Amina Figarova

Amina Figarova (born 1964) is an Azerbaijani jazz pianist and composer who is now based in Manhattan. Trained as a classical pianist in Baku, she became interested in the local folk music, later specializing in jazz. Since the late 1980s, together with her husband, the flutist Bart Platteau, she has performed in jazz festivals around the globe.[1][2]

Amina Figarova (2007)

Biography

Born in Baku on 2 December 1964, Amina Figarova learnt to play the piano as a small child and began composing when only six. She attended the Baku Academy of Music where she studied to become a classical concert pianist. In 1988, while at the Moscow Jazz Festival, she was invited to study at the Rotterdam Conservatoire where she soon developed an interest in jazz. She completed her education at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.[1][2]

While in the United States, she became involved in the Thelonious Monk Jazz Colony in Aspen, Colorado. Together with the flutist Bart Platteau whom she later married, she began to perform in jazz concerts around the world.[1]

Her albums September Suite and more recently Blue Whisper were inspired in part by the events of 11 September 2001 when she was in New York playing at the Blue Note Jazz Club.[3] Chicago critic Neil Tesser rates her as one of the leading contemporary jazz composers both with September Suite and Come Escape With Me.[4]

Figarova's compositions include the musical Diana,[5] and Tehora which she wrote for the Israeli singer Shlomit Butbul.[6] She has released 13 albums, becoming one of DownBeat's Rising Star Composers of the year in both 2014 and 2015.[7]

Discography
  • Rachmaninov/Skriabin/Wieniawski (Erasmus, 1993)
  • Firewind (Munich, 1999)
  • Night Train (Munich, 2002)
  • On Canal Street (STR, 2002)
  • Come Escape with Me (Munich, 2005)
  • September Suite (Munich, 2005)
  • Above the Clouds (Munich, 2008)
  • Sketches (Munich, 2010)
  • Twelve (In+Out, 2012)
  • Blue Whisper (In+Out, 2015)
  • Road to the Sun (AmFi, 2018)
  • Persistence (AmFi, 2020)

References
  1. "Amina Figarova Sextet". Daly Jazz. Archived from the original on 13 May 2018. Retrieved 13 May 2018.
  2. "Amina Figarova Sextet" (PDF). Luxembourg City. Retrieved 13 May 2018.
  3. "Sextet's sound speaks to pianist Amina Figarova's soul". Straight. 2 May 2018. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
  4. Tesser, Neil (27 April 2006). "Amina Figarova Sextet". Chicago Reader. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
  5. Dietz, Dan (2012). Off Broadway Musicals, 1910–2007: Casts, Credits, Songs, Critical Reception and Performance Data of More Than 1,800 Shows. McFarland. pp. 369–. ISBN 978-0-7864-5731-1.
  6. "Shlomit Butbul & Amina Figarova" (in French). Visit Luxembourg. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
  7. "Amina Figarova". America Composers Orchestra. Retrieved 14 May 2018.
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