Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Kira Kira: Bright Force

10

Kira Kira: Bright Force

By

View read count
Kira Kira: Bright Force
Pianist Satoko Fujii was playing for the Sydney Improvised Music Association in 2007 when she first crossed paths with composer/keyboardist/effects artist Alister Spence. Kindred spirits in terms of boundless musical interests, their initial collaboration took place in 2008 after their respective groups shared the stage at the Tokyo Jazz Festival. Later that year, the two recorded as part of The Raymond MacDonald International Big Band on Buddy (Textile Records, 2010). That group included Fujii's trumpeter husband Natsuki Tamura and accounts for three-quarters of the Kira Kira heard on Bright Force. Drummer Ittetsu Takemura fills out the bass-less quartet.

The writing credits on Bright Force are shared among Spence, Tamura, and Fujii. "Because of the Sun" opens the album, the only one of five pieces clocking in at less than ten minutes; it is a captivating start as it drifts from intensity to melodicism and back, culminating in an explosive Tamura solo. Tamura carries the dazzling display into the opening portion of his composition "Nat 4" but Takemura quickly steps in with an extended and propulsive drum solo. The piece morphs into a kind of progressive hard bop with a resilient but peculiar melody. The three-part suite "Luna Lionfish" occupies well over half-an-hour of the album and is a typically mesmerizing Fujii work. Each of the movements is distinctly different, though there is a consistency that holds them together. The opening section features the kind of experimental/noise playing that Tamura excels at. In contrast, the first section is carried off with Fujii's most delicate playing. Much of "Luna Lionfish 2" is dark and ominous with a warped blues feeling and. here again, Fujii catches the listener off-guard, switching gears completely at the close. The closing movement is a mélange of quiet passages and absorbing eruptions of vitality, the quartet sounding like an orchestra at times.

Bright Force is the fourth of twelve recordings that Fujii plans to release in celebration of her sixtieth birthday. Each so far has been innovative and distinctive, not only from its predecessor but from just about anything being recorded in modern jazz right now. Kira Kira weights layer upon layer of sound until it approaches a breaking point that never quite materializes. Instead, the music finds its way to someplace near perpetuity and how it gets there is never obvious. It's awe-inspiring music.

Track Listing

Because Of The Sun; Nat 4; Luna Lionfish: Luna Lionfish 1; Luna Lionfish 2: Luna Lionfish 3.

Personnel

Satoko Fujii: piano; Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Alister Spence: Rhodes electric piano, effects pedals, preparations; Ittetsu Takemura: drums.

Album information

Title: Bright Force | Year Released: 2018 | Record Label: Libra Records

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.