Akane Sakai
A Pianist Who Connects People and Creates Artistic Spaces

A Chance Encounter with Argerich

After graduating from the Toho Gakuen School of Music, pianist Akane Sakai moved to Belgium, and has since built an international career with Brussels as her base. Sakai is regularly invited to appear as a soloist for music festivals, concert halls, and orchestras around the world. Yet one of the most important dimensions of her artistic identity is undoubtedly her collaboration with Martha Argerich. Sakai receives the full trust from Argerich, considered one of the greatest pianists of the postwar era, and serves not only as her duo and piano four-hands partner, but also as artistic director of the “Argerich Festival” in Hamburg. Indeed, many listeners first came to know Sakai’s name through these collaborations with Argerich. What kind of path, then, has Sakai followed until now? In order to explore Sakai more closely and examine her artistic identity, FREUDE conducted an in-depth interview with the pianist.

Sakai first encountered Argerich when she was in her third year studying in the music course of Toho Girls’ High School.

“I was a huge admirer of Martha Argerich, and every time I went to one of her recitals, I would line up for the autograph session afterward. Little by little, Martha began to recognize me, and one day she asked me, ‘You’re a piano student, aren’t you? Would you like it if I heard you play?’ I immediately answered that I would love that, though honestly I could hardly believe that Argerich would really listen to my playing. But it truly happened. At the time I was living in the dormitory at Toho Gakuen when I received a phone call from a representative at KAJIMOTO saying, ‘Argerich is going to choose a piano in Hamamatsuchō, so please go there.’ Martha dislikes rainy weather, so she was in a bad mood that day and, in the end, she listened to my performance before a concert with GidonKremer at the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre. Having my playing heard by the pianist I idolized felt completely dreamlike. I was so nervous and exhilarated that I barely remember how I played, but afterward she even invited me to dinner. That was the beginning of my mysterious bond with Martha.”

After graduating from Toho Gakuen University, Sakai moved to Belgium, with Argerich playing an important role in helping her choose where to study abroad.

“Originally, I had planned to study in Germany, but the professor I had hoped to study with retired, and I suddenly had to reconsider my options. So I consulted Martha, and she recommended the conservatory in Brussels. Following her advice, I decided to study in Belgium, where I studied with Evgeny Mogilevsky and Alan Weiss at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. Since then, I’ve grown deeply attached to Brussels and have continued to base myself there. Brussels is an international city where many foreign musicians live, including violinist Yuzuko Horigome, and it also offers easy access to France, Germany, and the Netherlands. Martha herself also used Brussels as one of her bases and often came to the city.”

As Collaborative Partners

Sakai’s relationship with Argerich continued after her move to Belgium, gradually evolving into a true artistic partnership.

“Even after I moved abroad, Martha regularly listened to my playing at her home. She is an extremely humble person, so she always shows restraint when giving advice. I believe our first performance together was in 2005 at the ‘Argerich Festival’ in Buenos Aires, where we played works by Franz Schubert and Maurice Ravel for piano four hands. After that, we also performed together at the festival in Lugano. In addition to performing together as a duo and in four-hand repertoire, I have also served as artistic planner for the ‘Argerich Festival’ in Hamburg, which began in 2018.”

Among pianists, Argerich is known for possessing a particularly intimidating aura, but how does Sakai — who has spent so much time alongside her — perceive her as a person?

“Because we had always been close, our relationship did not fundamentally change even after we began performing together. As a collaborator, Martha leads the performance while bringing out the very best in her partners. She never tries to push herself to the forefront, yet at the same time she never retreats into the background. She maintains that exquisite balance completely instinctively. Above all, Martha treats everyone as equals. Whether in Lugano or Hamburg, all the performers receive the same performance fee, and she absolutely does not want to be treated differently from anyone else. When I first met her, she was in her early fifties, and I think she has become much gentler over the years. She used to dislike being followed by cameras, but now she loves watching YouTube and no longer minds being filmed.”

