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.

I have always liked black and white! It is simple and the colour of the piano.

Nobody wants to experience sad events but people like to listen to sad songs. That's the beauty of music.

The way to respect all the people I love is to eat the music, have it in my blood and bones, and try to explore it in as much different ways as possible to create my own identity.

Every day is different and improvised. Sometimes, a song can lead to a completely different adventure. You can't control it.

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.

Work hard! Just keep working hard until you can do something you want to do! We all progress at different speeds and in different ways, so be patient and keep working hard!

The beautiful thing about music is that even so-called negative emotions like anger, sadness, frustration, when they come through the filter of music, they all become beautiful.

Everybody improvises without noticing it. Life is about improvising. You can't control what happens in your life, I mean, you don't know what can happen in your life today. So you somehow improvise.

Challenges are the key in life. You always have to challenge yourself and try to get to different states.

Everything is inspiring! It could be fine art or a conversation I have with somebody!

But Grandmère is just like all those other women who go around wanting the same rights as men, but don’t want to call themselves feminists. Because that isn’t “feminine.

But that is what islands are for

The shortest interval between two points is the awareness that they are not two.

You are the closest I will ever come to magic.

The soul was not cured, it was as full as a clothes closet of dresses that did not fit.

Listening to classical music is a journey not a state; it's an activity not a meditation.

A leader tuned out of his internal world will be rudderless; one blind to the world of others will be clueless; those indifferent to the larger systems within which they operate will be blindsided.

The hardest part is the grueling work of constantly being wrong.

Musical acts that feign enthusiasm for what they're doing the guitarist who jumps up and down, like it's choreographed are so transparently vacuous.

Love is one of those things that should be so simple. You don't need to think about it and over analyze it when it's good.