{"id":59,"date":"2026-05-20T20:39:53","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T20:39:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=59"},"modified":"2026-05-20T20:39:53","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T20:39:53","slug":"nathan-tokunagas-whirlwind-jazz-career-goes-back-to-where-it-all-started","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=59","title":{"rendered":"Nathan Tokunaga’s whirlwind jazz career goes back to where it all started"},"content":{"rendered":"
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At 19, Nathan Tokunaga is pretty young to experience a full-circle moment, returning to the source of the inspiration that shaped his life.<\/p>\n

Read more This year\u2019s 11 most endangered historic places, including Bay Area site, nod to America 250 and the promise of equality for all<\/a><\/p>\n

But when the Belmont-raised reed player kicks off KCSM-FM 91.1\u2019s Jazz On the Hill 2026 festival with his quartet at the College of San Mateo on June 6 he\u2019ll be helping celebrate the epiphany-sparking radio station that led him to the heart of the New York City jazz scene.<\/p>\n

Tokunaga started listening to KCSM as a captive audience \u201con the morning drives to elementary school with my mom,\u201d he said. During a commute to sixth grade one day the car was filled by Australian reed expert\u00a0Adrian Cunningham\u2019s rendition of the voluptuous ballad \u201cPetite Fleur\u201d by foundational New Orleans jazz master Sidney Bechet (1897-1959).<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t know a clarinet can sound like that,\u201d\u00a0Tokunaga\u00a0said. \u201cI remember being captivated by it.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few months later Tokunaga came across a late-career video of clarinet star Benny Goodman in Japan, which fed his determination to start studying jazz. And when Gov. Newsom\u2019s stay-at-home order to slow the spread of COVID left him sequestered, \u201cI really used the lockdown to learn jazz,\u201d Tokunaga recalled.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember going on YouTube to find how to find a blues scale. My mom bought me music theory books. I spent a lot of time practicing and listening to records.\u201d<\/p>\n

When he emerged from his house in early 2021\u00a0Tokunaga\u00a0found a welcoming mentor in early jazz specialist Clint Baker, who featured the young teen at his twice-monthly All-Stars gig at Cafe Borrone in Menlo Park (Tokunaga\u00a0rejoins Baker at Cafe Borrone June 12 and Aug. 14).<\/p>\n

He\u2019s been soaking up bandstand experience ever since, while serving as something of a muse for older players like Charles Chen. A brilliant pianist who sidelined his software engineering career to focus on music, Chen produced a wildly ambitious night for Tokunaga\u2019s senior recital last June featuring a\u00a050-piece ensemble with strings, brass, woodwinds, percussion and special guests,\u00a0including saxophone great Bob Sheppard, a founding member of Chick Corea\u2019s Origin Sextet.<\/p>\n

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Recently signed to\u00a0Turtle Bay Records,\u00a0Tokunaga is preparing to make his first album.\u00a0Back in the Bay Area for the summer after his freshman year studying jazz at\u00a0The New School,\u00a0he\u2019s\u00a0lined up nearly two-dozen gigs across the region, both as a leader and a sideman.<\/p>\n

Read more Feds charge San Francisco man with having gun when police came to arrest popular rapper<\/a><\/p>\n

With his quartet \u2014 featuring Chen, bassist Dexter Williams and drummer Riley Baker \u2014 Tokunaga holds forth on soprano, alto and tenor sax, \u201cdepending on the situation,\u201d he said. \u201cBut clarinet is my first instrument.\u201d<\/p>\n

He kicks off his Bay Area run with two shows at Meyhouse in Palo Alto May 22, and moves over to play the newly opened Meyhouse venue in San Ramon on May 23. He brings the same group to Jazz On the Hill, and adds two more players to accompany swing dancers June 13 at Bootleggers Ball in San Francisco.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s also performing around the Bay with drummer Benny Am\u00f3n\u2019s Quartet, multi-instrumentalist Kyle Athayde and his Dance Party, and the Charles Chen Quartet. Aside from his own group, his most extensive commitment is to guitarist Nick Rossi\u2019s Jazzopaters, an eight-piece combo dedicated to music recorded by side-groups gleaned from the Duke Ellington Orchestra in the 1930s and \u201940s.<\/p>\n

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The Jazzopaters summer schedule includes performances at the Stanford Jazz Festival July 10, Petaluma\u2019s Mercury Theater July 11, and Mr. Tipple\u2019s July 12. Tokunaga was a founding member of the band three years ago, playing alongside veteran Bay Area artists like saxophonist Patrick Wolff and pianist Adam Shulman. Rossi recognized in Tokunaga a player besotted with the jazz tradition and eager to absorb new information.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe live in this golden age of technical brilliance with young musicians, so it\u2019s almost a given you have to function at that level,\u201d Rossi said. \u201cNathan does, and at the same time he\u2019s got big ears and can internalize things in a short period of time. I met him shortly after he started being mentored by Clint Baker and witnessed his accelerated development.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the New School he\u2019s gravitated to older masters, like 86-year-old drummer Andrew Cyrille, a lion of the 1960s avant-garde scene who made one of his first recording with tenor sax patriarch Coleman Hawkins (1961\u2019s \u201cThe Hawk Relaxes\u201d). Last semester he studied with 88-year-old bass great Reggie Workman and Nuyorican drum maestro Bobby Sanabria.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very much rooted in the tradition, but I\u2019m not trying to fit into one box or label,\u201d Tokunaga said. \u201cI want to move the art forward and find my own voice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Contact Andrew Gilbert at\u00a0jazzscribe@aol.com.<\/em><\/p>\n

NATHAN TOKUNAGA QUARTET<\/strong><\/p>\n

When & where:<\/strong> 6:30 and 8:30 p.m. May 22 at Meyhouse in Palo Alto, $38-$48; www.meyhousejazz.com; 6:30 and 8:30 p.m. May 23 at Meyhouse in San Ramon; $25-$42; 7:30 p.m. July 18 at The Sound Room in Oakland, $25 www.soundroom.org<\/p>\n

Read more Review: \u2018Forza Horizon 6\u2019 brings a Japanese ethos and world to players<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 19-year-old Peninsula-raised clarinetist owes musical journey to a Bay Area radio station.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":58,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-things-to-do"],"yoast_head":"\nNathan Tokunaga’s whirlwind jazz career goes back to where it all started - Next City Digest<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=59\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Nathan Tokunaga’s whirlwind jazz career goes back to where it all started - Next City Digest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The 19-year-old Peninsula-raised clarinetist owes musical journey to a Bay Area radio station.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=59\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Next City Digest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-05-20T20:39:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/a414a7c3adce620529e823faba6cd92d.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"655\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/13065d40d633843429ac57d4e5c06f9b\"},\"headline\":\"Nathan Tokunaga’s whirlwind jazz career goes back to where it all started\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-05-20T20:39:53+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59\"},\"wordCount\":878,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/05\\\/a414a7c3adce620529e823faba6cd92d.webp\",\"articleSection\":[\"Things To Do\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=59\",\"name\":\"Nathan Tokunaga’s whirlwind jazz career goes back to where it all started - 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