Izumi Kimura

Pianist Izumi Kimura explores between abstract and concrete, improvising and composing. She has performed extensively throughout Ireland and abroad since moving from Japan in 1995, and worked with some of the leading performers and ensembles from both disciplines of classical, jazz and improvised music, including RTE Symphony Orchestra, RTE Concert Orchestra, Crash Ensemble, Michael d’Arcy, Mia Cooper, Ken Edge, Benjamin Dwyer, Gerald Barry, John Buckley, Kevin O’Connell, Ian Wilson, Fergus Johnston from the world of classical music, and with jazz and improvising musicians including Barry Guy, Gerry Hemingway, Tommy Halferty, Ronan Guilfoyle, Michael Buckley, Joe O’Callaghan, Oki Itaru, Dominique Pifare?ly, Benoi?t Delbecq, Ste?phane Payen, Marco Colonna, Sarah Buechi, Lina Andonovska, Mathew Jacobson, Nick Roth, Colm O’Hara, Cora Venus Lunny. She has appeared in the festivals including RTE Living Music Festival, Boyle Arts Festival, Dublin Dance Festival, Dublin Fringe Festival, Bray Jazz Festival, Kilkenny Arts Festival, Ghent Street Festival of New Music, Music 21’s ‘Brazil Now’, ‘Artes Da Irlanda’ in Sao Paolo, Creative Connexions in Sitges, Ad Libitum Festival in Warsaw, and many more.

Butterfly Effect

By Izumi Kimura

Label: Codama Records
Released: 2025
Track listing: Hawthorn - Sceach gheal; Spindle - Feoras; Bell Heather - Fraoch Cloigi?neach; Holly - Cuileann; Forget-me-not - Lus mi?onla goirt; Rosebay Willowherb - Lus na tine; Sea Thrift - Rabha?n; Snowdrop - Plu?iri?n sneachta; Blackthorn - Draighean; Bog Cotton - Ceannbha?n; Herb-robert - Ruithe?al ri?; Selfheal - Dua?n ceannchosach; Bramble - Dris; Rain Falling on Sessile Oak - Dair ghaelach; Foxglove - Lus mo?r.

How The Dust Falls

By Izumi Kimura

Label: Auricle Records
Released: 2025
Track listing: Waterspear; Third Story; Corners; Dock Driftings; Starbook; Entertainments I; Stillness; Perimeter; Entertainments II; This Waiting Place; Chimneys; Shadowshift; Arrivals; Wishing Well.

Seven Dreams

By Izumi Kimura

Label: Fundacja Sluchaj
Released: 2025
Track listing: Dream Op. 3; Dream Op. 2; Dream Op. 6; Dream Op. 4; Dream Op. 5; Dream Op. 8; Dream Op.9

Glacial Voyage

By Christy Doran

Label: Between the Lines
Released: 2025
Track listing: Breakwater; Inishkea Islands; High Tide; Belmullet; Whale Tea Party; Downpatrick Head; Light Frames; Moon Pull; Blacksod Lighthouse; Horizon's Invitation.

Dreams And Dust: Two From Pianist Izumi Kimura

by Ian Patterson
September 10, 2025

2025 will go down as a busy year for Ireland-based, Japanese pianist Izumi Kimura. The first half of the year served up the solo album Butterfly Effect (Codama Records) and Glacial Voyage (Between The Lines)--the latter a free-form duo collaboration with guitarist Christy Doran. Both albums favored explorations of mood and textures over virtuosity. Two further ...

Barry Guy, Jaleel Shaw, Linda May Han Oh & Zoh Amba

by Maurice Hogue
July 28, 2025

English avant-garde bassist Barry Guy is considered one of the finest in any musical genre and his compositional work is equally regarded. One of his signature pieces is “Harmos," and you will hear that as performed by the London Jazz Composers Orchestra recorded live in Krakow Poland. Saxophonist Jaleel Shaw's new Painter Of The Invisible provides ...

Fabian Dudek, Dan Weiss, Jasper Hoiby & Mazam

by Maurice Hogue
June 17, 2025

German alto player Fabian Dudek's new This Every Place is an indication that Dudek's forming his own improvisational language, and his album is graced with the presence of Ingrid Laubrock. A definite must listen. There's a similar path followed by the Portuguese quartet, Mazam, on their new Pilgrimage Vol. 2. Drummer Dan Weiss' latest features a ...

Izumi Kimura: Butterfly Effect

by Ian Patterson
June 5, 2025

Japanese pianist Izumi Kimura has earned plaudits through her various improvisation-based projects with double bassist Barry Guy, percussionist Gerry Hemingway, and guitarists Christy Doran and Tommy Halferty, to cite just a few of her principal collaborators. But Kimura, a long-term resident in Ireland, is equally compelling when going it alone. Over the years, she has clocked ...

Darrifourcq/Hermia/Ceccaldi, Evans/Eldh & Ir��ne Schweizer

by Maurice Hogue
June 3, 2025

There are two mini themes running through this edition of One Man's Jazz: one is musical partners, as in the trio of Sylvain Darrifourcq, saxophonist Manuel Hermia and cellist Valentin Ceccaldi who have released but three recordings in their 13 years of trio-hood yet believe their time spent together has let them develop into one of ...