The short version
- Kitaro's album for the American label Domo Records, released in November 1999. Ten tracks, about 54 minutes.
- It won Best New Age Album at the 43rd Grammy Awards in February 2001. Kitaro has been nominated 16 times, and this is his only win.
- Only two other players are credited: Tito La Rosa on quena and panpipes, and Masa Ito on classical guitar.
- Kitaro took the cover photograph of a piano standing in the snow himself.
On 21 February 2001 the 43rd Grammy Awards were held at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. There were five records up for Best New Age Album, David Lanz, Phil Coulter and Maire Brennan among them. The award went to Kitaro. It was the sixth time his name had been on a Grammy shortlist since 1988, and the first time he won. He has been nominated ten more times since. The second trophy never came.
Where it sits in music history
The five records are laid out in Kitaro: where to start. The guide puts this one fifth and last and calls it the rest. The road that began with Silk Road and ran through Oasis and Silver Cloud slows down here.
Kitaro signed with Domo Records in 1994. Eiichi Naito had founded the label the year before, and Kitaro was its first artist. His first album there, Mandala, was nominated for a Grammy. In 1997 he scored the circus musical Cirque Ingenieux, and in 1998 he released Gaia-Onbashira, built on the songs of the Onbashira festival in Nagano, which was nominated too. According to his official biography, he finished this album in 1999, the same year he toured the United States in the spring.
When Domo presented the record, it quoted Kitaro twice. Living close to nature, he said, meant finding the joy of life every day. And on the title: the "you" meant the people close to him, near and far, and he had tried to speak to each of them through the music.
- Released
- 2 November 1999, Domo Records 72438-48129-2-8 (US CD)
- Recorded at
- Mochi House
- Mixed at
- A&M Studios, Los Angeles, by Peter Kelsey
- Mastered at
- The Mastering Lab, Los Angeles, by Doug Sax
- Composed, arranged and produced by
- Kitaro
- Recording and Synclavier programming
- Gary Barlough
- Players
- Kitaro, Tito La Rosa (quena, pututo, sampoña), Masa Ito (classical guitar)
- Cover photograph
- Kitaro
- Award
- Best New Age Album, 43rd Grammy Awards (February 2001)
- Length
- ten tracks, 54:28 (MusicBrainz, US CD)
Track list
| 1 | Estrella | 4:20 |
| 2 | Mercury | 5:57 |
| 3 | Cosmic Wave | 3:40 |
| 4 | Harmony of the Forest | 6:22 |
| 5 | Fiesta | 7:46 |
| 6 | Thinking of You | 6:53 |
| 7 | Spirit of Water | 4:44 |
| 8 | Stream | 5:33 |
| 9 | Space II | 6:58 |
| 10 | Del Mar | 2:11 |
The times follow the US CD as listed on MusicBrainz. Discogs has a few tracks one to three seconds off. Track nine's title varies too: Discogs has "Space Ten", and the Japanese Columbia edition prints "Space2".
Following "Thinking of You"
The guide says to play the title track, 6:53. Three things to follow.
First, where it sits. It is track six, right in the middle. After five pieces, the record takes a breath here.
Second, the tune. The guide promised a melody you would find yourself humming the next day. When the track ends, check whether it has stayed with you. If it has, the record has done its job.
Third, the material. On Silk Road Kitaro drew a single Minimoog line across the picture. Twenty years on, a Synclavier builds the sound, and a flute someone is blowing and a guitar someone is plucking move through it. Same man, same ear for a tune, different stuff to work with.
The rest of the record
Start with the titles. "Estrella", "Fiesta" and "Del Mar" are Spanish: star, party, from the sea, on a record with Andean flutes in it. "Harmony of the Forest", "Spirit of Water" and "Stream" are woods and water, which is why Domo sold it as nature set to music. The longest piece is "Fiesta" at 7:46, and "Del Mar" closes the record in just 2:11.
How to listen
- In daylight, with a window open. As the guide says, Kitaro is music for an hour after sunrise.
- Straight through. It is 54 minutes; take the ten tracks as one long breath.
- Keep the guide's order. After the first four records this one sounds like a comma.
- Keep the volume down. You can leave it on and get on with something else, and it will hold its place.
What happened next
After the February 2001 win, a two-disc collection simply called KITARO came out in May to mark it. That same year Domo released Ancient in the United States, music Kitaro had written for the NHK series on the four great ancient civilisations, and it was nominated the following year. Between the 2004 and 2018 ceremonies he was nominated five more times for the Sacred Journey of Ku-Kai series.
The numbers are worth getting right. Kitaro's official biography says Kojiki was nominated in 1990 and counts every later nomination one higher as a result. The Grammy site's own record has no Kojiki. It lists Kitaro at 16 nominations and one win, and the win is this record.
In 2014 Domo reissued the album, newly remastered, on CD and vinyl.
The one track to send a friend
Send "Thinking of You", just under 7 minutes. Then tell them this: it is the title track of the only album that won a Grammy for a man nominated 16 times. And the cover, an old piano standing alone in a snowy field, is a photograph Kitaro took himself.
Where to get it
The 1999 US CD on Domo Records is the record as it first appeared. The 2004 Japanese edition on Columbia came with a DVD of nature footage. Domo's 2014 remaster is on CD and vinyl. Put it on and open the window. Out in the snow, a piano stands there and makes no sound.