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Sali Oguri is a New York City based classically trained musician who has gravitated toward driving, hard-hitting and avant garde styles of Popular music. Her songs are true-to-the-heart songs about life, love, angst, fears, insecurities and pain. In her Modern Pop Crossover style of music, you'll hear Hard Rock, Hip Hop, Soul, New Wave and Jazz elements. Her sound is juxtapositioned extremes: heaven and hell, hot and cold. With Sali, life is intensely on the edge, the ever-changing here and now.

Sali began singing professionally at 16 with local bands including R&B group Top Shelf featuring Robyn S., appearing in clubs such as Sweetwater's, Ipanema's and The Manhattan Proper (now Proper Cafe) in St. Albans, Queens. Sali sang at Rock venues such as Long Island's Heavy Metal club February's as lead vocalist in a band with brother Kirk Oguri on guitar. Sali also sang Latin music (salsa, merengue, cumbia) and had the chance to perform with Tito Puente at Willie's Steakhouse in The Bronx. Sali sang straight ahead Jazz in the Bebop idiom, appearing at 55 Bar and catching the ears of drummer Victor Jones with whom she performed at the Sunday Jazz Concert Series in Newark, New Jersey.

While working as a singer for live venues, Sali made several recordings including lead vocals on "Reach Out From the Darkness" (Select Records) on a compilation Dance EP/vinyl featuring Loleatta Holloway, and lead vox on "I Fall In Love So Easily" on the album "The Rainbow-Colored Lotus" (Polydor), a project which led her to sing in Kobe before 10,000 people, sharing the stage with mammoth names such as Herbie Hancock, Keith Jarrett and Gary Peacock.

She's also performed with, recorded with and/or composed with the following great musicians who have blessed her life with so much: Yoshiaki Masuo, Ray Gomez, Carmine d'Amico, J. Dibbs, Katsuhiko Nakagawa and many more.

Sali can be heard on 10 Dance remixes of songs by Japan's Pop icon, Yuming (FOA Records) in October 2005 ("Sweet Dreams, Yuming") and on her own Pink Manhattan Petit-CD (EP). Sali sang, performed keyboards and arranged the songs for both projects, recorded at WUJ Productions owned and operated by producer/composer/guitarist Fred Kimmel.

Sali Oguri has been featured in a Japanese Coca-Cola ad and has written her own column for newspapers. Her songs have been played on numerous radio stations including New York's underground radio station WEVR (East Village Radio).

She is widely recognized in Japan as the host of a popular Japanese weekly satellite TV show called "New Yorkers", an instant hit and one of the longest-running series in Japanese TV history. Today, Sali represents NYC in the eyes of her 11 million-strong fan base. Each week on the show, Sali was heard singing its theme songs, "Makin' It In New York" (unreleased) and "Before We Say Goodnight" (ASCAP), her own composition. Original music videos of Sali's songs were produced for the show.

Sali gained additional experience as a radio personality on 81.3 FM J-Wave, a popular Tokyo station with 8 million listeners. Sali's weekly show was called "Switch On New York" featuring her colorful life as a New Yorker. The live one hour weekly program was simulcast on Internet TV showing Sali from a Manhattan studio.

Check out more Sali vox on Fred Kimmel "Jazz Bad" (Drum 'N Bass)
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