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Mamiko Watanabe
About Me
“Unafraid to explore and incorporate different styles, Mamiko Watanabe
plays and composes with passion and direction” - jazzreview.com
Like the best piano trios,Watanabe’s threesome has the focus and
interplay
of a working band -Jazz Inside Magazine
“Watanabe's piano playing and leadership on both discs is deft,
challenging and always solid.” - All About Jazz NY
“Ms.Watanabe already has a sound of her own plus impressive
technique. Her creativity is impressive throughout these modern
mainstreem performances and she is a skilled songwriter.” - Scott
Yanow;The Los Angeles Jazz Scene Magazine
With exposure to the different styles such Jazz, Funk, Latin, Gospel and
inspired from being surrounded by unique melodies and rhythm while
working with Brazilian and African decent, pianist Mamiko Watanabe is
trying to create uniquely her own sound and give good vibration to
people through music.
Mamiko Watanabe was born in Fukuoka, Japan and began studying
piano at age four at the Yamaha Music School. In 1999 she revived a
scholarship to attend Berklee College of Music and studied Jazz piano,
Improvisation and Composition. She was a semi-finalist at the
prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival Solo Piano Competition in Montreux,
Switzerland both in 2002 and 2003. She has toured Germany, Italy and
Japan and has performed with several jazz greats such as Joe Lovano,
Kevin Mahogany, Bobby McFerrin, Tiger Okoshi and Phil Wilson while in
college. In 2003 she received the DownBeat Student Award in the Jazz
Soloist Category before she made the decision to move to New York
and expand her musical horizons. Since then, Mamiko has performed at
notable venues such as The Kitano, Blue Note NY Sunday Brunch &
Late Night Groove Series, 55 Bar, Garage, Zinc Bar, Iridium,The Lenox
Lounge, Blues Alley (in Washington, D.C.), The Kennedy Center,
Victoria Theater (at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center), The
Knitting Factory, Bitter End, Joe's Pub and S.O.B.'s.
Her exposure to several different styles of music such as Latin, Gospel,
Reggae, Funk and R&B is the result of her working with several Afro-
Brazilian and African bands and playing Gospel in Church every Sunday
morning. She has worked with Roland Alexander Quintet, Joe Ford,
Valery Ponomarev Big Band & His Quintet and Afro-Brazilian groups
such Ogans, Dende and Velly Bahia & Kazwa Band.
As a leader, Mamiko recorded her album, One After Another in 2005
and released her second album,ORIGIN/JEWEL” in 2007 which in fact
is actually the combination of two separate discs; ORIGIN is a
collection of the Funk and Latin influences compositions and JEWEL
contains works recorded in a more straight-ahead jazz piano trio format.
Her latest album Mother Earth was released in 2010.