Born: March 13, 1971 Primary Instrument: Piano
SHOKO NAGAI (Composer/ Pianist/ Accordionist/ Improviser) Born in Nagoya, Japan, Shoko Nagai has been evolving as a professional musician for 20 years. After graduating from Berklee College of Music in 1999 she moved to New York City and quickly established herself in the downtown jazz scene performing with such renowned artists as John Zorn, Rasheid Ali, Miho Hatori (Cibo Matto), Ikue Mori, Satoshi Takeishi, Butch Morris, Elliot Sharp to name a few. The Shoko Nagai Quintet which features some of New York's best musicians has performed extensively at the BlueNote, The Stone, Joe's Pub, Vision Festival, Roulette and The Kitchen as well as at other top New York clubs. Nagai has performed in Sweden with Sanda Weigl (Nobel prize private ceremony 2009 for Herta Muller), Norway (Natt jazz festival 1998) in Germany (Moers jazz festival 2006), Japan, Switzerland, Brasil (resfest 2007), Israel, Canada (Suoni Popolo festival 2008) and United States(Freihofer's Jazz festival 2008). Her most recent project is “Vortex” which is a composition/ free improvisation duet with electronics. In 2010 she received grant from NYFA , in 2008 she received a grant from grant for JazzJaunts. She recently worked on music for an documentary film “ANPO” (selected 2011 Toronto film festival, Vancouver film festival, Hong Kong film festival, Poland film festival )about US/Japan peace treaty directed by Linda Hoaglund with Satoshi Takeishi which has been shown world wide. she worked for French film music “ L'AMOUR CACHÉ” (2007) directed by Alessandro Capone, conducted by Butch Morris. Also composed music for the Japanese film “ Starfish Hotel “ (2006) directed by John Williams with Satoshi Takeishi.”They give their all, whether the music is passing through a becalmed, inward phase, or whether it's arcing up to a pinnacle of beautiful excess”. (Time out New York)
