Satoko Fujii - Hyaku, One Hundred Dreams

January 12, 2023

Label: Libra Records, 2022

Personnel - Satoko Fujii: piano, composition; Ingrid Laubrock: tenor saxophone; Sara Schoenbeck: bassoon; Wadada Leo Smith: trumpet; Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Ikue Mori: electronics; Brandon Lopez: bass; Tom Rainey: drums; Chris Corsano: drums.

For her 100th album as a leader, the prolific avant-garde jazz pianist and composer Satoko Fujii assembles a tight-knit nine-piece ensemble filled with talent. The five-part suite that constitutes Hyaku, One Hundred Dreams was composed at home during Covid years, and matured into a compelling work captured live at The DiMenna Center in NYC.

With undeniable virtuosity, Fujii’s dreams begin enigmatic, dreamy and explorative with piano, percussion and electronics giving the example. They are later joined by the booming bass notes of Brandon Lopez, who makes his debut under the command of the bandleader. After a noisy collective passage, it’s the bassoonist Sara Schoenbeck, another novelty in Fujii’s new lineup, who shines with melodic attentiveness and timbral expansion. Following Wadada Leo Smith’s short yet alluring trumpet reverie, the pair of drummers - Tom Rainey and Chris Corsano - assumes a centripetal forward pull with energy. Ceremonial unisons give the piece its conclusion.

The Japanese trumpeter Natsuki Tamura takes control of “Part 2” in its inception, but the grinding bowed bass of the final section oozes some shades that go well with the previous buzzing, low-pitched fervor. “Part 3” features saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock in fashionable creativity with bass and drums. The other horn players work as tension inducers, but it’s the clusters of trumpet, electronics and drums that build up distinct layers of sound. Flurries of notes with exploratory impulses and impetuous interjections are part of the melodic thrust created by Laubrock and Schoenbeck. They maintain the momentum here, taking us directly to “Part 4”, where wonderful accented lines and a flowing angularity recall Andrew Hill. Electronic artist Ikue Mori organizes a section of her own, and then we have brass instruments and woodwinds in polyphonic counterpoint. Laubrock steps forward though, radiating interesting voicings with a handful of extended techniques. There’s no stiff metronomics but rather a free-flowing stream that benefits all these broad-minded improvisers.

“Part 5” brings the suite to a close, apparently as a self-possessed melodic configuration with a perceptible harmonic underpin. But then, things expand into multiple debate with the four horns at the center, and encouraging rock-prompted fluxes that also put the drummers in the foreground. Fujii, a tireless dreamer, is a creative force with an envelope-pushing imagination. She’s found here in the pinnacle of her compositional capacities.

Favorite Tracks:
01 - One Hundred Dreams, Part One ► 03 - Part Three ► 04 - Part Four

Satoko Fujii / Joe Fonda - Thread of Light

April 7, 2022

Label: FSR Records, 2022

Personnel - Satoko Fujii: piano; Joe Fonda: bass, cello, flute.

Thread of Light, the fifth collaboration between the prolific Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii and American bassist Joe Fonda was recorded separately in their respective homes of Kobe and New York during the pandemic. The conceptual idea for this record came from the bassist, after listening to Fujii’s piano solo pieces on bandcamp. He would complement the pianist’s vibes and feelings according to his own perception of the music, and the result was eight improvised duets and two solo numbers, one by each musician.

Sober and tempered in tone, “Kochi” is a solid opener where the duo is clearly on the same wavelength. Fonda added wafting bass plucks and intentional sliding motions to Fujii’s majestic piano playing, and the unification of their sounds - whether spacious or compact - is always treated with tasteful refinement. More electrifying, “Fallen Leaves Dance” has Fujii offering hasty runs and a low-pitched groove that welcomes Fonda’s unstoppable fretless rambles. This systematically kinetic interplay veers completely with the next track, “Reflection”, whose experimental world of mystery captures speculative tones through the use of prepared piano, extended techniques, and a fine combination of creeping pizzicato and noir arco bass legato. The latter piece is tonally related to the austere “Between Blue Sky and Cold Water”, where Fonda plays cello. In this part, an ominous stillness comes out on top.

