Sakura (musician)

, also known professionally as Sakura (born November 20 1969) is a Japanese musician whose main instrument is the drums.

Sakura was born in Nerima, Tokyo, Japan, the youngest of three children. He started taking piano lessons when he was a child. When he was in junior high school he became very interested in rock music, later taking formal music training. Initially he wanted to play guitar but soon changed his mind and devoted himself to percussion.

When Sakura was in high school, he was already playing in the percussion and brass sections for three different school bands. He started working as a roadie for well-known Japanese rock band, "Dead End", when he was nineteen, and became their support drummer soon after. Soon he began playing drums professionally and joined Japanese bands Die+Kusse and HaremQ (the latter released a CD on which sakura is the official drummer).

In 1993, Sakura joined Japanese rock band L'Arc~en~Ciel. The band released their debut album Dune soon afterwards. He remained L'Arc-en-Ciel's drummer until 1997, after being charged with possession of illegal drugs. In 1999 he became leader of Japanese rock band Zigzo, which disbanded in 2002. Currently he is the drummer of Sons of All Pussys, and has also played drums for rock/pop band Tamamizu as support drummer during the first half of 2005. From July 2005 he has been playing guitar for Lion Heads under the alias "Sakura-Die-Nerima".

Sakura is a Pearl Drums, Sabian Cymbals and Remo drumheads endorser, and has been giving drumming seminars and clinics since early on in his career. Pearl Instruments Japan has released a special Sakura signature drumset model in 2003.

Sakura has authored two books, one called "SakuraのDrumworks Quick Reference" about drumming; and one part-biography part-fiction book called 櫻澤の本気 ("Sakurazawa no honki") which gathers the articles published in Japanese magazine Arena 37º, in his column 櫻澤の浮気 ("Sakurazawa no uwaki"), during his days in Zigzo. The latter was only available through mail order to customers living in Japan.

External links

* [http://www.bubble-star.com Sons of All Pussys official site]
* [http://www.up-down.com/100zigzo Zigzo's Official site]
* [http://sakura.reverie-noire.com Sakurazawa no Honki — Unofficial fan site]
* [http://xlionx.hp.infoseek.co.jp Lion Heads official site]
* [http://haruka.baka-koneko.com/sakura/ SAKURA no kodawari DRUMSET]
* [http://sunday.angeltrip.net/sakura/ Sakura fanlisting]
* [http://sunday.angeltrip.net/lionheads Lion Heads fanlisting]