Mika Stoltzman

Mika has toured to 19 countries and 65 cities around the world. She has performed 10 times at Carnegie Hall (Zankel and Weill Hall), as well as at PASIC 2005 and 2007, the Blue Note in New York, the Tokyo and Cairo Jazz Festivals, and the Rockport Jazz Festival. She regularly performs around the world in a duo with her husband, clarinetist Richard Stoltzman, at major venues in New York, Boston, Austin, Buenos Aires, Mexico, Hong Kong, Japan, Germany, and many more. 

Stoltzman has performed as soloist with the Kyushu Symphony Orchestra, Kumamoto Symphony Orchestra, Kansai Philharmonic Orchestra, Krakow Philharmonic, and Szombathey Symphony Orchestra. In 2013, she gave the world premiere of Chick Corea’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on marimba with the Xalapa Symphony Orchestra in Mexico, and performed the work again with Orchestra Machiavelli in Italy in 2018. 

Stoltzman released her first album Mitsue in 1998, followed by Marimba Phase in 2003. In 2010, she released a live DVD, Marimba Madness, on Big Round Records, and a new CD, Mikarimba, on Video Art Music (Japan). In 2013, she released If You Believe with Steve Gadd on TeeGa Music (Japan). In 2017, Mika and Richard Stoltzman recorded a duo album titled Duo Cantando with producer Stephen Epstein, guest artist Chick Corea, and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP), released on the DENON label (Nippon Colombia, Japan and Savoy record, US). In addition, Stoltzman’s arrangement and performance of Tokyo/Vermont Counterpoint appears on Steve Reich’s album Triple Quartet (Nonesuch). She has also appeared on Richard Stoltzman’s album Goldberg Variations (BMG Japan) and Joe Hisaishi’s Asian X.T.C. (Universal Japan). In 2019, she released two albums: Palimpsest on AVIE Records, and Tapereba on Big Round Records. In 2022, she released Spirit of Chick Corea with Steve Gadd on the Disc Union, Japan label and joined Richard Stoltzman on his last solo album on the Nippon Colombia, Japan. 

Stoltzman is from Amakusa, a small island in the Kumamoto prefecture in southern Japan. Her grandparents played traditional Japanese instruments, while her aunt taught piano and her father was a Kendo master. She began studying piano at age 3, and in junior high became fascinated by the drums. At 18, she found the marimba, a perfect combination of piano and percussion. She studied marimba at Toronto University with members of NEXUS, and later moved to New York in 2008 where she learned from the master jazz vibraphonist Mike Mainieri. Stoltzman now lives in Winchester MA.