Mostly designed with canny single notes, “Anticipating” is turned into a polyrhythmic dance for two, with merely sparse harmonic fragments. In turn, “Wind Sound” is an atmospheric exertion containing contemplative flute lines in opposition to the ringing and metallic sounds of the prepared piano. This avant-garde setting arises curiosity in the way the musicians move through sound and texture, but the solo pieces by each don’t fall behind. Fonda’s solo delivery, called “My Song”, shows he’s a melodicist capable of taming angular impulses with a tremendous beauty. For her part, Fujii tackles her radiant “Winter Sunshine” with an indelible folk connotation and remarkable rhythmic agility. By turns, the album’s moodiness transfixes and beguiles.

Favorite Tracks:
01 - Kochi ► 02 - Fallen Leaves Dance ► 03 - Reflection

Satoko Fujii Orchestra New York - Entity

April 1, 2020

Label: Libra Records, 2020

Personnel - Satoko Fujii: composer, arranger; Oscar Noriega: alto saxophone; Briggan Krauss: alto saxophone; Ellery Eskelin: alto saxophone; Tony Malaby: tenor saxophone; Andy Laster: baritone saxophone; Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Herb Robertson: trumpet; Dave Ballou: trumpet; Curtis Hasselbring: trombone; Joe Fiedler: trombone; Nels Cline: guitar; Stomu Takeishi: bass; Ches Smith: drums.

Satoko Fujii is a prolific and multifaceted Japanese pianist, composer, and bandleader who has been playing in a variety of formats, from solo to small groups to large ensembles. Her delightful avant-garde style acquires a relevant expression with Entity, the 11th outing of her acclaimed 13-piece Orchestra New York, an assembly of some of the greatest jazz improvisers out there.

Inspired by the Buddhism, Fujii composed and arranged the five tracks on the record with the specific qualities of these musicians in mind. And the result is a wonderful sonic ride pervaded with surprise and adventure.

The title track welcomes you with a colossal jarring chord issued collectively, after which Ches Smith’s meticulous percussive work finds space available. The horns punctuate his expressions with a logic agglomeration of notes, forecasting a sonic storm that is brought by Nels Cline’s electrifying guitar. The rhythm keeps mutating into a panoply of body rocking locomotions and the guitarist dives deep in the noise rock, freeing bittersweet dissonance until a horn-driven passage brings tranquility. This is just before another sonic eruption arrives, this time accelerating into a crescendo with fiery saxophone outbursts.

“Flashback” takes a more straightforward inception through precise orchestral movements, the source of an incredible energy. Dynamics are cooked with carefully chosen ingredients and their distinguished seasoning refrains from spice things up all the time. This is noticeable when it all comes to a relative calm with electric bass noodling by Stomu Takeishi and an insouciant muted trombone drive by Joe Fiedler, who later leads a denser passage laced with tension. From then, we hear Oscar Noriega stretching out alone on alto saxophone, and the expressive trumpet of Herb Robertson projected against a minimalist background.

“Gounkaiku” starts off like a game of timbres provided by a spontaneous arrangement for the horn players, who devotedly build a panel of mosaics for approximately four and a half minutes. Bassist and drummer then provide twangy spells and rumbling toms, respectively, reaching wider panoramic landscapes, and the climax occurs with Dave Ballou inserting an unabashed trumpet solo while benefiting from Cline’s versatile accompaniment. An inclination to darker atmospheres marks the ending of this track.

If “Elementary Particle” offers a wild late section, “Everlasting” is a spiritual detour that proclaims a far more direct relationship with melody. This prayerful exercise is configured with occasional droning for mystery, and ethereal streams of light. Strange dialogues break out with air sounds, circular routines, slap and flutter tonguing expressions, obsessive squeaks, moaning whispers, and long stretchable notes. Embracing delicate shades of feeling, the orchestra creates moments of sheer beauty.

Fujii’s identity is stronger than ever, and her orchestral empowerment enmeshes textures, improvisations and timbres into a satisfying, cohesive whole.

Favorite Tracks:
01 - Entity ► 02 - Flashback ► 05 - Everlasting

Satoko Fujii Orchestra New York - Fukushima

December 19, 2017

Label: Libra Records, 2017

Lineup - Satoko Fujii: composer, arranger, conductor; Tony Malaby, Ellery Eskelin: tenor sax; Oscar Noriega: alto sax; Andy Laster: baritone sax; Dave Ballou, Herb Robertson, Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Joey Sellers, Joe Fiedler, Curtis Hasselbring: trombone; Nels Cline: guitar; Stomu Takeishi: electric bass; Ches Smith: drums.

