Aco Takenaka Interview - The Final On Vinyl Podcast

Aco Takenaka discusses the details of how and why she recorded her album Ancient Seeds.

Keith "MuzikMan" Hannaleck

Transcript

Speaker 0:11

Yeah.

Speaker 1 0:14

Hello everybody, this is Keith MuzikMan Hannaleck with the Final on Vinyl Podcast, and today we're with Aco Takanaka, and she is calling in from Japan. It's uh the early AM wee hours of the morning there, and I appreciate her calling in. And recently had the pleasure of covering Ancient Seeds, her most recent release that came out October 19th. Welcome.

Speaker 2 0:39

Thank you, Keith and the beautiful listener of the station. Thank you very much.

Speaker 1 0:46

I appreciate you coming on board to talk. And one of the first questions that comes up for me after going through all your music and and looking at all the titles and all the meanings, um, what was the one thing that drove you to create this music and to focus in on all these different spiritual aspects of these ancient seeds, these religions, um practices, um there's Buddhism and and all kinds of different things that you covered.

Speaker 1:21

Yeah.

Speaker 2 1:23

Um one song, one um the driving force me t to create this album. Um well this the driving force behind this project came from uh my deep feeling that our earth is in danger. And these ancient songs can help us remember the feeling of being connected, connected to each other, to nature, Mother Earth, and maybe m maybe even to life itself. And these songs uh uh ones I've met along my life journey, and each of them came to me through special people I was lucky to meet, and they share the songs or the words dialectly with me. So learning the meaning behind those words helped me sing on them from my heart.

Speaker 1 2:24

So you met people that gave this information to you. So you traveled all over the world and met these people?

Speaker 2:32

Yes. Mm-hmm. Where did you go? Where did you go? What co what co what countries?

Speaker 2 2:39

Um I visited Native American village in um yeah, Native American village and Brazil and Tibet and also India and Thailand and all over Asia and also yeah, African songs I've learned from uh my friend in US, but she introduced me to the singer in Africa and also uh the singer in France connected me to the singer in Africa. This is all uh came from the beautiful connection of souls all over the world.

Speaker 1 3:28

That's amazing. How long did it take you to put all this together? It must have taken a long time.

Speaker 2 3:34

Yes, yes. Actually, uh over time um well I sang again and again until I can really feel it because uh through tr translation, um the essence of the original song can easily slip away. So I I kept singing again and again in the ears and listening with my whole body and asking my body what kind of song it originally was. And I tried my best to honor the lands and the people where the songs came from, and uh the essence and their traditions. And when I do that, I felt the words themselves begin to dance again and feel the missing piece. And uh these are so lovely songs through my life, and I always wanted to bring them together as album, but so many of them, so I that I didn't know how I can make it album. But lately I've been really seriously feeling that our earth is really in danger, and I realized those songs are precious heritage of the earth. Um, they should be heard, they should be sung again, and so I shouldn't stop their flows um through my own hesitation. I wanted to help them to keep moving, to let them flow wherever they wish to go. So maybe that's probably the true um my um divide driving force to complete this album.

Speaker 1 5:21

Interesting. I know Mother Earth's been trying to tell us things for for many years now, and we're not listening. Um I hope we're not beyond fixing things as far as the environment goes.

Speaker 5:34

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 5:37

So you've been singing for many years. Did you start singing when you were a little girl?

Speaker 2 5:44

Yeah, I always I always loved singing ever since I was a child, but didn't have any formal music education. My first singing teacher was uh maybe the sound around me, like dogs howling or branches moving the in the wind, and voices that came naturally at sunset. So those sounds were my first teachers.

Speaker 1 6:14

So as far as the as far as the instrumentation goes on your album, Ancient Seeds, what are some of the uh the musicians you use, what are some of the instruments you used to create this music to go along with your angelic voice?

Speaker 2 6:32

Well, thank you very much. Uh we used um mm drum or rattles, like a wooden stick, or like show or like bamboo instruments uh in our tradition, or uh sometimes the guitar comes and flute comes, like sometimes from India, like Indian flute, or Native American flute, or like African drum, or Native American drum, or Japanese drums, or a shell horn and um and a synthesizer.

