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| Out May 9 – Satoko Fujii This Is It! Delivers Boisterous Third Album 'Message' with Takashi Itani and Natsuki Tamura Pianist-composer Satoko Fujii has an uncanny talent for picking musicians who can bring out unexpected aspects of her music. That ability is in full display on Message, the third album by her trio This Is It!, featuring long-time collaborator and life partner, trumpeter Natsuki Tamura, and the buoyant, unpredictable percussionist Takashi Itani. They are all deep listeners who are unafraid to strike off in new directions, and together they seemingly travel anywhere they like. The result is an album of boundless creativity and bubbling high spirits. The album will be released May 9, 2025, via Libra Records. "I always like having the 'voice' of my bandmates in my music, " Fujii says. "All my collaborators are great improvisers and they each have a different approach to my music. When they put their voice in my music, I feel like it has so much more life. Takashi Itani is a crazy percussion player. My compositions are sometimes too serious, but with him they can be full of humor." The trio debuted during Fujii's yearlong celebration of her 60th birthday in 2018 with 1538 (Libra). She had been trying to put together a new band but hadn't found the right combination of musicians. When Itani joined her and Tamura, the chemistry was immediate, and she realized that "This is it!" They followed up their explosive first recording in 2021 with Mosaic (Libra), recorded live via the Internet during the pandemic. Now they're back with Message, an album that bears the strong imprint of their distinctive approaches, but which sounds unlike any of their previous releases. They open the album with the title track, achieving a perfect balance of improvised freedom and composed structure. Each mode feeds off the other as the trio seamlessly welds references to Fujii's angular composition into their improvising. In a characteristically varied performance, Fujii and Itani engage in an intense duet of classical free-jazz proportions, Tamura's fluid lines soar over a jagged landscape of piano and drums, and Itani takes a rapid fire, beautifully orchestrated trap drum solo backed by Fujii and Tamura playing the written theme. Fujii's marvelously free-flowing solo opens "Cryptography, " a lyrical piece during which the trio weaves together delicate translucent sounds and tones with a big-picture sense of order and development. Named in honor of a Middle Eastern restaurant near an apartment that Fujii and Tamura once had in Berlin, "Falafel Feast" finds the trio deeply engaged in a thrilling collective improvisation before they kick in to Fujii's dancing odd-metered theme. The music has great immediacy and excitement. . "Ernesto" was inspired by a biography of Ernesto "Che" Guevara that Fujii read during the pandemic. Fujii's piano is in the foreground throughout the moody, turbulent piece, along with some gritty trumpet work from Tamura. "I couldn't agree with violent revolution, but I was moved with his passion, " she says. "I would like to live like him—without compromise and dedicated to pursuing the things that I believe in." "Never Mind" is another dynamic romp for the trio, full of explosive energy and urgency. The album concludes with "Orange Flicker, " a hushed, translucent piece, shot through with subtle tone colors. Pianist and composer Satoko Fujii, "an improviser of rumbling intensity and generous restraint" (Giovanni Russonello, New York Times), is one of the most original voices in jazz today. For nearly 30 years, she has created a unique, personal music that spans many genres, blending jazz, contemporary classical, rock, and traditional Japanese music into an innovative synthesis instantly recognizable as hers alone. A composer for ensembles of all sizes and a performer who has appeared around the world, she was the recipient of a 2020 Instant Award in Improvised Music, in recognition of her "artistic intelligence, independence, and integrity." Frequently cited in the DownBeat Critics' Poll, in 2024, she ranked high in three categories—piano, big band, and arranger. In 2022, she released Hyaku, One Hundred Dreams her 100th album as a leader. On the way to this impressive milestone, she has led some of the most consistently creative ensembles in modern improvised music, including a piano trio with Mark Dresser and Jim Black (1997-2009). In addition to a wide variety of small groups, Fujii also performs in a duo with trumpeter Natsuki Tamura, with whom she's recorded nine albums since 1997. She and Tamura are also one half of the international free-jazz quartet Kaze, which has released seven albums since their debut in 2011. Fujii has established herself as one of the world's leading composers for large jazz ensembles. Almost a quarter of her albums have been with jazz orchestras, prompting Cadence magazine to call her "the Ellington of free jazz." Satoko Fujii's This Is It! – Message Libra Records – Catalog Number: 203-080 Recorded October 8, 2024 Release date – May 9, 2025 write your comments about the article :: © 2025 Jazz News :: home page |