Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Satoko Fujii Orchestra Tokyo: Peace

Satoko Fujii Orchestra Tokyo: Peace

By Dan McClenaghan
December 18, 2016
View read count

The rumor rolled out in mid-2016 that Japanese pianist/composer/bandleader

Satoko Fujii

piano
b.1958

" data-original-title="" title="">Satoko Fujii had another orchestral album on the way. Peace was the title. "Peace" isn't a word that normally comes to mind when considering Fujii's music. "Bedlam," maybe, but not "peace."

In preparation for the oncoming Peace, three previous Fujii orchestral CDs on Libra Records came down off the shelf and spun onto the sound system: Ichigo Ichie (2015), by her Berlin Orchestra; Shiki (2014) from her New York group; and Zakoplane (2010), by the same ensemble responsible for Peace, the Satoko Fujii Orchestra Tokyo. The listening sessions confirmed the opinion that her large ensemble work is nothing if not adventurous and astounding, featuring brass/reed/rhythm section riots and percussive detonations juxtaposed against periods of delicately-rendered repose, sections of gorgeous harmony and near mainstream, two and three instrumental interplay, and noise, and squeaks and howls and sputters and brass flatulence

Noise: during a concert in San Diego in August of 2008 with her group ma-do, after her husband, trumpeter

Natsuki Tamura

trumpet
b.1951

" data-original-title="" title="">Natsuki Tamura involved himself with a call and response with the whistle of a passing train, a woman in the front seat of the audience, at the tune's ending, dropped her cell phone with a loud plastic clatter. Fujii, beaming, rose from her piano chair and told the woman that she liked that sound she had made. Certainly there was some Fujii-esque graciousness involved, but she was also certainly sincere. She really had liked that noise.

Peace, a tribute to the late guitarist Kelly Churko, who played on Fujii's Zakoplane and also her First Meeting set, Cut the Rope (Libra Records, 2009), starts with noise music—something Churko loved. The tune "2014" (the year Churko died) opens the album with what sounds like ghost breezes blowing through a spooky house. Then the chattering begins—the guess here it Natsuki Tamura working his trumpet magic, unaccompanied, then in duo with one of the set's two drummers five minutes into the thirty-three minute tune. Then the orchestra enters, in a loose, surging, melancholy segment that cuts off sharply, giving way a stuttering, squawking trombone interjected with low-in-the-mix vocal proclamations leading into a spirited trombone/tenor sax conversation. There is also a section that sounds like a stroll through a working construction site: jack hammers pounding, power saws singing.

Peace features a pair of guests from one of Fujii's wilder ensembles, Kaze: drummer

Peter Orins

drums

" data-original-title="" title="">Peter Orins and trumpeter

Christian Pruvost

trumpet

" data-original-title="" title="">Christian Pruvost. Provost combines his powerhouse percussive propulsion with that of the regular Orchestra Tokyo drummer Akira Horikoshi's. It results in some explosive moments. And Orins, combined with Tamura, leads the orchestra's brass sound into levels of density and strangeness not often heard.

The Natsuki Tamura-penned "Jasper" is a different sound, washes of horns pulsing over a drone, building to a crescendo then tapering down to relative peace. And the tune "Peace" is anything but peaceful. It opens as a riot, then moves into a segment that sounds as though they put a microphone up against a jar full of hornets, after somebody shook the jar. And the closer, "Beguine Nummer Eins," sounds almost mainstream, in a boldly pastoral way.

The pre-Peace spin-through of Fujii's previous orchestral outing says that the composer took more than her usual risks in putting this sound together. It has an audacity and powerful joy of creation that rises, ever so slightly, above her best orchestral work.

Learn more about our star rating system

Track Listing

2014, Jasper; Peace; Beguine Nummer Eins.

Personnel

Satoko Fujii

piano

Satoko Fujii: conductor/composer; Kunihiro Izumi: alto sax; Sachi Hayasaka: soprano sax, alto sax; Kenichi Matsumoto: tenor sax; Ryuichi Yoshida: baritone sax; Natsuki Tamura: trumpet; Yosihito Fukumoto: trumpet; Takao Watanabe: trumpet; Yusaku Shirotani: trumpet; Haguregumo Nagamatsu: trombone; Yasuyuki Takahashi: trombone; Toshihiro Koiki: trombone;Toshiki Nagata: bass; Akira Harikoshi: drums; Christian Pruvost: trumpet; Peter Orins: drums

Album information

Title: Peace | Year Released: 2016 | Record Label: Libra Records

PREVIOUS / NEXT

Peace
< Previous

Top Ten Musicians Who Embody Cool
Next >

Support All About Jazz

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.