Ragtime is the ideal jazz cafe in many ways. It’s a small place up on the 3rd floor of a rustic building right next to Chitose-Karasuyama station on the Keio Line, a residential part of the western outskirts of Tokyo. A small square room with about 20 seats, the feeling is cozy and inviting, the wooden walls and tables making it feel like home. There are pencils and strips of paper on each table for customer requests, always a sign of good vibes. They say only one per customer but when I went there as a many years back, spending 3 hours “studying” in the place, they took all my repeated requests. All genres represented and mostly vinyl behind the counter, of course.
On my last visit there were a couple of locals chatting at the counter seats, while the master put on a nice mix of tunes including Tal Farlow, Wynton Kelly and Joao Gilberto. Failry mellow sounds but suitable for a quiet afternoon coffee.
Ragtime is open from 3pm to 2am every day, making it perfect for either an afternoon pit stop or for drinks on your way home. Only in Japan can you find such wonderful jazz cafes in a random western outskirt. Photos of Ragtime now up at Tokyo Jazz Joints.
Jazz Haus Posy was opened in 1973 by jazz fanatic Misa. She’s a serious enough fan to have traveled all around the world to various jazz festivals, as can be seen by the numerous signed albums and photos on the wall of the bar. (I’ll have to ask her next time how the owner of a small jazz bar can afford to fly round the world 3 times a year to jazz festivals..)
The music is all vinyl, all classic jazz with nothing too heavy but nothing too quiet either. Like a lot of Japanese jazz bars, there’s a portrait of Bill Evans in the bar though Misa will also play records with a bit more groove to them.
Posy is small and dark, the kind of place where it always feels like 1AM while you’re drinking. There’s a small buzzer on a table at the entrance; push that gently and Misa or her daughter Ako will appear from the back rooms where they seem to live. The seats by the counter are tiny and close together so be prepared to get intimate with the regular customers and electric heaters during the winter. Despite the closeness, Posy never feels claustrophobic. It’s a jazz oasis in the crowded, noisy streets of Shimo-Kitazawa. See more pics of Posy over at Tokyo Jazz Joints.
Lady Jane has a very cinematic feel to it, the kind of joint that a lot of people outside Japan would envision upon hearing the words ‘Japanese jazz bar’. It’s dark, but clean and sleek, and the staff are immaculate, the drinks poured perfectly. The music is present but not overwhlemingly loud like in a cafe. If you grab one of the tables by the windows you can have some privacy or you can sit at the bar and chat with the bartender while sipping some drinks.
With all that you could think that it’s simply another cool & maybe slightly stuffy jazz bar for some quiet drinks, but Lady Jane also has weekend live gigs featuring a huge variety of local and foreign acts, including some unexpected experimental musicians. The vibe of the place completely transforms then into an intimate club with dedicated fans. It manages to keep a very fine balance between sophistication and true dedication to the music, something not many joints can do.
Lady Jane celebrates its 40th anniversary this year in 2015 and looks to continue to bring a grown-up jazz vibe to the funky, crowded Shimo-Kitazawa neighborhood in western Tokyo. Open until 3am most nights so it’s a perfect spot for that night-cap whisky.
Tokyo Jazz Joints photos of Lady Jane are here.
Miles is a treasure. It opened in 1960 and is one of the few remaining neighborhood jazz bars from that era, stubbornly and gloriously uninterested in the modern world. Cluttered, narrow and with a ton of records, it’s a time-warp to the Showa-Era of Japan. Motoyama-san the kind owner had been ill recently and the place was closed while she recuperated leading many to think it was gone for good, but she’s back now and has the joint open most nights from 6pm. The music is fantastic; all vinyl and with good sound; last visit she played Dizzy Gillespie, Roland Kirk, Joe Wright and Clifford Brown.
Since Masako in Shimo-Kitazawa closed I believe this is the oldest jazz cafe in Tokyo. Words can’t do it justice so see photos here and video. Miles is heaven for fans of old school Tokyo jazz joints.
I’ve known Yoshioka-san, owner and sole staff at Cafe Beulmans for several years now, since before he took over the cafe in mid-2012. He’s a sincere, heavy jazz fan who listens to an incredibly wide range of styles. Even being objective however, I can sincerely recommend Beulmans as one of the finer jazz cafes now operating in Tokyo.
Located in Seijo-Gakuen, a leafy, affluent area of western Tokyo with a ‘certain’ kind of afternoon tea clientele, Beulmans certainly takes care of the wealthy ladies with the freshly made cakes and gourmet coffee behind the counter. In its previous incarnation Beulmans was a tea & cake salon with baroque classical music on the speakers, but that’s slowly been phased out in favor of jazz during both the day and evening hours.
For the jazz cafe fan, Yoshioka-san’s large collection of vinyl and experimental tastes will be the main attraction. Though he keeps it fairly light in the day, during bar time at night be prepared for anything from Woody Shaw to Stan Getz to the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Think about that for a second the next time someone says the ‘Jazz’ at Starbucks is nice!
There are now live sessions too at Beulmans, check the schedule online. お疲れ様、吉岡さん！
NOTE: Masako closed in FEB 2010…I’m leaving it here anyways, so people will remember.
Masako in Shimo-Kitazawa is close to perfect, one of those places you could stay in for hours drinking coffee or beer, listening to one album after the next. As one of the oldest remaining jazz cafes in Tokyo it has a regal sort of atmosphere to it. When you walk in you come face-to-face with a large oil painting of Masako herself with the great Mal Waldron, a long-time visitor to Japan. A look further inside reveals a series of oil paintings on the walls, all of famous jazz musicians. What I liked even more were the old concert posters spread around the paintings, some from as far back as the 1950s.
No live music here, just 2000+ records and roughly the same amount of CDs. Lots of swing and 1950s and 60s albums in the collection, but even some fusion too. Requests are gladly accepted if they can find it in the cabinet. The seats and tables are low and the shop is kept fairly dark; like all the best jazz spots it’s a place for hard core fans who want to listen intently to the music and not work on their lap top or chat loudly to their friends.
There are two bookcases packed with old `Swing Journal` and `Jazz Review` magazines, fun to browse through even if you don`t read Japanese. I’ve learned a lot about jazz by browsing these magazines over the years, and still remember working my way through a long Japanese-language profile of Freddie Hubbard one day.
Masako passed on in 1984, and the place has been run since then by Fukushima-san. He said there weren’t as many regulars as there used to be, but every time I go there it’s packed so business seems good. (I’ve noticed again and again that jazz bar/cafe owners here often moan about the lack of customers compared to 30 years ago, yet their places are still open and usually at full capacity…. nostalgia for the old days perhaps?)
Masako is the oldest jazz cafe in Tokyo and second oldest in the whole Kanto area after Chigusa in Yokohama. Here’s hoping it stays open another 50 years.
