Kioto Aoki descends from a traditional performing arts family with roots dating back to the Edo period in Japan. She is the fifth generation of the Toyoakimoto family which ran an okiya (geisha house) in central Tokyo and specialized in providing live musical accompaniment for the dancers. On professional stages from age 7, Aoki continues this unique family legacy as Toyoaki Chitose (豊秋千東勢) in Chicago. Learning from and playing with her father Tatsu Aoki (Toyoaki Sanjuro), Aoki has built this traditional foundation in a contemporary musical practice, performing in contemporary and traditional contexts on shamisen, taiko and tsuzumi. Her playing is informed by the Japanese aesthetics of ma and emphasizes the melodic phrasing of space and choreography to reorient the notion of percussion as mere rhythm. Stoic, durational explorations elicit soundscapes that project organic textures of live performance and sonic nuances of cyclical, droning sustain. Aoki balances the artistic and aesthetic integrity of traditional Japanese music with a contemporary sensibility, bringing taiko to contemporary artistic ecologies of music, sound and performance to push her practice beyond measures of cultural preservation. 

Aoki's playing is informed by the Japanese aesthetics of ma and emphasizes the melodic phrasing of space and choreography to reorient the notion of percussion as mere rhythm. Her stoic, durational explorations elicit soundscapes that oscillate between the organic textures of live performance and sonic nuances of cyclical, droning sustain. Aoki maintains a balance of retaining the artistic and aesthetic integrity of traditional Japanese music with a contemporary sensibility that extends beyond the measures of cultural preservation bringing taiko to the contemporary artistic ecologies of music, sound and performance. Her solo albums retain the "liveness" of live performance while working through and expanding upon minimal phrasing and her solo performance series K.A. elongates choreographic sound in a continuous, concert length set as visual and sonic durée. 

Musical projects and performances include Experimental Sound Studio’s Sonic Pavilion Festival at Millennium Park's Pritzker Pavilion, the Soundtrack series at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Tatsu Aoki’s The MIYUMI Project, the Yoko Ono co-produced SKYLANDING album project, 24 Hour Drone Festival, The Reduction Ensemble, the Taiko Legacy / Reduction series, solo and collaborative album recordings. She has recorded and played with pianist Yosuke Yamashita, Nicole Mitchell, Hamid Drake, Michael Zerang, Mwata Bowden, Ed Wilkerson Jr., Tatsu Aoki, Francis Wong, Mai Sugimoto and Haruhi Kobayashi, among others. Aoki also leads Tsukasa Taiko, the Japanese drum (taiko) program at Asian Improv aRts Midwest, continuing to pass the traditional music with a new generation of students and apprentices from the community.