segi profile English ver.

Basic Data

Date of Birth：June 29, 1966
Zodiac sign：Cancer
Blood type：Ｂ
Inspired musician：SAVIA ANDINA, John Anderson(YES),Pygmy
Favorite magazine：NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, Newsweek, DUNK SHOOT, HOOP
Favorite movie：As Good as it Gets, Blades of Glory, Interstellar
Favorite thing to do：Watching sports(especially NBA）, Safari
Favorite food：Soba, Sushi
Speciality：Making Zampona, Packing(in a suitecase)

Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/takamasa_segi/

Profile

Takamasa Segi / Zampona and Quena Player.

Born in Tokyo in 1966, Segi began his zampona and quena study at the age of 13. With no teacher, Segi was forced to teach himself. At 18 years of age, Segi went to Bolivia to continue his studies. His performance was higly evaluated, he signed to a major record label in Bolivia.

After returning to Japan, Segi formed a band called “Takamasa Segi’s Club Andino” with Bolivia’s top musicians, Oscar Castor, Donato Espinoza, Rafael Arias from SAVIA ANDINA and Fernado Torrico, Edwin Castellanos from TUPAY. They released an album “ANDES” and toured 20 places all around Japan in 2001. Later that year, a Japanese pop band “Porno Graffiti” featured him on the single “Ageha-cho” which went on to sell over 1 million copies.

To date, Segi has released 22 CDs (include Maxi- single) in Japan and 6 albums in Bolivia. Throughout his career, Segi has performed with many famous Japanese musicians including THE ALFEE, ARASHI, Masaharu Fukuyama, Toshiki Kadomatsu, THE BOOM, Noriyuki Makihara, Ryoko Moriyama, YUZU, Kosetsu Minami, Yoko Takahashi, Katsumi Watanabe, Shuichi "Ponta" Murakami, coba, Kotaro Oshio, Naoko Terai and Lisa Ono. Also,some world-reknowned artists such as Pedro Aznar, Toninho Horta and Hugo Fattoruso have played with Segi.

In 2003, Segi recorded “Oracion” a collaborated track with Pedro Aznar, a former member of Pat Metheny group. It is included in Segi’s album “Let’s go safari(2003) ” , Pedro’s album “Mudras(2003)” and “A Roar of Southern Clouds(2006)” . In addition, Segi’s album “SAL Y AGUA” was nominated for CICOMBOL 2010, which is known as the Grammy Award in Bolivia.

Segi made a 5,000km journey down the Amazon River by canoe in 1997. This experience inspired him to compose some of the most amazing music of his career. Since that time, he has been actively seeking areas of unexplored region such as Central and South Africa and Patagonia to find the inspiration for his works.

Zampona was created in the Andes/Amazon region over 4,000 years, it is the oldest woodwind instrument. Ancient people noticed that as the wind blew through hollow bamboo a whistling noise was heard. The zampona is the sound of the wind. As the zampona was created by the earth, Segi contributes to conservation of wildlife with JTEF (The Japan Tiger and Elephant Fund, a non-profit and non-governmental organization) through his music.