A Personal History of Ayatake Ezaki.

A Childhood Familiarity with the Piano

What was it that awakened your interest in music?

Ezaki: My parents were big music lovers, so it was normal to have some kind of music playing in the house all day long. My parents later told me that when I went to the toy store when I was little, for some reason I was always playing with the toy piano (laughs). Seeing me like that, they thought, “Let’s let him learn to play the piano. That is how I started playing a musical instrument.

You have been playing musical instruments as long as you can remember, haven’t you?

Ezaki: In the company apartment where I was born and raised, there happened to be a lot of boys my age. This created an environment where we all played together from morning till night, but I had to practice because I had started learning to play the piano. I didn’t like being the only one who couldn’t go out and play, and I wasn’t very good at playing when given assignments. I liked playing the piano itself, but my dislike of practicing has not changed (laughs).

(laughs) – The Beatles were the first music you became aware of, weren’t they?

Ezaki: My parents were particularly fond of UK music, and The Beatles was the music they played the most, so I guess I naturally picked it up. There was a modern Japanese sweets shop in our neighborhood, and the Beatles were always playing in the background. Every time I passed by the shop, I would say, “Oh, it’s the Beatles! The Beatles were the first artist I recognized when I was born, and I have continued to listen to them ever since.

He told us that in addition to the Beatles, other artists such as the Carpenters, Queen, and Chet Baker were also played at his house. What made you especially fond of the Beatles?

Ezaki: I guess it was the sense of fun. I think Chet Baker has a kind of sex appeal that you come to appreciate as an adult, and I was attracted to the Carpenters because of their “gentleness,” but the Beatles are just four mischievous guys who seem to be having fun. The Beatles, especially in their early works, seem to be made on impulse, don’t they? In the later stages of their career, they started to use more technical and structural innovations in their music, but I think it was the fun atmosphere that was good at first.

I also have my own original experiences with the Beatles and YMO, but do you feel any influence from YMO?

Ezaki: Of course, I have listened to all of their works. What I really like about the album “Proliferation” is that it is a concept album and its cynicism. However, I am attracted to live instrumental ensembles, so I probably listened more to the solo works of each of the musicians. The same goes for Hosono (Haruomi) and Yukihiro (Takahashi), and I also delved deeply into Sakamoto (Ryuichi), especially his acoustic works.

Expressing difficult things in “an easy way” and “having the courage” to accept difficult things as they are

What was Ryuichi Sakamoto, who passed away the other day, like to you?

Ezaki: He was definitely one of the people I grew up watching behind me. I remember when I was in high school, I came across his autobiographical book, “Music Makes Us Free,” and was drawn into reading it. I think it is very rare for a musician to have friendships with people from various fields and to be able to delve deeply into each area. I am attracted to musicians who are like translators of various genres.

From Brazilian music to club music to contemporary music.

Ezaki: And not only music, but you can also talk about philosophy. I get the impression that you can express very difficult things in an easy way, and perhaps that overlaps with my impression of you as a “translator. You have a great sense of balance between using technically academic and experimental techniques while at the same time producing output with melodies that can be sung to anyone’s lips.

That is exactly what you are aiming for, isn’t it?

Ezaki: That’s right. I hope to be able to do a kind of translation, and I also hope to do that in the area of “education. Sharing what I know with many people is a valuable act. It is one of the “things that must be done,” and I would like to create a society in which everyone can understand the joy of expressing oneself through sound.

I wonder if our stance of “expressing difficult things in an easy way” has something in common.

Ezaki: Yes, that’s right. But I also think that conveying difficult things in easy terms is always a risk. I think there are times when we need to be a little more conscious of conveying difficult things in difficult ways.

I think that’s true. In many cases, the conflict and division caused by the Corona disaster was due to the act of trying to make everything black and white, or jumping to easy-to-understand answers. I also think that there are times when we need to have the “courage” to accept difficult things as they are, and difficult things as they are.

Ezaki: I think it’s very important to think about various things when you don’t understand something. I think it’s an act that goes against the grain in today’s world, where words like “typa” are so highly praised (laughs). I want to be careful not to make everything easy to understand.

In junior high school, he formed a band that completely copied the Bill Evans Trio.

