Award-winning Bay Area collective blends jazz, folk and disco in a lighthearted new release supported by YoungArts
OAKLAND, Calif. (September 22, 2025) — Bay Area collective LOBE has released its new single “Hummingbird Dances,” a kaleidoscopic track that flits between folk delicacy and disco exuberance. Written by flutist and composer Daiki Nakajima, “Hummingbird Dances” earned Nakajima the prestigious ASCAP Herb Alpert Young Jazz Composer Award in 2024.
Inspired by 1970s singer-songwriter folk, including Yumi Arai’s “Yasashisa Ni Tsutsumatreta Nara” and Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi,” the piece is transformed through LOBE’s distinctive lens: shifting time signatures, polyrhythmic layers, and an ethos rooted in shared joy and spontaneity.
LOBE is comprised of Daiki Nakajima (flute, bass, tenor/soprano sax), Sam Silverstein (violin), Ethan Buck (alto sax), Nolan Miranda (piano, synths), Mark Rau (bass, guitar), and Michael Hayes (drums). Emerging from the San Francisco Bay Area, the collective is known for bridging intricate writing and dynamic improvisation.
“I wanted to write a song with a fun listening experience,” said Nakajima. “For us, it’s about making music that feels alive in the moment. Music that's joyful, communal and a little surprising," he continued. "It starts kind of folksy and gradually morphs into a digital disco sound."
The track evolves from a folk-inspired guitar solo from bassist/guitarist Mark Rau into a playful flute solo from Nakajima threading through the central 11/8 theme, and concludes with a climactic drum solo from Michael Hayes soaring over a disco vamp.
Unlike many ensembles driven by a single bandleader, LOBE composes with one another in mind, such as melodies written for Sam Silverstein’s shimmering violin tone or ostinatos tailored to Nolan Miranda’s percussive piano playing, creating music that feels inseparable from their friendships. The group resists hierarchy, preferring to workshop pieces collectively until they blur the line between rehearsal and simply spending time together. The result is music that’s as much a reflection of friendship as it is of compositional rigor.
Album art for "was that on purpose?" by Whitley Wilburn
LOBE's sound draws on an unusually wide palette: Studio Ghibli scores, breakbeat rhythms, folk memories, and the improvisational language of contemporary jazz, all filtered through a playful, nostalgic lens.
Formed while studying at Stanford, LOBE grew out of the jazz program, where members discovered a shared love for rhythm-forward improvisation and experimental sound. What began as casual sessions quickly evolved into a collaborative practice.
“Hummingbird Dances” is the first glimpse into LOBE’s forthcoming debut album, "was that on purpose?," releasing this fall. The title itself nods to a question the group often asks: how much of improvisation is intentional, and how much is discovery? For LOBE, there is beauty in the tension between the crafted studio record and the spontaneity of live performance.
The mixing and mastering of the single and album are supported by YoungArts.
Production credits:
Recording Engineer – Mark Rau
Assistant Recording Engineers – Daiki Nakajima, Nolan Miranda, Taylor Goss
Mixing – Jack Kelly
Mastering – James Clemens-Seely
About LOBE
Emerging from the San Francisco Bay Area, LOBE is a collective of award-winning composers, arrangers, and musicians that lives at the confluence of intricate writing, dynamic improvisation and imaginative textures. Originally united through a common penchant for rhythm-forward contemporary jazz, LOBE quickly developed an interest in building on this aesthetic with dance, folk, electronic, and pop influences. Over many years of practice, friendship, and chemistry, the group came into its distinctive voice: whimsical and unhurried, challenging but inviting, time-bending yet always attuned to the here and now.
In Autumn 2025, LOBE is excited to showcase the culmination of the past three years of collaboration in their full-length debut album, "was that on purpose?." Comprised of 8 chimeric original works and arrangements, "was that on purpose?" celebrates the beauty that arises from chance encounters, mundane experiences with friends, and musical relationships transcending the professional. With this release, LOBE hopes to spread the communal joy they feel every time they sit down together on stage, in rehearsal, and at the dinner table.
