Fujii, Tamura, and Mori then proceeded to follow the compositional guidelines and send music files of their performances back and forth around the world via the Internet. Pruvost and Orins then added a new twist to the file-exchange procedure. “Instead of adding individually to the sound files, they did a very interesting thing,” Fujii said. “They played along with our files at a concert in Lille and recorded it. Ikue, Natsuki and I were not in the concert, but our recordings were. We try many different ways to make music!”
The combination of live and pre-recorded interactions, guided by compositions designed to accommodate the remotely situated players, results in uncommonly fluid and naturally developing music that belies the circumstances under which it was made. For instance, the Pruvost and Orins composition “Masoandro Mitsoka” guides the quintet from a quiet introduction into a kaleidoscopic group improvisation with acoustic and electronic colors swirling around a dialog between the trumpets. Ikue Mori’s “Motion Dynamics” sets up complex ensemble give-and-take that continuously changes the shape and flow of the piece. Fujii’s “Crustal Movement” establishes an irregular rhythm that pushes and pulls the group along a zig-zag path into a roiling mass that throws off sparks of color. Tamura’s “Rolle Cake” is a subtle tone poem that glides easily through subdued, almost lyrical passages and rumbling, anxious moments. The detail in the group interactions, the organic development of each piece, and the lovely flashes of surprise and discovery are exceptional throughout.
“The music may be quieter than when Kaze plays live,” Fujii noted. “We have a tendency to heat up so much and so easily when we’re on stage together. That’s harder to do when we’re remote, but we can still be exploring and intense.”
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. “Fujii’s music troubles the divide between abstraction and realism,” Russonello continues. “Plucking or scraping the strings of the piano; covering them up as she strikes the keys…. All of this amounts to abstract expressionism, in musical form. But it’s equaled by her rich sense of simplicity, sprung from the feeling that she is simply converting the riches of the world around her into music.”
For more than 25 years and over 100 albums as a leader, 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 prolific 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.”
Japanese trumpeter and composer Natsuki Tamura is internationally recognized for a unique musical vocabulary that blends jazz lyricism with extended techniques. This unpredictable virtuoso has led bands with radically different approaches throughout his career. He’s played avant-rock jazz fusion with the Natsuki Tamura Quartet, First Meeting, and Junk Box. Since 2005, he has focused on the intersection of European folk music and sound abstraction with Gato Libre. He also has recorded four albums of solo trumpet. A member of many of Fujii’s ensembles, ranging from orchestra to trios and quartets, he has also recorded eight duet CDs with her. Last year he released a half-dozen digital albums, including a composition for brass quintet. Tamura’s category-defying abilities make him “unquestionably one of the most adventurous trumpet players on the scene today,” said Marc Chenard in Coda.
Peter Orins is a French drummer, who has been playing jazz, improvised and experimental music since the mid-90’s. In 2001 he created the Circum collective (now called Muzzix) for which he’s still one of the artistic directors. Leading numerous projects inside the collective, from solo works to big orchestras, he also plays with many international musicians (Satoko Fujii, Natsuki Tamura, Ikue Mori, Dave Rempis, Joke Lanz, Michael Pisaro-Liu, Anthony Pateras, Jean-Luc Guionnet, Sophie Agnel, and Christine Wodrascka and others), and is very active on the improvised music scene in France and abroad. Since 2004, he has managed Circum-Disc, an artist-run label which has released some 100 recordings.
Christian Pruvost is a composer, improviser and trumpeter who has collaborated widely in jazz, improvised music and the performing arts. During its formation, he dedicated himself to concrete and acousmatic music and to electroacoustic composition with Carole Rieussec and Roger Cochini. His inventiveness and the originality of his approach have led to performances in France and internationally. He serves as artistic director for multiple projects in the Muzzix collective, and collaborates with numerous international musicians and ensembles (Dedalus, Axel Dörner, Otomo Yoshihide, Tom Johnson, Michael Pisaro-Liu, Satoko Fujii, Jérôme Noetinger, Cor Fuhler, Tony Buck, Nicole Mitchell, and others).
2022 MacArthur “Genius” Grant awardee, Ikue Mori moved from her native city of Tokyo to New York in 1977, where she started playing drums and soon formed the seminal No Wave band DNA, creating a new brand of radical rhythms and dissonant sounds and forever altering the face of rock music. In the mid 80's she started in employ drum machines in the unlikely context of improvised music. In 2000 she started using the laptop computer to expand on her already signature sound, thus broadening her scope of musical expression. She has received commissions from the Kitchen, Relache Ensemble, and the Tate Modern, among others. She performs with Mephista, a trio with Sylvie Courvoiser and Susie Ibarra, various John Zorn ensembles, Wadada Leo Smith, Ken Vandermark, and many others.
In the usual collective spirit of the group, each member contributes compositions for the recording. Knowing that this would be a largely remote effort, they each planned out pieces that were more like written outlines than musical scores. “We all composed a structure and made a blueprint,” Fujii said. “In most cases we made a chart on paper, not on music paper. The blueprints have time durations and instrumentation and some instructions like ‘play fast’ or ‘play quietly.’”
www.satokofujii.com/
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