Ezaki: You began piano lessons, and your interest in classical music was sparked when you came across Grieg’s Nocturne, a collection of lyric pieces.

Ezaki: Yes, I did. It was the piece I was able to play most successfully after I started learning piano. For some reason, I really got into it when I played it. The image of the piece was very compatible with me, and for the first time I felt that I was very happy to be able to express it. Until then, when I learned Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, etc., I often felt intimidated or didn’t understand what they were trying to say, but with Grieg, I thought, “I understand something! I thought. I think I was in the middle or upper grades of elementary school, and from there I gradually began to feel like I was actively engaged in music.

A few years later, Seicho Matsumoto’s novel “Suna no Kiki” was dramatized, and Akira Senju wrote a piano piece called “Shukumei. It was so wonderful that I practiced it incessantly, and for a while I bought the orchestral score and read it over and over (laughs). (Laughs.) Even though it was a piano concerto, I arranged it for a single piano and performed it at a festival in Fukuoka, my hometown.

Is that when you started writing songs?

Ezaki: I’ve been composing music since I was in the first grade of elementary school. My piano class required us to write one original song a year, and I liked composing more than practicing. When I was in sixth grade, I got into “Shukumei” and performed it at festivals, where I also performed my own original compositions.

I heard that you got into jazz when you entered junior high school and met Bill Evans.

Ezaki: I think it was when I was going from sixth grade to first grade. I picked up “Waltz For Debby,” which was sitting on the dining room table, and played it, and I thought, “This is exactly what it means to be struck by lightning” (laughs). I thought to myself, “This is the kind of piano I want to play. Of course, I was impressed when I heard “Fate,” but it was on a different level.

Ezaki: I was fortunate in that I had a friend in piano class who played the drums, and a senior double bass player in the junior high school orchestra, so I thought, “I can play in the Bill Evans Trio! (laughs). Soon I was practicing with a band that was a complete copy of the Bill Evans Trio.

From meeting with other talented musicians of the same generation to the setbacks he experienced and subsequent appearances in Kohaku

-You were already playing in a jazz band when you were in junior high school. Was it a big part of the process from there to the formation of WONK that you first went on to study at the Tokyo University of the Arts’ School of Music?

Ezaki: Yes, it was. The drummer of the band was going to Berklee College of Music in the U.S., and the bass player was going to the University of the Arts, so I started aiming to go to the University of the Arts myself. From around the time I was a sophomore in high school, I couldn’t concentrate on my studies because I couldn’t stop improvising solos in my head during class (laughs).

However, there was no place to study jazz at the University of the Arts, so after moving to Tokyo, I started hanging out at the Modern Jazz Society of Waseda University, the oldest jazz society in Japan, and that is where I met Arata, the drummer of WONK.

-So that’s when you decided to become a musician in earnest?

Ezaki: No, it was pretty significant that I had a setback when I moved to Tokyo. When I entered the University of the Arts, there were many musicians of my generation, such as Shun Ishiwaka and Kohei Ueno, who were already active as professionals at the age of 19 or 20, and I realized how difficult it was to make a living with music, or I lost my confidence. On the other hand, I was happy that there were so many people of my generation who really liked jazz and were good at their instruments and cool.

-I see. But you didn’t “quit music,” did you?

Ezaki: Not to the point of quitting, but I did consider interning at a record company or working behind the scenes. But it just so happened that Arata, the leader of WONK, asked me if I wanted to be in a band with him. Arata, the leader of WONK, asked me if I wanted to join his band, and around the same time, there was talk of doing a project with Ishiwaka, Tsuneta (Daiki / King Gnu, millennium parade), Nukata (Taishi / Tokyo Shiokouji), etc. If someone thinks my keyboard playing is good, then I will continue playing a little longer, make music, and play piano. I was able to come back to the feeling that if there are people who think my keyboard is good, then I will continue to make music and play the piano a little bit more.

-I think that by working with people I thought I couldn’t compete with, I was able to gain confidence and find my role in the group. And from there, you became more active in the underground scene, appearing in Kohaku with King Gnu and millennium parade. Did anything change in your mindset during that time?

