Masahiro Takahashi - Flowering Tree, Distant Moon (2021)

Japanese multi-instrumentalist Masahiro Takahashi's latest album is a meditation on seasons and distance, recorded in isolation at his temporary home studio in Toronto. Following “the coldest winter I have ever experienced,” he began crafting hushed, lush vignettes of color wheel electronics with an array of software synthesizers, granular samplers, plug-in FX, MIDI controllers, and a shruti box.

The songs sway, shimmer, and unspool in sparkling arcs, between reverie and lullaby, inspired variously by blooming apple trees, gagaku music, the “nostalgia of immigrants,” and longing for home. Flowering Tree, Distant Moon moves from soothing to surreal, a swirl of quiet melody and imagined landscapes, as transportive for its listeners as its maker: “I dreamt of places outside my room and traced the music from my memories.”