- Interview Date: 4/4/2026
- Interview Location: Anime Boston 2026
- Interview Format: In-Person, Round-Robin
Anime Herald: I will give you a “Choose Your Own Adventure.” Would you like to talk about the music you’ve found cool in the last decade, your time working with Rudy Van Gelder, or what your masterpiece would have been in the alternate universe where you chose to be an author?
Yoko Kanno: I’ll answer the alternate universe question. I’m a huge fan of Stephen King and David Lynch. I think if I could become an author, it would be someone like that.
Dead Rhetoric: You engage your senses to get inspiration for writing. What are some of the most memorable ways that you have accomplished this over the years?
Yoko Kanno: One of the things that I did, because I wanted to feel the wind in my hair and on my face, so I went air gliding. I also dove into the ocean at night. That’s when the fish are typically sleeping, so I got to see the fish as they slept.
The Fandom Post: How do you balance taking influence from music across so many different places, eras, and styles with ensuring everything you produce has its own identity separate from its inspirations?
Yoko Kanno: Each person has different senses, different experiences, different feelings. For example, this is water. Just water. After running, water is delicious. But if you are drowning, that same water becomes dangerous. This morning, I washed my face. I felt that Boston’s water is so cold.
I recently lost my brother. In his last days, I placed water on his lips. Water is so deep. This is a quick answer. This is just water, but everybody feels it differently. I want to say that the creator feels everything.
A-to-J Connections: Who are your biggest inspirations in music?
Yoko Kanno: I think, right now, my biggest inspiration is God. I was talking about how I was diving to see the fish. I was looking at all these beautiful fish, with different shapes and colors. I was thinking about how I could never be God.
Manga Mavericks: What inspired you to perform your upcoming solo show, “Piano Me?” What feelings do you hope to inspire in your audience as you bring them on this musical journey?
Yoko Kanno: I actually performed this show at Otakon in 2013. I hadn’t had a chance to do that performance again since then. If you’re in a big concert with lots of bands, then it is harder to connect and communicate with the audience. If it’s just me, I can really connect with people. For example, if there’s a baby crying in the corner, I can respond to that. If someone is having an experience, I can share that experience. The interactivity.
Jotaku Network: What is your musical learning and inspiration process, and how has it evolved since you’ve started working in the anime industry?
Yoko Kanno: I think one of the things that has always stood out to me for anime, or any kind of media, is how much of the emotion and the feeling comes from the music for the viewer. That is something that has always struck me.
I think, with anime in particular, that connection is really important and is strongly felt by the people watching. I also think that, in general, anime fans are sensitive people, so it is very easy to hurt their feelings. I have to be very responsible and careful with the music.
Anime Herald: Why “Piano Me” in New York right now? Why did you feel this was the right moment to bring “Piano Me” to New York?
Yoko Kanno: To be honest, I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to do that kind of show. I’m getting older, my bandmates are getting older. Even as musicians, we have a timeline that we’re following. I wanted to be able to do it while I still could.
Dead Rhetoric: In writing for everything from anime to advertisements, what skills have you been able to transfer when writing music for different types of media?
Yoko Kanno: Doing music for advertisements is quite different than doing music for other types of media. They are very strict with rules about what you can and cannot do in music for advertisements. They are also spending a lot of money on that, so I really feel a responsibility when I am doing music for advertisements.
There’s also a rule that you have to grab your audience in the first three seconds when doing an ad. I learned how to focus everything that needed to be in those first three seconds to grab an audience.
The Fandom Post: How does working on a series like Cowboy Bebop, which treats the music as absolutely central to every scene, compare to working on something where the music is meant to be more in the background?
Yoko Kanno: It depends on the director and what it is that they are looking for from the music. For example, in something like Gundam, the conversations between the characters are the most important thing. The director almost wants the music to go away.
On the opposite end, you have Cowboy Bebop, where the music was essential. The director respected music so much that there were times they ended up cutting lines that were part of the script. It’s not my decision, per se. I just follow what the director wants.
A-to-J Connections: If you were stuck on a desert island and could only bring four albums with you, which four would you bring?
(Editor’s note: Pre-pandemic it was only three albums. The post-pandemic inflation is real.)
