It’s so odd to observe Satoko Fujii in a conventional jazz trio setting because nothing about this pianist is conventional. But she’s done this before some time back and after eight years, Fujii has decided it’s time to do it again.
Moon On the Lake is the recording debut of the Satoko Fujii Tokyo Trio, where the sage composer is backed by a younger generation rhythm section comprised of Takashi Sugawa on bass and cello and Ittetsu Takemura on drums. Although Fujii has a deep appreciation for the piano jazz trio in the Bill Evans sense, that’s not what she’s going for here. Instead, the focus is not so much on style than on hearing the individual personalities on display both alone and in telepathic interaction with each other. Music is the happy by-product.
Fujii wastes no time in ceding the floor to her bandmates, either. After a brief reading of the theme of “Hansho,” we are treated right away to the solo bass acumen of Sugawa and Fujii’s understated return brings to focus how much Sugawa’s improvised bass figures stay within the shape of the melody. After another statement of the main figure, Takemura makes his own statement on drums, inventive and not easily pigeonholed. Only after that do we hear the full trio stretch out together, and they do so with perfect simpatico.
“Wait For the Moon to Rise” is an exemplar for Fujii-led bands resourcefully wringing out uncommon sounds out of acoustic instruments. Here, they are able to resemble the resonance of a full string orchestra and I have no idea how they were able to achieve that.
Fujii songs don’t normally run very long, so the eighteen-minute “Aspiration” is a fairly rare occasion of her executing such an extended form. Starting on solo piano with dramatic, dark figures more akin to classical than jazz, this is followed almost five minutes later by Sugawa’s chamber performance on bowed bass, where he is able to match the leader in profundity and intelligence. Takemura doesn’t appear until halfway through, and his angular showcase emphasizes the spaces between the beats as much as the beats themselves. The fury builds up over the course of his presentation, though, and teaming up with Fujii, they culminate it into the inevitable release.
Takemura activates “Keep Running” with a drumming feature that minds the timbres as much as the percussive elements. Sugawa comes in on bass to add sauce to it and then Fujii’s entry instigates the whole group into free-form jazz mode, spending the rest of the performance liberally crisscrossing the lines between the charted and uncharted.
On “Moon On the Lake,” the trio delves into hushed, apprehensive tones, stringing along the development with seemingly as little notes as possible. Eventually, they arrive at a spot where a melody of fragile beauty appears, and then tumult.
So in the end, Satoko Fujii’s Tokyo Trio isn’t even close to being a conventional jazz trio. It’s often not even functioning as a jazz trio, strictly speaking. But it is a Satoko Fujii ensemble in every sense, with the grace, sophistication, surprise and ingenuity found in every other of her ensembles. Only this time in a small, nimble, and deceptively familiar construction.
Moon On the Lake is now on sale, from Libra Records.
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