Junko Mine (峰純子, Mine Junko in Japanese order; her record covers often spell it Junko Miné) was a Tokyo jazz singer with a low, unhurried voice who made about a dozen albums between 1976 and 2002, most of them with American sidemen. Her real name was Junko Ishizuka (石塚純子). She recorded with the cornetist Thad Jones and the drummer Mel Lewis, the pianists Roland Hanna and Hank Jones, the guitarist Barney Kessel and the bassist Ray Brown, and she passed away on June 17, 2004, at the age of 58. Her records stayed in circulation afterwards. A previously unreleased 1976 concert with the pianist Tsuyoshi Yamamoto's trio was issued in 2026.

She was born on June 19, 1945, in Yonezawa, Yamagata. According to a Japanese biographical dictionary of entertainers (Nichigai Associates, 2010), she graduated from the vocal department of the Toyo Music School and first aimed at a classical career, but her voice sat too low and she moved to jazz. She studied at the vocal institute run by Sanae Mizushima (水島早苗), spent a year in Hawaii learning English, and on her return began working as a club singer in hotels and live houses around Tokyo.

Her first record, A Child Is Born (Trio Records PA-7124, released in 1976), was made at Mouri Studio in Tokyo; a retail listing dates the session to November 25, 1975. Discogs credits Thad Jones on cornet, Mel Lewis on drums, George Mraz on bass, and two pianists, Walter Norris and Yasuaki Watanabe (on two tracks). The eleven songs run from "My Funny Valentine" and "The Nearness of You" to Jones's own "A Child Is Born". Japanese retail copy for the album says she had sung live for close to a decade before Jones and Lewis recognised her.

Pre Morning (Trio, 1976) paired her with the Roland Hanna Trio, with Mraz again on bass and Donald Bailey on drums; its title song is credited to Hanna and Mel Dancy. Live at Storyville (Trio, 1977) was recorded at the New York club of that name with the tenor saxophonist and flutist Clifford Jordan, the pianist Norman Simmons, the bassist Lisle Atkinson and the drummer Al Harewood. Back in Tokyo she recorded A Tribute to the Great Hollywood Stars with the guitarist Barney Kessel on March 6, 1977, billed as "Junko & Barney," with the Japanese rhythm section of Kunimitsu Inaba on bass and Tetsujiro Obara on drums.

Her late-1970s records show the range of her sessions. I Wish You Love (Trio, 1979) is billed "Junko & Sleepy" and features the tenor saxophonist Hidehiko "Sleepy" Matsumoto; it was recorded in Tokyo on November 19 and 26, 1978, with a trumpeter on three tracks and several different rhythm sections taking turns. You're the Top: Junko Mine Sings Cole Porter (Trio, recorded September 18 and 19, 1979) was made in California with a Los Angeles band: Lou Levy on piano and arrangements, Conte Candoli on trumpet, Bill Perkins on tenor saxophone and flute, Bill Reichenbach on trombone, Mundell Lowe on guitar, Red Mitchell on bass and Larry Bunker on drums. Once in the Evening (Trio, 1979), billed as "Junko Meets Hank Jones Trio," has Hank Jones at the piano with George Duvivier on bass and Shelly Manne on drums.

The 1980s kept the same pattern. Jesse (Lob, a 1982 release) is a second album with Jones and Duvivier, with Grady Tate on drums. Honeysuckle Rose (Junko Sings the Blues) (Lob, 1984) was recorded at Pioneer Studio in Tokyo with Cedar Walton on piano, Ray Brown on bass and Connie Kay on drums. Love Me Tender (All Art, 1987) draws on two Tokyo sessions: the first five songs were recorded on October 16, 1985, with the Great Jazz Quartet (Jones, the flutist and tenor saxophonist Sam Most and the drummer Alan Dawson), and the rest on October 3, 1986, with the Ray Brown Trio (Gene Harris on piano and Mickey Roker on drums). Brown is credited on bass for the album. Junko Sings Ballads at Good Day Club (All Art, 1988) was recorded at the Tokyo nightclub Good Day Club on January 17 and 18, 1988, with a Japanese quartet: the pianist Shubi Arima, the saxophonist and clarinetist Takenori Sawaki, the bassist Shigeharu Sasamoto and the drummer Kazuo Nakamichi.

A compilation, Junko's Best (All Art, 1991), gathered tracks from the Trio years. The Nichigai dictionary and a 2004 blog post both say she won the grand prize at the Japan Jazz Vocal Awards in 1999 (the 15th edition), and German Wikipedia, citing the 1979 issue of the magazine Jazz Forum, says it named her and Martha Miyake among Japan's leading jazz singers. Her last two studio albums came in her fifties: It's Wonderful! (Vivid Sound, 2001), a set of Stevie Wonder songs, and Junko Sings George Gershwin (All Art / Absord Music Japan, 2002), recorded at Q-Tec Studio in Tokyo on November 13 and 14, 2000, with Ted Rosenthal on piano, George Mraz on bass, Terry Clarke on drums, Howard Alden on guitar and Ken Peplowski on clarinet. Alden and Peplowski also have profiles here: Howard Alden and Ken Peplowski.

A short notice posted the day after she passed away on June 17, 2004, gave her age as 58. In January 2023, All Art Promotion and Solid Records began reissuing her Trio-era albums in remastered editions, starting with A Child Is Born, I Wish You Love and You're the Top. In 2026 Solid Records issued Live at Basie 1976 (catalog CDSOL-2052), a concert recorded on May 20, 1976, at the jazz café Basie in Ichinoseki, Iwate, with the Tsuyoshi Yamamoto Trio: Yamamoto on piano, Akira Daiyoshi on bass and Toshio Osumi on drums. It has eleven tracks, including several that are also on Pre Morning, such as "My Foolish Heart", "Close Your Eyes" and "The River of No Return", and it is the first time the tape has been released.

Mine sang American-songbook standards and ballads in a deep, low register, and that was the quality reviewers singled out when her 1976 concert tape finally appeared: a Tower Records staff review of Live at Basie 1976 praised her low, deep-voiced singing, and a Disk Union announcement described her as one of Japan's representative crooners. Her repertoire was built from the Great American Songbook, with Cole Porter and George Gershwin each given a full album, plus Thad Jones's "A Child Is Born" as her title song and, less expectedly, the Stevie Wonder songs of It's Wonderful!.

Her records are small-group vocal jazz in the mainstream mould, with room for instrumental solos from players such as Thad Jones on cornet, Bill Perkins on tenor saxophone and flute, Clifford Jordan on tenor saxophone and Sam Most on flute; Lou Levy is credited with the arrangements on the Cole Porter album. She worked the Tokyo club and hotel circuit and recorded for Trio Records and later All Art. Her whole discography is jazz singing, with no competing J-pop or kayokyoku career.