Text by Sohrab Saadat Lardjevardi

Just by chance, when I was looking for a Melvin Gibbs YouTube video for the DooBeeDoo music listings, I found this video which features Arto Lindsay’s special appearance at the opening reception for Jean-Michel Basquiat’s exhibition, “Sketchbook for Arto”.

I have known Arto since 1991 when I met him and his band The Ambitious Lovers for the first time at the Club Quattro in Tokyo. We met backstage and became friends. I met him again in NY the next year. He invited me to his big apartment in Manhattan. We talked about the NY music scene and about doing some music together. The next year we met again in Tokyo, when he toured Japan again. In his free time I showed him around Tokyo.

From that time on I lost touch with him, because he didn’t come to Japan and I didn’t go to NY. But I heard from music colleagues that he moved to Brazil for private reasons.

I still love Arto because I owe him two things: first f all because when he was in Tokyo with his band the Ambitious Lovers, I became friends with his rhythm section : Damon Banks on bass and Tony Lewis on drums, who both recorded with me on my record 1992 a year later. Secondly, when I came to New York, he was the only New York musician, among the other NY musicians I had met in Tokyo before, who had the time to meet me and invited me to his apartment. Trying to help me out in this crazy city.

My message for Arto: Arto, if you still remember me (in Japan I was called “Sadato”) and find out about me by this post, please get back to me and let’s meet again and play music.

About the film

Venue: Live at AS IF Gallery, Harlem
Date: May 7th, 2011
Video by:  Hiroshi Sunairi and Yoshi Saito
Edited by: Hiroshi Sunairi