Yoko Kanno: First of all, I don’t really listen to albums all that much. If I had to pick four things, it probably wouldn’t be albums. If I want to lie down and score something and a song is playing…
I think I’d want someone to perform with. At least, if I could have some birds to perform with, I’d take that. Some birds would be good, we could sing together.
Manga Mavericks: Your relationship with music began when you started learning the piano in your childhood. When composing “Piano Me,” what reflections did you have about your childhood experiences learning the piano and your relationship with the instrument over the course of your life? How will those feelings be expressed in your performance?
Yoko Kanno: To me, a piano is not a machine. It’s a spaceship. It’s the thing that allows me to connect with the audience and then we get to ride this spaceship and journey through the music together. It’s the vehicle that allows us to travel with music.
From the beginning, as a child, I viewed the piano as a vehicle, not as a machine. The piano is not something I practice. I don’t like practicing.
(In English) “Never.” (Laughs)
Jotaku Network: Given that many of your anime composer roles tend to be for original projects, how has that felt compared to times when you’ve worked on adaptations, which have additional source material to work with?
Yoko Kanno: For something that has a source, like a manga, it has an already existing fan base. I feel a responsibility to not let those fans down. For originals, there isn’t that pressure from a pre-existing audience, so it is a little bit more free.
Anime Herald: Can you share any stories from your time recording with Rudy Van Gelder?
Yoko Kanno: By the time I met him, he was in his seventies. Age-wise, he was like a grandpa. But personality wise, he was quite aggressive. I found that quite surprising for an older gentleman.
For example, there was a moment where the request was to make the sound “fly.” That required me to do some outrageous movements with my wrists. I’d never seen anything like that before. Just by turning their hands, they could make the sound completely different. I think, when I grow older, I would like to be an older person like him. To be able to do these things when I am in my 80s. (Laughs)
Dead Rhetoric: What do you place as being most important when it comes to the intersection of sounds and visuals?
Yoko Kanno: This is a little hard to answer, because I believe there are a lot of ways to connect visuals and sound. It becomes less about what I want to do than what the director wants to do. What do we have to do together so that it fits their vision? That’s how we create that connection.
The Fandom Post: You’re best known as one of the best anime composers of all time. Is there any reason you haven’t scored any anime since Terror In Resonance in 2014?
Yoko Kanno: Not really. If the timing worked for that, I’d be happy to do it. To be honest, my fees are a little bit on the high side, and the economy is not so great right now, so maybe I’m a little hard to work with.
A-to-J Connections: How did you get started writing music for anime?
Yoko Kanno: A friend of mine who knew me suggested I would be a good fit for anime. That was the person who introduced me.
Directors like (Shōji) Kawamori-san and (Shinichirō) Watanabe-san saw what I could do and decided they wanted to work with me, so we worked on this project together. I didn’t set out and decide I wanted to work in anime. They always said, “You’re actually pretty good at this, it’s working out quite well.”
Manga Mavericks: What does the phrase “Inner Universe” mean to you?
Yoko Kanno: Now we’re sort of in an era where anyone who wants to, can create art, music, videos, can do so. We have tools like YouTube, TikTok, and more. Anyone who wants to create can do so. Right now, I am interested in going through a journey to find my true self. The parts of me that I am not currently aware of.
I would love for the music I create to connect the parts of me that I am not aware of with the parts of the audience that they are not aware of. A Jungian theory of the collective subconscious. Using music to communicate through the collective subconscious.
Jotaku Network: What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced working on all of these amazing projects in your career, and have you faced any additional hardships as a result of your success?
Yoko Kanno: Netflix. Working with Netflix.
Anime Herald: Keeping it 100.
Yoko Kanno: I was chased on a bike once. It was scary.
Anime Herald: What is the media you’ve found cool in the past decade?
Yoko Kanno: DJs. The turntables. I’d love to be able to do that one day.
Anime Herald: DJ Kanno.
Yoko Kanno: (Laughs)
Dead Rhetoric: Over the two nights in New York, you have two concerts coming up (with the Seatbelts on 4/10, and “Piano Me” 4/11). How do those two concerts reveal two different sides of you?
Yoko Kanno: There are a lot of things I would love to try. We’ve been talking about DJ’ing. I’d love to do classical. I’d love to do a lot of people singing together. I want to try a lot of different things. Two of those sides are what I am doing in those shows. One side is “Piano Me.” One side is with The Seatbelts.
