Pan Asian Chamber Jazz Ensemble

Led by Japanese composer and virtuoso violinist and erhu (Chinese violin) player Meg Okura , Pan Asian Chamber Jazz Ensemble explores areas of jazz, world music, and chamber music, while embracing traditional sounds from Japan and surrounding countries.
Meg Okura has cultivated her unique style of composition and improvisation through her richly diverse experiences as a classical violinist and an improviser in jazz and world music. Originally from Tokyo, Okura has performed all over the world at numerous music festivals and concert halls including Carnegie Hall, Barbican Hall in London, Hollywood Bowl, Kennedy Center, Verizon Hall, and Lincoln Center, and won numerous competitions both as a violinist and composer. For the past decade, Okura has performed and recorded with diverse artists including, Mary J. Blige, David Bowie, Michael Brecker, Sarah Brightman, Circue du Soleil, Coheed and Cambria, Philip Glass, Quincy Jones, Ziggy Marley, Lee Konitz, Diane Reeves, Alexander Schneider, Steve Swallow, and Kanye West. She has also performed as the concertmaster for some of the top jazz artists, among them, Herbie Hancock, Shirley Horn, Diana Krall, and Terrence Blanchard.
Growing up in Japan, Okura was the youngest winner of the Young Musicians' Debut Audition in Tokyo in 1990. By age seventeen, Meg was invited to take the prestigious concertmaster chair in the Asian Youth Orchestra, leading one hundred of the finest young musicians from nine countries and touring all of Asia. After making her US debut at the Kennedy Centre as a soloist with the late Alexander Schneiders New York String Orchestra, she settled in New York and earned her bachelors and masters degrees in classical violin from The Juilliard School.
Currently, Meg tours extensively with world music groups such as Pharaohs Daughter and Septeto Rodriguez, the Grammy-winning Michael Brecker Quindectet, and critically acclaimed Steve Swallow/Ohad Talmor Sextet, as well as her jazz group, Meg Okura Quartet, featuring Eric Niceberg on piano, Thomas Bramarie on bass, and Elliot Zigmund on drums.
Pan Asian Chamber Jazz Ensemble is Meg Okuras latest project, featuring some of the most exciting up-and coming jazz musicians in New York City: Meg Okura herself on violin, Megumi Yonezawa on piano, Jennifer Vincenton cello, Yukari on flute, and percussionist Satoshi Takeishi, playing his special kit of world percussion instruments including a Japanese Taiko drum. The group performs at various venues in New York City including recently at the Stone.
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