Speaker 7:13

Yeah, and so on.

Speaker 1 7:16

Did you play any of the instruments or did you just provide the vocals?

Speaker 2 7:20

Yeah, I I did uh besides a vocal, I yeah, I did um like a ring or uh rattles or drums. Yeah, that's that's that's my my part. I did uh I see. Yeah, but like I thought yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 7:39

It's it's pretty amazing how many different sounds and tones different drums have.

Speaker 2 7:46

Hmm, thank you. Yeah. Um I try to invite um very authentic people who can s vibrate together with these songs and I explain the meaning of the songs and and um I think they're all the instruments made of wood or made of like animals um keys. Uh resonated beautifully together.

Speaker 1 8:19

Oh, that's different.

Speaker 2 8:21

And the pills, yes.

unknown 8:23

Yeah.

Speaker 1 8:23

Do you have a favorite do you have a favorite instrument that you like to play as far as the drums?

Speaker 2 8:29

Um yeah, I love playing guitar or like drums. But um well when I record that I ask more um authentic people. I love singing with guitar, singing with uh um harmonium, singing with uh like uh yeah, these uh Okinawan guitar or these instruments my favorite. But when I recorded this album, uh I didn't play that part. I wanted to focus on singing. And I was very, very nervous about the make it uh good layers of voices.

Speaker 1 9:14

So along with the title Ancient Seeds, you worked with ancient instrumentation as well, is that correct?

Speaker 2 9:23

Yes, thank you very much. Yes. Um this title came from the feeling that um these ancient songs can wake up of a DNA to love um each other, to love Mother Earth, to love nature, a sense of wholeness. Um that feeling uh helped me to uh gather and select the ancient songs and while the meaning behind the title is like image of a seed, even seeds found in ancient ruins, thousands of years old, can sprout once they are returned to the soils. And when these ancient songs are sung with human voice, the sense of oneness of ancient time, love and the connection with the universe and all life loom without within us, like just like the seas loom. So um I wanted to make this as prayer of Baba that we can remember our memory of connection together. So I wanted to make it uh something um something uh uh powerful to help us to remember our love to the nature and take to learn to take care of mother earth better.

Speaker 1 11:07

So there are actual seeds that are five hundred years old that will come to life and sprout? Is that what you said?

Speaker 2 11:17

Yes, yes, uh yeah. Uh we found uh like thousands of years old seeds in Japan and when we s uh uh volleyed in the soil, they could sprout still and with water and sunlight of course. So uh these uh it's not just the heav uh it's not just the um they are still alive. It's sleep, it has been sleeping thousands of years, but they can sprout. So the wisdom in these songs is like that. Even they asleep, they have been sleeping long time. When we sang in human voice, they can sprout their wisdom again.

Speaker 1 12:07

That's incredible. Never heard of anything like that before. Wow.

Speaker 2 12:12

Oh, I can send you I can send you a photo of 700 years seeds. Yeah. Yeah, I surprised about it and I I felt it is just like the songs. Um we think it's just the old song, but it's com uh it carries the wisdom to help us to feel um our is wisdom inside and feel connected like ancient people used to feel. It's really happening when we when you really, really listen and read their body and sing. So I wanted to introduce those songs.

Speaker 1 12:57

Well, I thank you for that, and uh thank you for your time today and your music. And uh I hope you're very successful I hope you're very successful with your recording and in the future if uh you decide to record again, I hope that I have a chance to hear it and and cover it.

Speaker 2 13:18

Oh, I love to you to hear it. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for your time too.

Speaker 1 13:25

Well, thank you. It's time for you to get some rest now.

Speaker 2 13:29

Okay.

Speaker 1 13:32

You take care now, okay?

Speaker 2 13:35

Okay, thank you. Bye bye. Have a beautiful have have a beautiful day. Bye bye.

Speaker 1 13:41

You you too, bye.