The Fandom Post: It’s great to see you performing here on the East coast. Do you have any interest in performing on the West coast, or elsewhere in the country?
Yoko Kanno: Have someone call me, and I’ll be there.
A-to-J Connections: How are you enjoying Boston?
Yoko Kanno: Before coming to Anime Boston, I was in New York. I am going back after the convention. One of the things that stuck out to me is how different New York and Boston are from each other.
People are polite. There’s no smell of marijuana. New York is a little bit stinky. I am not a fan. The city is also gorgeous, and very clean. Also, people are well put together with their outfits. Not sloppy. The convention… The clothing is a little strange, but the people are nice.
(Editor’s note: I am a New Yorker. She’s right about the smell. There are so many unlicensed marijuana shops throughout the city. They smell like a Grateful Dead concert.)
Manga Mavericks: How do you feel the light projections in your concerts complement the music in immersing the audience in the experience?
Yoko Kanno: We first started by setting the animations so that they would move and stop when the music moved and stopped. It sounds quite easy, but it was actually quite difficult. The piano is not an electric instrument, so you can’t connect it to a computer and have the animation track with the sound. Personally, as an artist, I like to be free with my music. I don’t like it to be boxed in and limited. We needed to develop technology that could keep up with my artistry and move when I wanted to move and stop when I wanted to stop.
Jotaku Network: It sounds like you’ve gone on many trips to establish emotional connections with the projects you are working on. What of those experiences has stuck with you the most?
Yoko Kanno: I don’t know if it has been the most influential, but recently I was in Chennai, India. In Chennai, music is for God. It is a way to praise and revere God. Culturally for them, music is something you are offering to God. You are humble. You don’t wear shoes when you are recording music because it is something you are offering to God. I had to take off my shoes and socks in the studio and record barefoot. It was very exciting. I enjoyed that experience.
Anime Herald: Speaking of turntables, do you have any questions for us?
Yoko Kanno: Any recommendations for what I should do for the rest of my life?
A chorus of outlets: DJ!
Anime Herald: Write a horror novel, or DJ Kanno.
Yoko Kanno: That’s pretty good actually. I wonder if I can write that.
Anime Herald: Maybe not a novel, make it a novella.
Yoko Kanno: Okay! New York Times best seller!
Dead Rhetoric: You mentioned being humble. At the concert, you made sure all of your bandmates got their due. Is that something in how you approach your life?
Yoko Kanno: To be honest, I was never aware of that feeling. I figured we had this opportunity to be there together. I am sure people spent a lot of money on tickets. I wanted to take advantage of that moment and share that experience as a good memory and influence in their life.
Unnamed Outlet: In your concert and on your website, there are baby chicks. I was curious if you could explain the inspiration?
Yoko Kanno: Ever since I was a child, all of my nicknames were “baby chick,” or “little duckling,” or “small bird”. I think that’s where it is coming from. I’m not a very quiet person who stays still. Maybe I waddle a little bit like a bird.
The Fandom Post: How did you find and assemble the initial collective of musicians for Cowboy Bebop?
Yoko Kanno: We got a call from Rudy Van Gelder. We asked him if he knew anyone and he reached out to his network and recommended people.
My first international concert was Macross with members of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. At that time, I just called people up and said “Hi, my name is Yoko Kanno, I’m a composer from Japan, would you be interested in playing my music?”
I don’t think they’d ever had someone do that before. They were very surprised to get that phone call. Rudy was, too.
A-to-J Productions: Any closing message to your fans?
Yoko Kanno: Stay healthy and live long and prosper. Let’s meet again.
Manga Mavericks: Have you ever had a fan interaction where they told you how much your music meant to them that resonated with you?
Yoko Kanno: There was a fan of Macross Plus that I met in the United States who said, “I was so inspired by Macross Plus that I joined the Air Force.”
This was during the Iraq War. Sometimes I wonder if he’s okay.
Jotaku Network: If you could talk with your past self when you were just starting out, what would you like to say?
Yoko Kanno: That’s hard to answer. I think I would just say, “Take it easy.”
Anime Herald: Thank you very much.
Information on Yoko Kanno’s concerts in New York is available on Yoko Kanno’s website.