closer than before. It’s a feeling I’ve never experienced, and while I have it, I want to listen to his music as much as I can.

Interview Part 2: U-zhaan and India

━━You mentioned that half of your record collection consists of Indian music. How did you come to collect them?

U-zhaan: Around 1999, a friend of mine who plays sitar contacted me saying, “I happened to visit the factory of a record label called Gramophone in Kolkata, India, and discovered a huge stockpile of records just sitting there as dead stock.” He told me they were going to be thrown away soon and asked if I wanted to buy any. I told him, “Just pick out whatever seems good and send it to me.” I didn’t have much money at the time, and shipping from India wasn’t cheap either, so I ended up narrowing it down to about 200 classical Indian music records. Apparently, there were also lots of Indian pop and film music records, and if I’d had the budget, I would’ve wanted those too. I’m sure the rest were just discarded. The people at the record factory probably never imagined that a time would come again when vinyl would be in demand — it feels like such a waste when I think about it now.

━━What’s the record scene in India like today?

U-zhaan: Back in the day, when you went to a classical music concert in India, there would be stalls selling CDs and cassette tapes, like little CD shops. But recently, since CDs no longer sell at all, those have disappeared and been replaced by chai or snack vendors. However, when I went to a concert in Mumbai this year, I was surprised to see a used record vendor there. They had a ton of classical Indian music records, and the condition was surprisingly good. The shop owner was about my age and told me he goes around to elderly people's homes to buy up their collections. Since I was there, I bought a Zakir Hussain record — even though I already owned it, I figured having two copies wouldn’t hurt.
You don’t really hear about record shops in Indian cities. Mumbai is probably the cultural hub of India right now, but even there, I haven’t come across any. Then again, I’m usually busy taking tabla lessons or visiting instrument makers when I’m in India, so I don’t really have time to explore the city properly — so I’m not entirely sure.

━━How much did the records cost?

U-zhaan: The one I bought this time were about 3,000 yen. When I bought the factory dead stock back then, they were around 150 to 200 yen a piece, so the price has increased more than tenfold even for used records.

━━On the other hand, what’s the current state of digital music distribution in India?

U-zhaan: My hard drive is already full of Indian music that I want to listen to, so I don’t really search for Indian music through streaming. That means I don’t know too much about it, but when I occasionally search for artists, I get the sense that the amount of music available on streaming platforms has definitely increased. That said, there are a lot of recordings in India where nobody even knows who owns the rights anymore, so it’s still far from being a situation like in Japan, where almost everything is available.

━━What kind of music is popular in India right now?

U-zhaan: Itused to be that you could go to a major CD shop and find all the current hits at the listening stations, so you’d get a pretty good idea of what was popular. But those kinds of stores don’t really exist anymore, so I can’t say for sure.
This is going back about 20 years, but back then, what was popular in the U.S. tended to be popular in India too. Indian film music was always big. Outside of that, oddly enough, there was also a decent market for instrumental stuff like Richard Clayderman or Kenny G, and New Age artists like Deep Forest. I’m not sure what’s trending now, but I do get the impression that a lot of young people are into hip-hop.

━━So the influence of the West is still strong?

U-zhaan: Yes, definitely. But I feel like India doesn’t really just copy Western styles outright. For example, Korean pop music does have its own distinct elements, of course, but the sound itself tends to follow Western pop methods pretty closely. In India’s case, even pop songs often use melodies based on raga scales, or they’ll include traditional instruments like the tabla or dholak. So there’s often some element of Indian musical identity in the mix.

━━So would you say classical Indian music feels more familiar or accessible to Indian people than traditional music does to Japanese people?

U-zhaan: I think it does have more popularity. Even now, when people in India say they’re learning an instrument, there are more learning tabla than piano or guitar. In Japan, way more kids learn piano than, say, koto or shamisen, right? In India, a lot of pop singers actually start out learning classical Indian vocal music. Like I mentioned earlier, classical phrasing often shows up naturally in popular melodies, so having a background in classical music might help musicians gain recognition more easily.

━━Since we have this opportunity, could you recommend three essential works for those new to Indian classical music?