The Mission of an Artistic Planner

As Sakai has already mentioned, she serves as artistic planner for the “Argerich Festival,” held every June in Hamburg. The fact that she has been entrusted with such a responsibility reflects the immense trust Argerich places in her. But what exactly does the role of artistic planner involve?

“The festival is organized by the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, so I discuss the programs and artists together with the orchestra’s intendant. I am mainly responsible for the recitals and chamber music events outside the orchestral concerts. The 2026 edition will take place from June 20 to 30, with Japan highlighted as one of the festival’s central themes. One of the major events will be the European premiere of Dai Fujikura’s Piano Concerto No. 4, Akiko’s Piano, in which I will appear as the soloist. Akiko Kawamoto, who died in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, would have turned one hundred this year had she survived, and the upright piano she cherished also marks its hundredth anniversary this year. Martha herself had originally been scheduled to give the premiere of this concerto, but due to travel restrictions during the COVID pandemic at the time, that was not possible, so, with that in mind, it led us to decide to include the piece in Hamburg this time around. Since Akiko’s piano contains ivory, it cannot be transported abroad, but Casio digitally sampled the instrument’s sound. In the cadenza for the Hamburg performance, we will use this digitized version of Akiko’s piano.

We also plan to present the Noh work Nagasaki no Yūbin Haitatsu (The Nagasaki Postman) by Noh performer Masanosuke Okura. Based on The Postman of Nagasaki by Peter Townsend, this Noh production was created in 2025, eighty years after the end of the war. Together with Fujikura’s concerto, it will give the festival an opportunity to reflect on peace and nuclear disarmament. At the Hamburg Argerich Festival, we place great importance on diversity in programming, actively presenting not only Japanese Noh theater, but also jazz, Indian music, flamenco, and musical traditions from around the world.”

Sakai’s profound understanding of Argerich’s artistic spirit is equally evident in the festival’s lineup of classical performers.

“I always try to create a balance between artists who have long collaborated with Martha and musicians appearing at the festival for the first time, so that the programs never feel predictable and instead offer experiences that can only be heard in Hamburg. Of course, we also present things that people especially want to hear from Martha herself, such as performing the complete Beethoven violin sonatas together with Maxim Vengerov. Another core element of the festival is the annual performance of songs by Robert Schumann that Martha herself loves, with each year featuring a different singer. In the same way that Rudolf Serkin repeatedly performed Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy at the Marlboro Music Festival, this Schumann series may well be considered a symbol of the Hamburg Argerich Festival.

I also frequently appear at La Folle Journée, and similarly, the Hamburg festival is filled with an intimate atmosphere that makes artists feel they have ‘come home.’ Building relationships of equality and trust among all the artists is something Martha values above all else.”

Rediscovering The Seasons

Another remarkable undertaking by Sakai is her YouTube project devoted to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s piano cycle The Seasons, releasing one piece every month.

“The project began after a performance at the ‘Lausitz Festival’ in the eastern German city of Görlitz in September 2022. There, I performed Tchaikovsky’s The Seasons together with readings from The Thirteen Months, a collection of poems by the German writer Erich Kästner, who is also known as the author of Lottie and Lisa. The concert also featured a unique staging concept called ‘Osmodrama’ where a device released scents into the audience corresponding to the content of the poems. Through this experience, I rediscovered the beauty of The Seasons, and since then I have frequently programmed the work into recitals. The year 2026 marks the 150th anniversary of the publication of The Seasons, and to commemorate the occasion I decided to upload one piece every month to YouTube. Originally published month by month as supplements to a music magazine, The Seasons is a masterpiece that fully reveals Tchaikovsky’s delicate musical sensibility. His solo piano works are not widely known, but besides The Seasons, there are many hidden gems, such as the 18 Pieces, Op.72. I hope to continue to cherish performing Tchaikovsky’s piano music in the future.”

