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DOWNBEAT MAGAZINE BY TED PANKEN
Virtuosic complexity marked an accomplished, breathe-as-onethier magical duo by Vortex, as pianist-synthesist Shoko Nagai and the individualistic drummer Satoshi Takeishi, her spouse of 20 years, call their electro-acoustic project. Nagai introduced their duo — dedicated to musicians who had recently transitioned — with rubato atonal passages complemented by Takeishi’s fragmented xylophone rhythms, before transitioning to a stormy march-like motif that metrically modulated several times. They achieved Cecil Taylor-Aki Takase energy levels, then made their way home with delicate, informed sound-painting, finally reaching the gentle introduction. Nagai began the second duo — provoked by her first-ever poem, written for M³’s Anthology — with electronic tintinnabulations, maneuvered into a repetitive atonal line, and then stated brisk, urgent variations.