U-zhaan: Should I choose from what's available on Spotify? Well then, I think a sitar recording is essential, so how about Malgunji 1980 by Pandit Nikhil Banerjee? The tabla on this recording is played by my other teacher, Anindo Chatterjee.

U-zhaan: Also, I really like the sound of the bansuri, the Indian bamboo flute, so I’d recommend listening to ZaRa by Rakesh Chaurasia. The tabla accompaniment on this album is by none other than Zakir Hussain. As far as Indian classical music goes, this might be Zakir-sensei’s last released recording.

U-zhaan:For the third one, I’d like to introduce a vocal work: Swar Sadhna by Kaushiki Chakrabarty. After all, vocal music is at the heart of Indian classical music.

━━Thank you very much. I’ll definitely check those out. By the way, in the world of records, there’s a strong sense of “vintage” value, where original pressings are prized. Does that kind of value system exist in the world of tabla?

U-zhaan: Not really. The most important part of a tabla is the drumhead, and that gradually deteriorates over time. So the best sound is generally when it’s freshly made. As for the wooden body, it’s not necessarily better when it’s older either — in fact, many develop cracks as they age. So you don't really hear things like, “This one is a vintage piece from the 1930s.” At least, not in my experience. That’s why I do feel some admiration for instruments like vintage guitars, where the sound and value can increase the more they’re played.

━━Are there any well-known brands in the tabla world, like Fender or Gibson in the guitar world?

U-zhaan: Not quite as famous as Gibson, but yes, there are popular makers. Most of the tablas I use are from a maker called “HARIDAS R. VHATKAR.” Their instruments are much more expensive than those from other makers, but the sound quality is excellent. There are also well-known makers scattered across North India, such as “RHYTHM” and “NARAYAN” in Kolkata, “Qasim Khan Niyazi & Sons” in Delhi, and “Somnath” in Pune.

━━India is often associated with Ayurveda and the concept of “food as medicine.” Is dietary awareness also considered important when performing Indian classical music?

U-zhaan: That really depends on the person. In Japan too, there are musicians who are extremely health-conscious, and others who seem to get all their nutrients from alcohol, right? It’s the same with Indian musicians — some are devout vegetarians, while others probably live on an all-you-can-eat meat diet.

━━What do you eat when you're staying in India?

U-zhaan: I mostly eat out. I don’t really cook for myself in India. Basically, I eat Indian food every day. Since I stay in urban areas, you can find Chinese, Italian, or pretty much any kind of cuisine, but Indian food — especially curry — is by far the most affordable. There was a time when I got tired of everything tasting like curry and thought, “Everything tastes the same,” but now I’m totally fine with just Indian food. Well, after about three weeks, my body sometimes starts craving other flavors. Still, Indian food you eat locally is just so good. I'm really glad that starting tabla led me to discover Indian cuisine. If you like Indian food, I definitely recommend visiting India.

━━I’ve been really into Indian food these past few years, so I’d love to go. Are there any restaurants in Tokyo that serve authentic-tasting Indian food?

U-zhaan: I always end up giving the same answer, but I’d say “Suri Mangalam A/C,” a South Indian restaurant in Soshigaya-Okura, and “Puja,” a Bengali restaurant in Machiya. Those two are must-visits. Near ELLA RECORDS’ shop in Hatagaya, there’s “Thanjai Meals.” In Shimokitazawa, near ELLA RECORDS VINTAGE, “ANJALI” is reliably good. This might be a bit off from your question about authentic taste, but the curry at “Nasu Oyaji” is delicious, and I also like the katsu curry at “Pannya.”

━━Thank you for the useful information (laughs). It was a pleasure hearing your stories about India. As a closing question—what makes a “good record shop” in your opinion?

U-zhaan: I think it’s a record store where I get along well with the owner. Some people might not like being talked to while they’re browsing, but I don’t mind chatting with the staff at all.

━━Do you usually initiate conversations when visiting a shop for the first time?

U-zhaan: No, I don’t start the conversation. But I tend to get talked to a lot—whether it’s a record store or not.

━━On X (formerly Twitter), people see you as a funny person, so I’m sure they feel like approaching you (laughs).

U-zhaan: No, I’m really not a funny person at all. But if that’s the impression people have of me, then I’m happy to hear it.