Jazz Articles about Satoko Fujii

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Satoko Fujii featuring Paul Bley: Something About Water

by Budd Kopman
May 12, 2008

Pianist Paul Bley was one of pianist Satoko Fujii's teachers at the New England Conservatory of Music, which she attended on scholarship in 1993. Upon attaining her Graduate Diploma in Jazz Performance, she recorded the delicately beautiful and mysterious Something About Water (Libra, 1996), that has Bley playing with her on eight of the eleven tracks of free improvisation. While this release can be considered her debut recording, it is a fully mature effort where teacher and ...

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Carla Kihlstedt / Satoko Fujii: Minamo

by Budd Kopman
March 13, 2008

For those listeners who enjoy free, truly spontaneous improvisation and the combination of violin and piano, Minamo with violinist Carla Kihlstedt and pianist Satoko Fujii cannot be recommended highly enough.Featuring two live recordings from performances at Rova Saxophone Quartet's 25th Anniversary Festival in San Francisco in 2002 and the Music Unlimited Festival in Wels Austria in 2005, this exhilarating record demonstrates the highest levels of musical interaction.Kihlstedt is known mainly for her work in the avant-garde ...

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Satoko Fujii Min-Yoh Ensemble: Fujin Raijin

by Budd Kopman
January 5, 2008

If there is one thing certain in this world, it is that pianist Satoko Fujii will never stop expanding her musical horizons, nor stop amazing the listener. Fujin Raijin is a stupendous, almost terrifying record that shatters any and all expectations during its six tracks. Min-Yoh is Japanese folk music or folk songs in the way we westerners understand the terms: simplicity in form, scale and structure. Fujii is emphatic, however, not only about the effect this ...

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Satoko Fujii Quartet: Bacchus

by Troy Collins
November 10, 2007

With a discography of forty plus albums featuring ensembles ranging from intimate duos to big bands, pianist Satoko Fujii is one of Japan's most prolific and versatile jazz artists. The fifth record by her long- standing quartet, Bacchus is preceded by the similarly titled Vulcan (Libra, 2001), Minerva (Libra, 2002), Zephyros (Natsat, 2003) and Angelona (Libra, 2005).

Regular members, trumpeter Natsuki Tamura, electric bassist Takeharu Hayakawa and drummer Tatsuya Yoshida once again accompany Fujii, blending straightforward popular music ...

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Satoko Fujii Quartet: Bacchus

by Dan McClenaghan
November 4, 2007

You'll often hear jazz artists say that they don't like to call their music “jazz." The word, after all, is a label, and labels confine--if you take them seriously/and or let them. Pianist Satoko Fujii may or may not label her music (it's doubtful), but there are certainly no constraints on the sounds she makes.Fujii records, prolifically, with any number of ensemble configurations: from her extremely freewheeling and often cacophonous big bands to duo projects, the European-flavored Gato ...

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Satoko Fujii & Natsuki Tamura Duo

by Jim Santella
September 27, 2007

Satoko Fujii & Natsuki Tamura Café Metropol Los Angeles, California September 8, 2007

Using every inch of her piano's keyboard and every nuance of his trumpet's capabilities, Satoko Fujii and Natsuki Tamura appeared at Café Metropol in Los Angeles to begin an extended tour in the name of avant- garde jazz. As prolific composers and performers, the duo carries a wide range of ideas with them wherever they go. Reflecting the history of LA's ...

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Satoko Fujii: Defying Expectations

by Kurt Gottschalk
July 20, 2007

Satoko Fujii is a rare breed. The pianist and composer manages to continually defy expectations while remaining solid and eminently musical in her work. She puts out new recordings at an almost ridiculous rate, rarely repeating a composition, but doesn't simply toss any live session to whatever label will take it. Each new disc (she's released more than thirty under her name since her first release in 1995, including eight in 2006 and eleven in 2004) seems to advance her ...