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There’s no turning back when an artist samples Krzysztof Penderecki’s Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima in the first few seconds of a song.

Out of context, the screeching, amplified violins that open Penderecki’s most recognizable piece sound like the metallic scream of a train car applying its brakes.

Fifteen seconds of Penderecki’s Threnody also open up “Tasogare”, the seventh of eight tracks on UA’s sixth studio album, Breathe. By that point, UA has made it perfectly clear pop has little sway on her music nowadays.

But for the Threnody to wash over the minimal robotic beats of the song’s introduction signals UA’s full embrace of the avant-garde.

In the past, she pushed against pop’s boundaries. Now, she’s breaking through them.

UA collaborates on this album with Uchihashi Kazuhisa, a guitarist who’s worked with Elliott Sharp and Otomo Yoshihide. As with her last two studio works, Doroboo and Sun, the music is mostly introspective, freely rhythmic and timbrally adventurous.

But while the general mood of Breathe isn’t far removed from its predecessors, it still possesses its own identity.

Uchihashi and UA go for a more synthetic sound, samples and rhythm machines replacing the live dynamics of a house band.

“The Color of Empty Sky” starts of with a wheezy accompaniment, only to give way to lush strings for the chorus.

Odd samples propel “Moss Stares”, which could have been an outtake from Björk’s Vespertine. (What if UA went completely a capella for her next album, ala Medulla? Something to consider.)

Takuji Aoyogi provides a nice contrast on the duet, “Beacon”, while the repeated motifs of “Mori” feel almost minimalist.

Unlike her last two albums, Breathe clocks in at 39 minutes, which is still somewhat long for eight songs. But even though she remains as experimental as ever, she’s reigned in the expanse of her previous outings.

It’s heartening to witness UA continually challenge herself and her listeners. After unshackling her rock ‘n’ roll potential with AJICO five years ago, she’s become fearless in pursuing new creative outlets.

But it’s hard not to miss the tuneful UA, who brought the world “Kanashimi Johnny”, “Rhythm” and even “Senkoo”.

Aside from a melodic chorus here and there, the songs on Breathe don’t offer anything resembling a single, a point not lost on UA’s label — Speedstar didn’t even precede the album’s release with one.

Breathe is a fascinating, demanding album. But like Sun before it, enjoying it depends on how much you want to work for it.

When I was a kid, I hated children’s music. I distinctly remember in the second grade rolling my eyes when the teacher would put on yet another record of off-key kids singing mind-numbing tunes.

Back then, I didn’t have the vocabulary to put it like that, but my older brother and sisters played the radio all the time and schooled me in the world of pop music at a very early age. The stuff I heard outside of the classroom was far more interesting than the stuff I heard in it.

So it’s not surprising my perception of children’s music in the last 32 years would be dismissive. The deep stuff, the challenging stuff — that would have to wait till later when kids are old enough to understand it.

But there’s a flaw to that assumption — parents will have to listen to children’s music too.

So it was a happy day when news broke that UA would release Uta UUA, an album based on appearances on the Japanese children’s program Do Re Mi.

UA has, literally and figuratively, done it all — jazz, pop, rock, electronica, improvisation. Her distinctive, resonant voice was a natural for children’s music.

But UA is also a creative magnet, the kind of charismatic performer who attracts talent from all over for collaboration.

So it’s something amazing to find avant-garde improviser Otomo Yoshihide and Buffalo Daughter’s Oono Yumiko alongside UA on, of all things, an album of children’s music.

UA, however, isn’t content just to phone in her performance. The eclecticism and open-minded approach to music she applies to other albums is in full force on Uta UUA.

In a way, the album is her most diverse work yet.

Unlike the strict parameters under which all popular genres work, children’s music prioritizes simplicity over all else. It doesn’t matter whether the song is a mambo, a folk song, or a lullbuy.

And in that sense, children’s music provides an incredibly broad canvas for experimentation.

“Teinsagunu Hana” finds UA singing in an highly embellished style, whereas “Omacha no Cha Cha Cha” is, literally, a cha-cha-cha.

“Umi” features some subcontinental Indian instrumentation, “Do Re Mi Mizundo” has a North African/Middle Eastern feel, while “Yama no Ongaku Uchi” is based on Mozart’s The Magic Flute.

UA isn’t afraid to challenge her young listeners either. Some of the timbres used on Uta UUA can get mildly strange. “Shalom” starts with a dischordant horn. “Omacha no Cha Cha Cha” includes some deep tablas.

“Ringo no Hitori Goto” is Japanese melody, but UA has Oono accompany her on steel drum.

With Uta UUA, UA has stamped children’s music with her singular, eclectic vision. She found a way to inject maturity into a style of music aimed for the developing mind.

Adults will find a lot to like about the album, and it’s great for children too.

UA really doesn’t have much left to prove.

In a career that spans a decade, the adventurous Japanese jazz singer has sung in just about every conceivable genre — pop, jazz, world, rock, dub, electronica, even children’s music.

If she did an album of country covers, it would probably be one of the best country albums ever recorded.

So if Sun, UA’s fifth studio album as a solo artist, seems impenetrable, well — where else can UA go? It’s amazing she hasn’t arrived there sooner.

Despite all of her genre hopping, UA is, at heart, a jazz singer, and Sun is about as angular as be-bop can get.

She introduced a more live, organic sound with 2002’s Doroboo. Now, she’s taking it a step further, cutting her band loose to improvise, to occupy the spaces between tonality and rhythm.

In short, to get fucking noisy.

And UA herself isn’t afraid to sound, well, weird. On “papito”, barking dogs provide backing vocals. She gets pretty damn Mingus on the 7-minute “Bouga”, while on “Fatima to Semira” she babbles for two minutes before launching into the tune proper. Thing is, her band doesn’t follow, preferring instead to play arhythmically to her melody.

“Roma” evokes the kind of dark, sparse mood she explored on Doroboo, while “Ua Ua Rai Rai” finds UA singing extemporaneously over a full Indonesian orchestra.

“Strange” would be an understatement.

Even the so-called singles off the album — “Lightning” and “Odoru Tori to Kin no Ame” — don’t have much in the way of hooks. At least not on the level of “Senkoo” or “Kanashimi Johnny”.

In short, Sun is an album that can be greatly appreciated as a bold artistic statement. It doesn’t mean you actually like it.

It’s nice to see UA strive for the kind of wild artistic abandon her past work more than strongly indicated. It’s equally nice when she reigns those urges in to service a hook.

Hooks are in short supply on Sun, and the album demands a lot of thinking to appreciate fully.

But that’s OK — UA and her incredibly magnetic voice can pull it off. She makes even a thinking listener’s album seem effortless.

And that marks her greatest ability as an artist.