Another significant artist has passed away.
The pianist, Mr. Kazuoki Fujii.
Mr.Fujii had supported me for many years on stage as a collaborative and accompanying pianist. I think I was about 25 or 26 when I first performed with him. As I got exposed to his brilliant music, I felt that I wanted to be influenced by it more, and that was when our performances together started increasing. At first, before we started performing together, Mr. Fujii had just returned to Japan from France, and he had an amazing reputation and everyone was talking about this wonderful pianist returning from France. All the music press published articles about him. He didn’t take long to become one of a kind, with his unique presence and his artist-like appearance.
It was said that when you hear him play, his technique is just magnificent, and that he could sight-read the most difficult pieces most easily. I got to confirm it later for myself when we started playing together. But for me, that was just a part of him, it was his rare sensitivity that I was so amazed by.
He had this special sensitivity that I had never come across before, with his delicate touch on the keyboard and his diverse arrays of sparkling tones, making him possible to play on any piano, even instruments in bad condition. I was so amazed that when he touched the keyboard, the beautiful “Fujii tone” resonated. His glossy and smooth, distinct sound never was affected even by the fastest passages, and it was like unleashing the notes into a different place in space. I thought, “This is what a genius is like” as I watched and listened to him playing.
As I admired him so much, I remember securing his schedule to play together on stage, as much as possible. When I was on stage with him, I was truly excited, feeling that I wanted to become an artist like him.
Each time I got on stage with him, I wondered what kind of beautiful sound world would appear, and learned and absorbed from him.
During the performance on stage, fascinating tones in a micro-world were created that were not played in rehearsals, which was a kind of surprise that only those who had stepped on the same stage with him could experience.
He often used the word “telepathy”, and said that we talked to each other telepathically on stage which I was convinced with.
He was the type of pianist who no longer even used eye contact, with almost no prior talks and only rarely rehearsed. I think that was why the tension between us on stage allowed us to weave sharp and highly sensitive sounds into the space. So that was “telepathy”. When I performed with my eyes closed on stage, I think I took this word naturally. Playing with Mr. Fujii was indeed telepathic.
In the third movement of Franck’s Sonata, for example, the whispering PPP (pianississimo) is more delicate than the PP (pianissimo), and the notes of the keyboard and strings intersect and blend in without a single millimeter of deviation.
There was, in that part, a “Fujii tone” that could only be heard in actual performances, which made the 2000 audiences stiffen with the air trembling so finely. That was the moment that I realized the sound of the piano and violin mingled in a way that shook people’s hearts…
When I close my eyes now, I can immediately go back to that moment on stage. There were many impressive moments on stage with Mr. Fujii.
For that reason, I had hopes that Mr. Kazuoki Fujii would develop that sound-in-a-vacuum kind of world again in his later years.
However, on the other hand, Mr. Fujii was a wine connoisseur who loved drinking more than anything else. He not only knew a great deal about wine, but from some point on, he seemed to drink so much and was not enough even after drinking quite a lot. I figured that he might have suffered from stress and worries being a highly sensitive person, but I began to worry that the amount he drank was just too much as he was becoming more and more inebriated. Since then, the number of our collaborations on stage decreased.
I just hoped that one day, he would return to his wonderful “Fujii tone” again, and time passed by so quickly.
My mother used to say that artists should be solitary, but she was indeed a great fan of Mr. Fujii. She used to mention right from the start about Mr. Fujii’s sense of loneliness and his beautiful music. She felt that “Because of his extraordinary talent, it seems difficult for others to understand his personality.”
I now think that Mr. Fujii was actually a person who wanted to be with others, despite his loneliness.
He showed his friendly side when we had dinner together with a group of people drinking wine, and he never stopped talking and drinking. He might have done so because he wanted to stay longer with the people around him.
I hadn’t seen him for a few years now, and today I would like to sip some wine alone, remembering him from when he was in good health.
Mr. Kazuoki Fujii, please rest in peace, and I hope that your favourite wine and French music will be with you.