Sumie Kaneko

Sumie (Sumi-é) Kaneko is a Yamada-ryū koto and shamisen player and vocal artist. After graduating from the Tokyo University of the Arts, she moved to the United States in 2002 to study jazz vocals at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

Sumie Kaneko has garnered high acclaim for her cross-genre collaborations. In 2021, she signed a contract with the American Ballet Theatre and performed a solo shamisen arrangement of Dai Fujikura’s Neo for a pas de deux by the company, premiering the work at Lincoln Center. She later reprised this solo performance at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam in 2026. With a versatile style that includes a mastery of improvisation, she has performed alongside a wide range of top-tier artists—including taiko drummer Kenny Endo, jazz pianist Nik Bärtsch, and saxophonist Lew Tabackin, as well as painters, dancers, and calligraphers. In 2025, she held a duo concert in Austin, Texas, with Keisuke Zenyoji, a Kinko-ryū shakuhachi player designated as a Living National Treasure of Japan. She is also deeply engaged with academic and cultural institutions, having lectured at her alma mater (Berklee College of Music), the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and TED, while also frequently collaborating with Gamelan Galak Tika, the MIT-based ensemble led by Evan Ziporyn.

In addition to her activities within the United States, she frequently performs internationally as an ambassador of Japanese culture. She has conducted cultural outreach across Central and South America as an artist for the Japan Foundation New York’s dispatch program. Furthermore, since 2013, she has actively toured developing nations in South Asia at the invitation of various Japanese embassies in the region. Her work in countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, and Nepal has included performances at local universities and volunteer facilities. She expanded her activities to Europe in 2018 and has since performed in numerous locations across the continent.