A fool who dances is simply a fool who sees more!

And if you’re already a little crazy—why not dance too?
I got seriously into Japanese folk songs and ended up writing five pieces for a women’s vocal ensemble: Awa Odori, Anekomosa, Kokiriko, Tanchame, and Nanbu Yoshare. At some point, I thought: If I’m going to be crazy anyway, I might as well write songs.

The melodies in folk songs don’t quite fit into classical tonality, which made composing them pretty tricky. But I also learned something important along the way: folk songs aren’t something you understand just with your head—they’re something you feel, almost like they go straight through your skin and into your heart.