In this episode of the Japan Station podcast we're going deep into the world of J-pop with Dr. Capital.

Dr. Jonathan Patterson is an Assistant Professor of Popular Music in the Division of Jazz Studies of the University of North Texas College of Music. Also known by the stage name Dr. Capital, he is a composer, singer, guitarist, and an all-around expert on Japanese popular music who has been performing music in Japan for around two decades. Over the course of his career he has worked with a long list of prominent figures in Japan's music industry, including Shing02, Ayaka, Miho Nakayama, Angela Aki, and many more. Dr. Capital also runs a popular YouTube channel. In his videos Dr. Capital performs acoustic guitar covers of well-known J-pop songs, as well as explains the many musical concepts within them--and he does this completely in Japanese.

In this episode we discuss:

What inspired Dr. Capital to start playing the guitar
Dr. Capital's first guitar
How Dr. Capital became interested in Japan
How Dr. Capital became interested in J-pop
How Dr. Capital first got to Japan
How Dr. Capital met the rapper Shing02
What it was like working with Shing02
The power of music
Dr. Capitals passion for teaching people about music
What makes Japanese pop music different from American pop music
The overabundance of the 1-5-6-4 chord progression in Western pop music
The music of Yasutaka Nakata
How Dr. Capital came to learn the Osaka dialect (Osaka-ben)
And much more!

Note: In the intro of this episode it is incorrectly stated that Dr. Jonathan Patterson is an associate professor at the University of North Texas. As of the time of the release of this episode (08/01/19) Dr. Patterson is listed as an Assistant Professor and not Associate Professor.

For more extensive show notes, including videos and links the things mentioned in this episode visit http://www.japankyo.com/2019/08/japan-station-podcast-jpop-dr-jonathan-patterson-dr-capital-interview/

19 Deconstructing J-pop with Jonathan "Dr. Capital" Patterson