Sonoko has been played on NTS over 30 times, featured on 39 episodes and was first played on 5 January 2017.

Sonoko is a singer from Kyoto, Japan.

In her own words: "Even when I was very little, I liked to make music like most kids play games. I always liked stories, movies and music boxes. I really started to think about my own music seriously when I was sixteen. In 1984, I sent my first demo to three labels that I liked a lot: Cherry Red Records, Crammed Discs and Les Disques Du Crépuscule." At that time, Cherry Red wrote Sonoko to say they liked her demo. They offered to make a record and arranged for her to go into studio with Morgan Fisher who was then in Japan. Despite a lot of studio work, the chemistry just didn't seem to be there.

About the same time, Sonoko met The Honeymoon Killers (the Belgian group, not the American band by the same name) who were on tour in japan. They really liked her music and persuaded her to move to Crammed Discs. In 1986 she went to Brussels to work with the Crammed team. Work on the album was done from July to December, 1986, at Daylight Studio in Brussels with Gilles Martin as Sound Engineer. Most of the cuts were produced by Colin Newman with "French Touch" by Aksak Maboul (Marc Hollander and Vincent Kenis). Additional keyboards were performed by Irish composer John Bonnar who has worked with Brian Eno and Dead Can Dance. In 1987 the album ""La Debutante" came out. It got very good press from papers and magazines like Liberation and Melody Maker who cited its provocative inventiveness and the crystal voice of the singer.

Despite uneven distribution and the fact that the European release was only available in vinyl (no CD, they were just the new thing at that time), the album proved to be a long-lasting seller and has built up a large following of die-hard fans. It's become an underground classic and collector's item. After making "La Debutante", Sonoko lived in Paris for seven years, in the 14e arrondissemnt on Passage D'enfer, and then returned to Kyoto. She is currently working with artists in Kyoto and Tokyo on new recordings.

from Sonoko's Official Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/sonokodebutante.