Jazz Articles about Takashi Itani

About Takashi Itani

Album Review

Satoko Fujii This Is It!: Message

Read "Message" reviewed by Neri Pollastri

by Neri Pollastri
February 9, 2026

Terzo album per il trio This Is It! di Satoko Fujii, che vede accanto alla pianista il compagno di vita Natsuki Tamura alla tromba e Takashi Itani a batteria e percussioni, per un lavoro che mescola con equilibrio e ingegno scrittura e improvvisazione radicale. I sei brani in cui è suddiviso l'album si basano infatti tutti su degli elementi scritti, ma gli spazi per praticare l'improvvisazione con modalità estremamente libere e creative non mancano in nessuno di essi, ...

Album Review

Satoko Fujii: Message

by John Sharpe
December 28, 2025

Even within the remarkably consistent output of prolific Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii, certain ensembles command special attention. The This Is It! Trio --named for her conviction that the group represented an ideal working unit has become one such forum. Message, the trio's third release, reunites Fujii with her crew -husband and trumpeter Natsuki Tamura and drummer Takashi Itani -for a program that underscores her strengths as both composer and catalytic improviser. Unlike in some of her other bands ...

Album Review

This Is It!: Mosaic

by John Sharpe
January 12, 2022

Fittingly for an artist as relentlessly exploratory as pianist Satoko Fujii, on Mosaic she pushes at the boundaries of recording technology, as well as the music, and comes up trumps. For the second release from the trio This Is It! lack of physical proximity proved no obstacle. Confined to base during the pandemic, Fujii and husband trumpeter Natsuki Tamura coordinated their parts in her tiny practice room, while drummer Takashi Itani collaborated from his apartment bedroom 264 miles away in ...

Album Review

Satoko Fujii: Mosaic

Read "Mosaic" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
December 8, 2021

Another Covid-19 pandemic year, 2021, seems to have brought about a revival of Japanese pianist Satoko Fuji's duo work, with her husband, trumpeter Natsuki Tamura on Keishin, and with vibraphonist Taiko Saito--a pairing dubbed “Futari"--on Underground and Beyond. All three discs are on Libra Records. As the year winds down, she teams once again with Tamura, and brings another artist, Takashi Itani, into their duo orbit, to form a piano trio of sorts, in a group they call “This Is ...

Album Review

Francois Carrier: Japan Suite

Read "Japan Suite" reviewed by John Sharpe

by John Sharpe
December 27, 2020

Canadian alto saxophonist François Carrier frequently travels light. Even more so on this occasion as his regular peripatetic partner drummer Michel Lambert was not on board for a 2019 tour of Japan. This 78-minute album presents a first-time meeting with a group of Japanese improvisers, comprising bassist Daisuke Fuwa founder of the Shibusa Shirazu Orchestra, with a discography of 18 releases, fellow alto saxophonist Masayo Koketsu, also an alum of Fuwa's outfit, and drummer Takashi Itani, who has appeared alongside ...