Monopoly Game is the sixth recording released by the Toshiko Akiyoshi Jazz Orchestra featuring Lew Tabackin. The three tracks, "Kyoto Paradox", Caribbean Dream" and "Urban Rhapsody" make up the three part "Suite for Koto

Koto (musical instrument)

The koto is a traditional Japanese stringed musical instrument, similar to the Chinese guzheng, the Mongolian yatga, the Korean gayageum and the Vietnamese đàn tranh. The koto is the national instrument of Japan. Koto are about length, and made from kiri wood...

 and Jazz Orchestra" commissioned jointly by the San Francisco Jazz Festival

San Francisco Jazz Festival

Debuting in 1983, the San Francisco Jazz Festival is an annual three-week celebration of today's best music, with over 30 concerts. Produced by SFJAZZ, a non-profit organization dedicated to jazz and jazz education...

 and UCLA. The song "Jazz Club" was commissioned by NHK

NHK

NHK is Japan's national public broadcasting organization. NHK, which has always identified itself to its audiences by the English pronunciation of its initials, is a publicly owned corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee....

 Radio.

Track listing

All songs composed and arranged by Toshiko Akiyoshi

Toshiko Akiyoshi

is a Japanese American jazz pianist, composer/arranger and bandleader. Among a very few successful female instrumentalists of her generation in jazz, she is also recognized as a major figure in jazz composition. She has received 14 Grammy nominations, and she was the first woman to win the Best...

:

1. "Jazz Club (Opener)" – 2:56
2. "Glass Ceiling" – 7:50
3. "Monopoly Game" – 10:17
4. "Kyoto Paradox" – 9:41
5. "Caribbean Dream" – 12:30
6. "Urban Rhapsody" – 10:55
7. "State of the Unison" – 7:01

Personnel

• Toshiko Akiyoshi
  Toshiko Akiyoshi
  is a Japanese American jazz pianist, composer/arranger and bandleader. Among a very few successful female instrumentalists of her generation in jazz, she is also recognized as a major figure in jazz composition. She has received 14 Grammy nominations, and she was the first woman to win the Best...
  
   – piano
• Lew Tabackin
  Lew Tabackin
  Lew Tabackin is a jazz flautist and a tenor saxophonist. He is married to Toshiko Akiyoshi, who is a jazz pianist and a composer/arranger.-Biography:...
  
   – tenor saxophone, flute
• Tom Christensen – tenor saxophone, clarinet
• Dave Pietro
  Dave Pietro
  Dave Pietro is a jazz saxophonist who plays alto saxophone. He started playing at age 11 and was first recorded with his school's band by Clark Terry. He received his bachelor's in music from the University of North Texas where he was a member of the world renowned One O'Clock Lab Band...
  
   – alto saxophone, flute
• Jim Snidero
  Jim Snidero
  Jim Snidero is an American jazz saxophonist.Snidero studied at the University of North Texas before moving to New York City in 1981. After touring with Jack McDuff, he joined Toshiko Akiyoshi's Jazz Orchestra in the early 1980s in New York, working in the group for twenty years...
  
   – alto saxophone, flute, clarinet
• Scott Robinson
  Scott Robinson (jazz musician)
  Scott Robinson is an American jazz musician. Robinson is best known for his work with various styles of saxophone, but has also performed with the clarinet, flute, and sarrusophone, along with other, more obscure instruments....
  
   – baritone saxophone, bass clarinet
• Michael Ponella – trumpet
• Andy Gravish – trumpet
• John Eckert – trumpet
• Joe Magnarelli – trumpet
• Scott Whitfield – trombone
• Luis Bonilla
  Luis Bonilla
  Luis Bonilla is an American Afro-Cuban jazz and Latin jazz trombonist born in Los Angeles, California of Costa Rican descent. He is a Grammy Award- winning performer, composer, and Music Professor, about whom the New York Times has described as the artist who "explodes the usual musical structures...
  
   – trombone
• Pat Hallaran – trombone
• Tim Newman – bass trombone
• Philippe Aerts
  Philippe Aerts
  Philippe Aerts is a Belgian jazz double bassist. He is a member of Philip Catherine trio and Ivan Paduart trio. He also has his own trio with John Ruocco and Tony Levin and quartet with on top Bert Joris...
  
   – bass
• Terry Clarke – drums

Guest

• Miya Masaoka
  Miya Masaoka
  Miya Masaoka is an American musician and composer who performs on the 17-string Japanese koto zither, often augmenting it with string preparations and electronic triggers...
  
   – koto
  Koto (musical instrument)
  The koto is a traditional Japanese stringed musical instrument, similar to the Chinese guzheng, the Mongolian yatga, the Korean gayageum and the Vietnamese đàn tranh. The koto is the national instrument of Japan. Koto are about length, and made from kiri wood...