In Her Hometown of Nagoya

On June 6, Sakai will give a recital in her hometown of Nagoya at the concert hall Lunde.

“At Lunde, I launched an annual recital series in 2025. This year’s concert, the second in the series, will feature works by Frédéric Chopin, Alexander Scriabin, and Ludwig van Beethoven, alongside Fujikura’s Akiko’s Diary for piano. This piece is an independent version of the fourth cadenza from the piano concerto I mentioned earlier, and in Nagoya as well I will perform it using the digitized sound of Akiko’s piano. In this recital series, I have decided to include at least one work by a living composer every year. Last year, for example, I performed one of the Études by Toshio Hosokawa.

As this interview clearly demonstrates, Sakai is an artist with a broad perspective and a strong artistic vision. Inspired by Argerich, she left Japan and ultimately evolved into a figure trusted by artists around the world for her role not only as a pianist, but also as a producer. Rather than simply deepening her own pianism, Sakai has devoted herself to connecting people through music and creating new artistic spaces, and through this work is leaving a substantial impact on the classical music world.

Opportunities to hear Sakai perform in Japan remain relatively rare due to her demanding international schedule, but she now hopes to increase her appearances in Japan and dedicate herself to passing on the experience she has accumulated to the next generation. FREUDE will continue to follow Sakai’s exceptional musical activities and artistic journey in the years to follow.

Akane Sakai

Born in Nagoya, Akane Sakai studied under Midori Miura at Toho Gakuen Music High School and Toho Gakuen School of Music. After graduating, Akane went to Belgium and studied under Evgeny Mogilevsky at Royal Conservatory of Brussels and completed the master’s course with top honors at the Lemmens Institute under Alan Weiss. She further studied with Pavel Gililov and Lilya Zilberstein. Akane was selected as a scholarship student by the NPO Yellow Angel and as a trainee for Program of Overseas Study for Upcoming Artists by the Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan.

Akane Sakai has performed with many orchestras including Kremerata Baltica, Sinfonia Varsovia, Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, Avignon-Provence National Orchestra of France, Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, Manchester Camerata, Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, and under the baton of Alexander Vedernikov, Sylvain Cambreling, Lionel Bringuier, Jean-Jacques Kantorow, Hubert Soudant and Naoto Otomo.

She has been invited to numerous music festivals worldwide, including La Folle Journée (Nantes and Tokyo), Pacific Music Festival (Sapporo), The Festival de La Roque d’Anthéron, “Chopin and His Europe International Music Festival” (Poland), Lausitz Festival (Germany), Lugano Festival (Switzerland), Argerich’s Meeting Point in Beppu (Beppu Argerich Music Festival) among others.

Her repertoire ranges widely from Bach to Prokofiev, Bartók, Messiaen, and Takemitsu, and she actively performs rare works by composers such as Szpilman, Maciejewski, and Weinberg. She is also deeply involved in chamber music and has performed with Martha Argerich, Gidon Kremer, Ivry Gitlis, Yuzuko Horigome, Nicholas Angelich, Alexander Knyazev, Mayu Kishima, Evgeni Bozhanov, and Yoshiko Kawamoto.

Her recordings include a live CD from the “Lugano Festival” released by Warner Music and Deutsche Grammophon, and her first solo CD “Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Ravel” released by King International, which was selected as a special edition by Record Geijutsu magazine. The latest album, “VOYAGES,” was released by German label Acousence in June 2022.

In addition to being the artistic planner for the Argerich Music Festival in Hamburg, Germany, she is also active as a jury member for international competitions, conducting masterclasses in various locations, and engaging in writing activities. 2026 to celebrate 150th anniversary of the publication of Tchaikovsky’s Seasons op.37a monthly broadcast will be held on her  YouTube channel “Akane Sakai”.

Website: https://www.akanesakai.com/
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@akaneconcert7781
Martha Argerich Festival Hamburg: https://www.symphonikerhamburg.de/martha-argerich-festival