Takeji Tomita

, born 1942-02-03 in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan, is a Japanese aikido teacher who since the 1960s lives in Sweden. He teaches in his own dojo in Stockholm, Aikido Dojo Stockholm, as well as in others in Sweden and around the world. He has taught and demonstrated aikido on numerous occasions in Great Britain, Italy, Portugal, France, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Russia, Poland and the United States.

Takeji Tomita is ranked 7th dan in the Aikikai. He also holds an 8th dan from a Japanese budo organisation, which is not an aikido rank. Tomita belongs to the kind of aikido teacher who points out the effectiveness of techniques as the core of the art. He teaches aikido weapons - jo and bokken - according to Morihiro Saito's system.

Tomita began practising aikido at university in 1961, and joined the Aikikai in Tokyo in 1962. He trained as an uchi-deshi under the founder of aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, and under Morihiro Saito at the Iwama Dojo in Ibaraki prefecture. He is generally considered a student of Morihiro Saito's. In 1969, on the death of the founder, he relocated to Sweden and began work spreading aikido in Scandinavia together with - and in competition with - the instructor then formally in charge of aikido in Sweden, Toshikazu Ichimura. He first landed in the city of Gothenburg, where he and his Gothenburg students such as Ulf Evenås have had large influence on the local aikido scene. He soon moved to Stockholm, and founded his dojo, Aikido Dojo Stockholm, in 1976. Saito and Tomita split up their teacher - student relationship during the 1980s. The major part of Tomita's students then preferred to follow Saito direct rather than split off together with Tomita, which was one major reason for the creation of the organisation Iwama Ryu.

Tomita continued on his own, and since the death of his previous teacher Morihiro Saito he has distanced himself from the Aikikai. In 1992 he created his own style organisation, "Takemusu Aiki Tomita Academy" (or shorter "Tomita Academy"), to promote what he feels is the correct study of Japanese budo. He has not formally left the Aikikai but most of his activities, such as the awarding of dan rank takes place outside of the organization.

His ex wife, Kishti Tomita, has become well known to Swedish audiences as one of the judges in the TV show Idol 2005. They divorced in 2007.

External links

* [http://www.takemusuaiki.org Homepage of Takemusu Aiki Tomita Academy]