Creative Japanese pianist, composer, and bandleader Satoko Fujii had a particularly appealing year in terms of new music and enrichment of a prolific and audacious career marked by consistency and innovation.

Following the stimulating album Aspiration, a quartet session recorded with the virtuosic trumpeters Wadada Leo Smith and Natsuki Tamura and electronics wizard Ikue Mori, the pianist focuses on a wider scenario, commanding her famous Orchestra New York, a 13-piece big band that includes some of the best improvisers and sound explorers on the scene. The work expresses feelings and sensations related to the nuclear power plant disaster of Fukushima occurred in 2011.

Devised as a continuous one-hour suite, the piece was divided into five untitled parts for this record, starting with air noises that can be associated with wind blows or sea waves coming and going, intercalated with aching silences. In the periphery of this irregular hissing, we have percussive garnitures such as irregular rattles, screeches, and impulsive baritone notes surrounded by atmospheric guitar chops. It’s a slow awakening, but a powerful one. And that can be testified when the guitarist Nels Cline applies his tart chords, joining Stomu Takeishi’s electric bass plucks before a mysterious sonic mass of short cacophonous phrases and rueful cries grows in anxiety and dimension.

“Track 2” is a mutable 16-minute odyssey that flourishes with the consistent drumming of Ches Smith, who roots it through the regularity of his breathable cymbal strokes. It obtains an ominous, electrifying textural persuasiveness while assorted saxophones murmur upon. A beautifully melodic moment comes to our attention when the written lines, delivered in parallel motion by the reedists, fill our ears with a magnified certitude. The saxophonists, often resorting to flutter-tonguing and other extended multi-timbre techniques, cause a great impression, operating over a malleable, thin, yet absorbing foundation built by bass, guitar, and subdued brushed drumming. This piece flutters with extraordinary dynamics and its segments are sometimes light and easygoing yet, at moments, dense and severe due to occasional collective ascendancy. Everything ends like in the beginning (with air sounds) but not before the establishment of a stylish passage where the horn section holds on a predetermined phrase laid down over a solid, tendentiously dark tapestry rooted in the rock genre.

Far more reserved, “Track 3” brings us Noriega's saxophone roams with multiple ticking sounds aside, featuring trumpet wails and laments, collective warbles, and a relentless buzzing intensified by a trombone that begs for backup. He gets it by the end in another grandiose instrumentation packed with emotion and color.

Before the concise heavenly contemplation of “Track 5”, the record's encouraging final piece, “Track 4” packs another great instrumental juncture that begins unhurriedly with four bass notes implying a sparse yet revelatory harmonic sequence. It scrumptiously unfolds into a groove as the baritone of Andy Laster joins the bassist, welcoming the improvisers to share something from their own. After a few indignant collective roars, the victory of human resilience arrives with the regeneration of the unyielding 5/4 groove.

Painfully contemporary and garnished with off-kilter elements and conscientious coalescence, Fukushima is another triumph for Ms. Fujii, an insightful orchestrator.

Favorite Tracks:
02 – Track 2 ► 03 – Track 3 ► 04 – Track 4

Satoko Fujii - Aspiration

October 12, 2017

Label/Year: Libra Records, 2017

Lineup – Wadada Leo Smith: trumpet; Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Satoko Fujii: piano; Ikue Mori: electronics.

Prolific Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii became a reference in the extreme end of the avant-garde jazz. Not only her ambitious big band projects (New York, Tokyo, and Berlin) have deserved accolade all over the world, but also other collaborative works like the great album Duets, recorded with the inventive bassist Joe Fonda, have drawn very positive reactions among the lovers of the creative current.

On Aspiration, her latest album, she relies on a portentous frontline of trumpeters composed of Natsuki Tamura and Wadada Leo Smith, and complements it with the electronics wizard Ikue Mori. This unusual formation also marks the very first collaboration of the pianist with the latter two.

To introduce “Intent” there is a cutting, multiphonic trumpet, later joined by its equal, which operates in synch but an octave below. Fujii’s awe-inspiring chords and linear notes contextualize the pair of horns, which keep emitting beseeching cries, in an unpredictable contemplative-aggressive communion that feels as much sinister as marvelous. The tasteful electronic effects thrown in by Mori integrate perfectly with Fujii’s textural approach. This also becomes particularly noticeable on the title track, a showcase for the bandleader’s entrancing harmonic movements and melodic delineations, and “Floating”, a piece where the trumpets fiercely clash after an atmospheric start. The horns collapse, having Fujii’s meddling framework attempting to get between them. They end up agreeing at the end, reducing the turbulence considerably and following the same interstellar route with unflinching stability.

