Kuniko

Kuniko Kato is a Japanese virtuoso percussionist and crossover artist known for her powerful and meticulous interpretations of Pärt, Reich, Miyoshi, and Bach. Also a passionate educator and humanitarian, she works with children who have learning disabilities in Japan, and she teaches masterclasses and percussion workshops. She was born in Toyohashi, Japan and she initially began exploring music through the piano. However, Kato eventually discovered that she was severely limited on the instrument because of her small hands. Attracted to the wide tonal spectrum of percussion, she became a percussionist and studied with Keiko Abe and Akira Miyoshi at the Toho Gakuen School of Music, and with Robert Van Sice at the Rotterdam Conservatory. After her graduation, she continued refining her style and won top prizes in several competitions in the late 1990s. Her career as a recording artist began in 1997 with James Wood’s Marimba Concerto, and in 1999 she released her debut solo album To the Earth. She started directing a series of log drumming workshops in 2004 for disabled children in Japan, and in 2005 she performed in the Japanese premiere of Wood’s The Pure Land. In the following year she made a live recording of Takemitsu’s Cassiopeia Percussion Concerto at the Takemitsu Memorial Concert in Tokyo, and she toured widely thereafter. Kato returned to the studio in 2009 with her crossover album Sound Space Experiment: Steel Drum Works Selection, and in 2011 she released Kuniko Plays Reich. Cantus from 2013 won the Best Recording award at the Music Pen Club’s Music Awards ceremony in Japan, and it made the UK’s Top 10 Specialist Classical Chart. This was followed by Counterpoint: Kuniko Plays Reich in 2014, and Iannis Xenakis: IX in 2015, which was nominated for Japan Record Academy Awards in both the Best Recording and Best Contemporary Music Categories. She founded the Artist Incubation Project, Inc. in 2017, which offers mentorship and direction to young artists, and her album Bach: Solo Works for Marimba was number two on Japan’s Classical Billboard Chart and the top-selling album on Linn Records. She released Steve Reich: Drumming in 2018, and Tribute to Miyoshi in 2020, and she can also be heard on her 2024 album Kuniko Plays Reich II.
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