Happy and Artie Traum - Japanese Tour

In 2007, my brother, Artie, and I had a wonderful tour in Japan to support a new CD, “Live Recordings, 1970s – 1980s,” released by Slice of Life Records in Kyoto. This is the first “in concert” recording we’ve put out, and it features fifteen old cuts, taken from tapes made at a variety of gigs back in the day, and three recently recorded “Bonus” tracks. Several of the songs are oft-requested ones from our first Capitol recordings, including “Rabbit’s Luck,”“The Hungry Dogs of New Mexico,” “Golden Bird,” “Double Back” and “Going Down the Road to See Bessie.” Others, like “Deep River Blues,” “Stack-o-lee” and “When I Paint My Masterpiece,” are heard here for the first time (unless you were at one of our many shows back in those days).

The tour was a wonderful success, with five sold-out shows in four cities: Osaka, Yokohama, Nagoya and two in Tokyo. We were overwhelmed by the reception from our fans for our first Japanese tour as a duo in almost 30 years. In Tokyo, we got a chance to play some songs with our old friends Ritsu and Isato, two excellent musicians who recorded translations of some of our songs way back in the early ‘70s. The combination of the four of us brought the house down at our last gig, the club Back in Town.