When you play with someone you can feel the chemistry with, just the first show is already magic.

I started to listen to Japanese jazz musicians when I went to high school. Some people I listened to were Yosuke Yamashita, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Sadao Watanabe.

My biggest musical dream is to keep playing all my life. There's nothing bigger than that and that's very challenging because you have to satisfy yourself at every stage.

I am playing the music I love and I really play it from my heart, and whatever the out form is - it doesn't matter whether it's art or music.

The first reason why I started to use the [electric] keyboard is because I really like the bending sound of the guitar and bass player. I can't bend the piano sound. I really like the feel behind it. I feel it adds flavour and character to my music.

A child isn’t born bitter. I point no fingers as to who tainted the clean, pure pool of my childhood. Let’s just say that when I realized that I didn’t want to grow up, the damage was already done. Knowing that being grown up was no swell place to be means that you are grown up enough to notice. And you can’t go back from there. You have to forge another route, draw your own map.

Travelling is very difficult, you have to go to places with different climates and time zones. Travelling like that every single day through the year is definitely not healthy, but that's something I have to sacrifice if I want to play music.