Water Garden (Japan): Neo Prog

Water Garden was suggested to the Neo Prog team via the collab zone, and has already been evaluated and cleared for addition (though not yet added to the site). This thread is here merely to give those of us who don't have access to the collab zone a chance to get acquainted with the band.

The roots of Water Garden go back to 1991, when Koji Atou (guitar) and Hiroki Nakagawa (drums) met and formed a band that specialised in playing covers of various anime songs. The project was short lived however, and Hiroki continued with a different partner in a new band that just played pop music. This partnership also broke up fairly swiftly (in 1993), and the alliance between Koji and Hiroki was re-established, with a vocalist (known as 'Mr T') brought in to complete the band's line-up. They were booked to play at a friend's wedding reception shortly after their debut live performance, and once again just played simple pop music in these very early days.

However after this second performance Koji and Hiroki decided that they wanted to play more ambitious material, and began to incorporate fantasy-based progressive rock elements similar to CAMEL and RENAISSANCE, hard rock/AOR elements such as those associated with bands like ASIA and JOURNEY, and Japanese folk music of a healing nature into their repertoire. The theme for the new style of music was largely inspired by Japan's largest lake – Lake Biwako in Shiga Prefecture, and when Koji suggested that the name of the evolving band should be 'Water Garden', Hiroki immediately agreed that this would indeed be the case.

A four-track EP called 'In A Celebration Day' was recorded in 1994 while they were still essentially performing as a pop band, but Vocalist Mr T did not approve of the impending change in musical direction, and left that same year.

After this, Koji and Hiroki concentrated on studio work rather than live gigs, and used guests to fill out the vacant roles in the band.

In the spring of 1995 a three-track EP called 'Windy Memories' was released using a guest vocalist whom Hiroki had previously played alongside in a hard rock band called Afterimage - a lady named Chifumi Abe - with just 50 copies of the EP produced in total, and each accompanied by a questionnaire postcard. The response to this EP far exceeded the duo's expectations, and they thus decided that a permanent vocalist was now necessary to enable the band to move forward.

A formal vocalist called 'Mr K' - who, of the candidates auditioned, seemed most at ease with the fantasy concepts the duo were looking to explore with their music - was recruited, and in the summer of 1995 a three track EP called 'Since You're Here', was produced - followed by another at the end of the year with a Christmas theme called 'Little Winter Tales'. The last track of the Summer EP was subsequently used as the theme for a televised video that was part of a special show to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Shiga Prefecture Cultural Properties Protection Association, and the band created a soundtrack album in the spring of 1996 called 'Twilight Colors' which was also used by the association as an accompaniment to a video in their televised anniversary show.

In September 1996 a six-track mini-album 'At The End Of Boyhood' was produced – which also coincided with the resumption of live band activities.

Two of Hiroki's previous associates - 'Mr. Y' on bass and 'Mr. H' on keys were recruited, and the band began preparing for live performances in earnest – their first gig being at a hotel in Hikone-shi in February of 1997.

After that, the band decided on summer participation in the BIWAKO BEAT WAVE contest, where qualifying was carried out in various parts of Shiga Prefecture, but vocalist Mr K left the band in June to study overseas, so Afterimage vocalist Chifumi Abe was hurriedly brought back in again as guest vocalist so that the band could begin rehearsals.

Water Garden then won a prize in for their performance in the preliminaries of the BIWAKO BEAT WAVE contest, and in September got to perform in public at the Omihachiman Cultural Center, an event which was recorded and aired on Shiga FM. It was here that the track 'Stardust and Dreams', which features on the eventual Water Garden debut album 'Himiko - Prayer In The Land Of The Rising Sun', was first recorded.

There were further live performances at the end of the year in Kyoto Prefecture, and and the band also appeared on the 'Roland Band Paradise' as Kyoto representative in February 1998. This event however marked the end of Chifumi's second spell in the band as guest vocalist, and the project was put on hiatus until a permanent replacement could be found.

The new vocalist was called 'Mr N', and the band resumed its activities to give more live performances, as well as recording a three track mini album 'Endless Journey' in April 1999. They gradually stalled again after this however, and the last live performance of this incarnation of the band was at the Shiga B-Flat event at Hamaotsu Chrome in August 2001.

Five more years then passed before Hiroki began an attempt to resurrect the band again – starting a personal blog in the autumn of 2006, reworking old material, and composing some new songs. At the same time, the previous Water Garden guest vocalist Chifumi had also started work with a new band called HRC (later renamed as 'Ledream' - or 'Lessonia Dream'), which included Megumi (Mei) Yamauchi on keys (a lady who had also played keys in the past with Teru's Symphonia) and Hiroshi Morita on bass, whom Hiroki had previously played with in Afterimage. They were looking for a drummer to enable them to participate in that year's 'Patissier Rock Night' ('Pastry Chef Rock Night') event, so Hiroki joined them to complete their line-up in readiness for the event.

The new band activities started in earnest in 2007, as well as those of the former band Afterimage, and a performance in the hard rock cover events "Hard Rock Road" was arranged - all of which prevented Hiroki from devoting much time to the resurrection of Water Garden. However, he did make time to contact previous Water Garden guitarist Koji with a view to starting the band up again, and some live evening performances were arranged for later in the year at Azuchi Nursery School.

Hiroki then asked Hiroshi and Mei to become members of Water Garden too, and to complete the line-up he finally persuaded Chifumi to become the band's permanent vocalist after her two previous spells in the role purely as a guest.

Rehearsals began slowly in 2008, new songs were recorded, and in the Autumn of 2009 Water Garden performed live for the first time in eight years at the Kyoto VOX Hall.

New songs were written based on the concept of the "Yamatai Kingdom" in 2010, and the band's first concert in Tokyo took place at Numabukuro Sanctuary in February 2011.

Further concerts at Numabukuro Sanctuary, and outdoors at Azuchi Castle (Azuchi-jō Archaeological Museum) were performed in September, and recording activity for the Water Garden's first full album production was begun.

The album finally saw the light of day in December last year, released on the Musea Parallèle label, who had this to say about the band:

"WATER GARDEN is a fantastic present band, devoted to symphonic Progressive rock, and to the ancient legends of Japan. Published in the year 2014 on the Musea Parallèle label, "Himiko - Prayer In The Land Of The Rising Sun" illustrates the mythology of the oldest history book of the country, named "Kojiki". This concept-album narrates the mysterious story of the mystic queen Himiko, reigning over a country known as Yamataikoku. The music itself covers a wide range of musical elements, from lyrical Progressive rock (dear to the members of the band) to hard-rock, not to mention popular music and more. There's a main theme in all the lyrics of this album, as indicated in the album's subtitle: "Prayer In The Land Of The Rising Sun". With WATER GARDEN, TERU'S SYMPHONIA may have found a legitimate heir, at last."

The album includes music that was originally written as long ago as the second half of 1994, as well as the 'Stardust and Dreams' track recorded in 1997 during the Biwako Beat Wave contest proceedings, and further music that has been recorded since 2009.

Edited by yam yam - May 09 2015 at 10:45

Water Garden added, thanks to Yam Yam for translating it.