Few Japanese jazz pianists are as strikingly original, either as composers or performers, as Hiromi Uehara, who performs under her given name only. Hiromi has an instantly recognizable style, featuring a dense flurry of notes and chords that recalls Art Tatumwho, not surprisingly, is one of her idols. Shizuoka native Hiromi, who is one of those rare individuals blessed with perfect pitch, started studying classical piano at age five, but soon became aware of jazz through her piano teacher. After...

Few Japanese jazz pianists are as strikingly original, either as composers or performers, as Hiromi Uehara, who performs under her given name only. Hiromi has an instantly recognizable style, featuring a dense flurry of notes and chords that recalls Art Tatumwho, not surprisingly, is one of her idols. Shizuoka native Hiromi, who is one of those rare individuals blessed with perfect pitch, started studying classical piano at age five, but soon became aware of jazz through her piano teacher. After moving to Tokyo and getting work as a jingle writer, she moved to Boston in 1999 to attend the prestigious Berklee School of Music. Richard Evans, Hiromi's jazz composition and orchestration teacher at Berklee, sent a demo tape of Hiromi's music to veteran jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal. Impressed by what he heard, Jamal put Hiromi in touch with U.S. audiophile label Telarc, which released her debut album, Another Mind, in 2003. That album received foreign jazz album of the year in March 2004 at the Recording Industry Association of Japan's annual Gold Disc Awards after selling 100,000 copies - more than any other jazz album in Japan in 2003. (Another Mind was considered a foreign album because Hiromi is signed to Telarc, which licensed her album to Universal Music in Japan.) Hiromi's 2004 album, Brain, featured more of her electric-keyboard playing, giving it more of an edgy, '70s-fusion feel. Hiromi, who maintains a busy tour schedule in Japan, North America and Europe, says her ambitions include writing film soundtracks. Quentin Tarantino is her first choice as the director she'd like to work with.