Former Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare Yasuhisa Shiozaki, Reveals the Real Face of Ryuichi Sakamoto, His Friend of 57 Years, After His Battle With Cancer

Ryuichi Sakamoto, a composer and pianist who underwent rectal cancer surgery in January ’21 and announced that he was battling the disease, has passed away.

In January this year, he released his first original album in six years, “12,” and on March 17, at a regular press conference, Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike revealed that she had received a letter from Sakamoto stating that the redevelopment of Jingu Shrine should be reviewed. It is not widely known that Sakamoto and Yasuhisa Shiozaki, who served as Chief Cabinet Secretary and Minister of Health, Labor, and Welfare under the bullet-riddled cabinet of Shinzo Abe last July, had been friends since junior high school, and that the two had taken the lead in occupying the principal’s office and staging a strike when they were students at Shinjuku Metropolitan High School.

At the end of February, Mr. Shiozaki told “FRIDAY Digital” about his memories with Sakamoto from their school days until recently, and about Sakamoto’s true face. FRIDAY Digital”. The article published on March 22 is reproduced below.

A cocky and hateful junior (smiles wryly).

Sakamoto and I have been together for so long that he is like air, but I feel comfortable and inspired when I am with him. Nothing has changed since he told me that the sound of a piano lid closing is part of the performance, which I thought was an interesting idea.

Mr. Shiozaki first met Mr. Sakamoto 57 years ago in the brass band club of Chitose Junior High School in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo. Mr. Shiozaki, who was the head of the club, had a hard time with a large boy a year younger than himself who tended to skip club activities. When he nudged him to “come to school,” he would smile amiably and nod his head, but then skip club activities again. But on the day of the presentation, he still managed to make it to the sound of the music, and I couldn’t help but wonder about him.

The head of the club is Yasuhisa Shiozaki, 72, a former member of the House of Representatives who has served as Chief Cabinet Secretary and Minister of Health, Labor, and Welfare. His junior is Ryuichi Sakamoto, 71, a composer and pianist known as “Professor” and “The World’s Sakamoto.” Mr. Shiozaki gazed into the void and recalled, “At that time, Sakamoto was a great artist.

I didn’t know at the time that Sakamoto was learning piano and composition from a teacher at the University of the Arts, and since he already had the body of an adult, I consulted with my advisor and assigned him the bass tuba for the brass instruments. From the standpoint of the head of the department, I was a cocky and hateful junior (chuckles).”

The two went on to Tokyo Metropolitan Shinjuku High School. Mr. Shiozaki took a year off to study in the U.S., and when he returned to Japan and returned to school, they were in the same class in the second grade.

We spent a meaningful year in the suburbs of San Francisco.” In ’67 and ’68, rock was at its peak, and I went to venues like the Fillmore West and Winterland. I was also numb to seeing Jimmy Hendrix play guitar at the Tongue Bella. My host brother was a band member, and I listened to live performances of Cream, Janis Joplin, etc., which had Eric Clapton. I brought a donut disc of Jackie Yoshikawa and the Blue Comets from Japan and played it for them, but I guess they didn’t respond well.

When I returned to Japan, I had Sakamoto-kun, who became a classmate of mine, listen to the records I had bought at that time. I told him that in San Francisco at the time, there were no chairs at venues, and I was surrounded by hippies sitting on the ground listening to the music.

They were connected through music, but after school exams, they would go to a small movie theater near the Isetan department store in Shinjuku, Tokyo.

In 1969, I went with Sakamoto to see “Shinjo Ouburu Karusisa,” directed by Yukio Ninagawa at the Art Theater Shinjuku Bunka. We both watched as Ninagawa-san was pushing the actors around in the rehearsal hall in Nanpeidai. We went to the opening night performance, and were impressed by the way the audience was part of the stage.

The hot blood that flowed in their bodies later became the driving force behind a strike at their high school.

After returning to Japan after experiencing firsthand the independence and diversity of the U.S., Mr. Shiozaki became fed up with the rigid rules of school life and decided to run for student body president in order to change the entire school.

In San Francisco, only Japanese, physical education, and U.S. history were required for all students, but the rest of the classes were optional. The blind children also took classes together, and the teachers did not write on the board at all at that time. The person who had the next subject with me took the blind person to the next classroom as a matter of course. The school counselor assigned to me was wheelchair-bound and disabled, but he did not compartmentalize them from able-bodied students; they were part of their daily routine.”