Ezaki: I’ve always had a bit of a bird’s-eye view of things, and I don’t really have an overground or underground consciousness. I was a teenager who was into jazz all my life, so I’ve come this far without passing through much J-pop or rock, and I’m just doing what I can do because my close friends need it. So there hasn’t been any particular change in my state of mind, but there have been things like learning the maximum amount of tension and my grandmother recognizing my work (laughs).

If I can do something new, “I just want to try it out first.

So far, we’ve talked mainly about music, but did you have any hobbies outside of music?

Ezaki: Yes, I did. I always wanted to be a robot engineer. When I was in the upper grades of elementary school, I did programming and joined the “Invention Club,” a club activity at the Fukuoka City Science and Culture Center for Boys and Girls (laughs). I also participated in “RoboCup Junior,” in which we assembled soccer robots and programmed them to play soccer with other robots.

I see.

Ezaki: In my elementary school graduation book, I set a specific goal: “When I graduate from engineering school and turn 30, I will build an autonomous biped robot that can do a double jump. I guess I was on the right track (laughs).

(laughs). So you didn’t think of becoming a musician at that time.

Ezaki: I didn’t think about becoming a musician at all. Until the middle of my sophomore year in high school, all I was thinking about was going to engineering school. Because I’ve been doing science-related things since I was a child, I think I might see music as a format for expressing my emotional side.

─ It’s true you are very sensitive to new technology in your musical activities.

Ezaki: The 3DCG live performance was partly due to the fact that the bass player, Mikio Inoue, works for a game company, but the Dolby Atmos mix was realized after I made a strong appeal to the members. Even now, I spend more time watching tech news than listening to music, so if something new is possible, I’m always eager to try it out first.

Identity Shaken by the Coming of the “Post-AI Era”

What is it that you are most interested in now?

Ezaki: “How on earth should we live in the future?” I guess that’s what I’m most interested in. The current atmosphere is like the eve of the Industrial Revolution. Various things on the earth are unstable, and there are hidden moments when things that have been repeated as a matter of course will no longer be valid, and I think that sooner or later a tremendous paradigm shift will occur. How will people react to this?　This is what I am most interested in right now.

For example, in terms of one job function, I am aware that I am a “music maker,” and I am also aware that I like to do it. Oddly enough, I will continue to make music even if no one asks me to do so, and I feel that it is meaningful that I am working with my hands, but not everyone lives that way, so I wonder how people will live when the age of automation arrives in the future.

I wonder how people who have been working by “responding” to what is demanded of them will live when they are no longer required to do so.

Ezaki: That’s right. If machines can produce overwhelmingly high-quality work in a short time, what will people find to be worth living for? In music, too, there may come a time when machines will surpass human quality. However, I find meaning in the fact that I am working with my hands and making music even though no one is asking me to, so I can dismiss that as irrelevant and say, “What I am doing is meaningful. However, there may be people who don’t feel that way, and there are definitely areas where we can’t say that.

When society undergoes a major shift like this, I think everyone is looking for a place to stand on. Our identities will be shaken considerably. When that happens, what will those of us living in Japan turn to?　I wonder what we in Japan will turn back to when that happens. For example, the Meiji Restoration was undeniably a turning point for Japan, and at that time, books such as “Bushido” (by Inazo Nitobe) were published and the tea ceremony was revisited. The same is true of Tanizaki Junichiro’s “In Praise of Shadows.

Before the world became what it is today, it was originally like this, right? “Before the world became what it is today, this is how it used to be,” and “This is how it has been handed down from generation to generation. These things are being sorted out in these times of fluctuation. If this is the case, then I am wondering if someone, somewhere, is sorting these things out at this very moment, and if so, what kind of things are being sorted out.

If so, I’m very curious about what that might be.

Ezaki: There are two themes behind this solo album. First, it is about myself. I was a little shaken by that. Then there is the “post-AI era” that I just mentioned. I was wondering if there might be some resemblance to the “vacillation” during the Meiji Restoration period. When I came across the book “In Praise of Shadows” at that time, I felt the urge to say to myself in my work, “I must have originally had this kind of sensibility. I wanted to go back to my own origins, and to make music that is meant to be listened to alone, not together in a large space. I set these two as the theme of the album.