“Liberation”, composed by the quartet, is another segment where we can observe Wadada and Tamura embarking on mesmerizing blows as they explore the timbres of their instruments. The long high-pitched notes dropped by one of them go against the muted short phrases of the other, while Fujii, getting into action at a later time, sounds relentlessly spectral in her moves. The band skews any effusive liberating movement until the last section, which engulfs us with a stormy, deep-toned sonic efflux.

The last track is Tamura’s “Stillness”, whose initial deep tranquility awakes gradually, stirring dynamics while progressing toward a whirlwind of emotions. It is a wonderful track and the proper closure of this narrative work.

Aspiration is a challenging trip to the free-form imaginaries of a quartet that searches for the perfect poise in the abstractness and exactness of sounds.

Favorite Tracks:
01 - Intent ► 04 - Aspiration ► 06 - Stillness

Satoko Fujii Orchestra Tokyo - Peace

February 7, 2017

Satoko Fujii: piano; Masaya Kimura and Kenichi Matsumoto: tenor sax; Sachi Hayasaka: soprano and alto sax; Kunihiro Izumi: alto sax; Ryuichi Yoshida: baritone sax; Christian Pruvost, Natsuki Tamura, Yoshihito Fukumoto, Takao Watanabe: trumpet; Yasuyuki Takahashi, Haguregumo Nagamatsu, Toshihiro Koike: trombone; Toshiki Nagata: bass; Akira Horikoshi and Peter Orins: drums.

Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii, a highly creative exponent of the international avant-garde jazz scene, has been riding on the crest of the wave through formations that range from solo to large ensembles.
Throughout more than two decades, experimentalism has been a trait she exploits in each of her albums.

Her latest feature, Peace, recorded with the 15-piece Orchestra Tokyo, is a stunningly arranged tribute to the late Canadian guitarist Kelly Churko, who lived in Japan for more than a decade before dying of cancer in 2014. This is the pianist’s fifth album with this particular orchestra, another high point in her vast curriculum of big-band formations (New York, Nagoya, Kobe, and Berlin), and an excellent follow-up to her duo recording with the bassist Joe Fonda, precisely entitled Duet.

The album kicks in with “2014”, a 32-minute challenge delivered with no obstructions or discriminations. It features two French guests: drummer Peter Orins and trumpeter Christian Pruvost. The latter opens the curtains with breath attacks and then steadfast phrases, entering into a strange dialogue with the former. Subsequently, the saxophonist Masaya Kimura and the trombonist Yasuyuki Takahashi create another unorthodox, microtonal dialogue. Advancing like a storm, the tune easily gets the shape of a 4/4 orchestral jubilation populated with percussive contrivance and brash horn blows. All wrapped up in psychedelic effervescence.

“Jasper” has no connotations with the amazing vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson, who gave the same title to one of his most unforgettable tunes. It was rather composed by Fujii’s husband, the trumpeter Natsuki Tamura. In a symbiotic exchange, Toshiki Nagata’s balmy bowed bass and Sachi Hayasaka’s melodious soprano wave at each other in an accessible, curvy salutation peppered by Oriental flavors. Despite the pacific atmosphere, don’t be surprised if paroxysms arise in a sporadic way.

Highly contrasting is the title track, a colorful eruption of avant-jazz muscularity whose horn infestation creates sonic noise and confusion, even if well-defined melodic lines inhabit in the back.

Chosen to close, is “Beguine Nummer Eins”, a grandiose triumph that glides as a freeing hymn, similar to those of Carla Bley or Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra. A voluptuous susceptibility takes possession of the melodic strolls, which are galvanized by Yoshihito Fukumoto’s emphatic trumpet solo.

Whether attracting or repulsing, Fujii’s music is always full of passion and unlimited artistic creativity. Peace was forged by the hands of an adventurous pianist and master conductor who’s capable of moving in different directions with an extravagant magnificence.

Favorite Tracks:
01 – 2014 ►02 – Jasper ►04 – Beguine Nummer Eins