Tokyo Soul Singer Tyrone Hashimoto Releases New Single Oct. 2, Plays Tokyo Jazz Club Same Night

Balle Balle Radio™ Entertainment Desk

Tyrone Hashimoto (born Shunichi Suzuki), a Tokyo-based singer-songwriter,, plans to release his latest single, "Wake Up in the Morning Sun," across streaming platforms on October 2, per his production company Teddy Bear Productions. The artist will celebrate with a live performance by the Lakeside Struttin’ Band at Sometime Jazz the same evening.

The song arrives as the latest entry in what Hashimoto has called the "Music Cruise" series, an ongoing project now in its seventh installment, according to prior coverage of his work. The announcement describes the new track as an offering of encouragement, framed around the idea that a better life is within reach.

Hashimoto has built a four-decade career that spans well beyond his nine solo albums, all recorded in English, and a catalog the announcement puts at more than 600 original songs. He’s written jingles for McDonald’s, KFC, Nissan, Canon, Sharp, Kodak and Tokyo Disneyland, among other clients, and took a bronze prize at the Cannes Commercial Film Festival in 1994 for a Panasonic spot. One commercial job, for the Japanese coffee brand UCC, reportedly involved bringing James Brown into the studio to sing for the ad.

Originally from Yaita in Tochigi prefecture, Japan,, Hashimoto won the Grand Prix at the first All Japan Folk Music Festival at age 17, citing Simon & Garfunkel and Peter, Paul and Mary among his early influences. He went on to work with Haruomi Hosono’s Tin Pan Alley project, played a role in Yellow Magic Orchestra’s debut album, and became an original member of La Orquesta Del Sol, described in the announcement as Japan’s first major salsa band.

His American profile traces back to a 1987 visit to Seattle, where local press and broadcasters, including KIRO, KUOW and NBC affiliate KING5, covered his music; a KING5 documentary profiling the artist that was subsequently distributed to 37 additional U.S. markets. He has also taught voice and guitar to more than 1,000 students, including Japanese musicians Sugizo, Miyavi, Takeru and Junya Enoki, and recently received an honorary doctorate in music education from University of Perpetual Help System DALTA in the Philippines.

For Studio CarryOnHarry, the throughline here isn’t the single itself but the career behind it: a working musician who has moved fluidly between recording artist, jingle writer and educator for going on 40 years, in two countries, without a signature hit driving any of it.

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