Track List

About the CD

 Try a new twist… The east tunes to the salsa… Check it out…

Try to imagine post WWII Japan. Now imagine post WWII Hawaii with its huge population of Americans of Japanese Ancestry and their immigrant parents. Also imagine the huge population of American servicemen and women either stationed in Japan or Hawaii or passing through.

In the years immediately following WWII recorded music from Japan was extremely hard to come by. Sometime in the late 1950’s George Ching began bringing Japanese bands to Hawaii. The post WWII climate had cooled down and it seemed all right for Japanese-Americans in Hawaii to try and get back in touch with their cultural roots. There was also a huge population of American service personnel passing through Hawaii who wanted to bring home with them a musical souvenir of the exotic cultures they had visited in the Pacific.

The music of Japan’s All-Star Orchestra helped them all to do just that. This album, Japan Goes Latin (LP 3457) along with three other 49th State Hawaii Records albums: Festival Time in Japan (LP 3454), New Sounds of Japan (LP 3456), and Japan Calling (LP 3458) were all recorded by Tokyo’s All-Star Orchestra.

The late George Ching told us that the All-Star Orchestra was composed of famous Japanese session players from the Ginza-Tokyo’s entertainment hub. Every effort was made to try to identify these musicians. Unfortunately, we could not.

Enjoy this fabulous ethnic instrumental romp through 1950s Japan!