One of Satoko Fujii’s first ensembles in the mid-90s following her graduate studies was a trio with bassist Mark Dresser and drummer Jim Black. From their first record Looking Out of The Window on, Fujii quickly established herself as a pianist and composer who unabashedly mixed jazz, classical and improvisation, unafraid of taking chances and she encouraged her bandmates to do the same. In doing so, she changed the rules of what a piano jazz trio could do. Today, Fujii’s primary piano trio these days is her Tokyo Trio and the basic script with this trio hadn’t changed from that one more than a quarter century ago except that it’s even brasher, unpredictable and risk-loving.
Now with their second release Jet Black, Fujii, bassist Takashi Sugawa and drummer Ittetsu Takemura build on the sumptuous 2021 debut Moon On The Lake, which revealed the prowess of Fujii’s new partners. This time around, the three had since gotten to know each other better and that prowess is even better directed at running down all the possible alleys opened up by Fujii’s pliable compositions.
Fujii has a buoyant, fetching melody for “Along The Way” but she reveals it in chunks, making sudden stops for freeform performances by Takemura, Sugawa and then Fujii herself. As nothing stays still for long, the song moves into another phase, also full of surprises lurking around the corner before returning to the theme.
Sugawa and Takemura handle the front end of “Gentle Slope,” revealing that like their leader, they don’t play to expected conventions while also performing with purpose. When the duo turns into a trio, we find a song where rhythm and harmony are tightly intertwined and the trademark playfulness thriving within a serious composition that nonetheless leaves room for almost limitless improvisation.
The leeway Fujii gives her bandmates is precisely what makes this trio so special. Sugawa plays a pensively on arco bass for the initial phase of “Sky Reflection” and his cohorts feed the dark, brooding mood that he sets until Fujii brings the song into the light with an affecting piano that dispenses with genre in favor of pure emotion.
“From Sometime” runs on pure instinct, carefully building up to a galvanizing climax. Fujii moves the proceedings of “Take A Step” from a stammering state to studious arco bass and drum explorations to ultimately an identifiable, bass-led motif.
“Jet Black” ends the program placing more emphasis on melody than spontaneity and gosh, what a pretty melody it is.
Jet Black is out now, courtesy of Libra Records.
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