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Aska Officially Leaves Chage and Aska Music Duo After 40 Years

Musician Aska (Shigeaki Miyazaki) announced on his official blog on Sunday that he is leaving the Chage and Aska musical duo. August 25 was the 40th anniversary of the duo's formation.

In the announcement, Aska said that it is finally time for him to pursue his own path. He also clarified that the duo's "indefinite hiatus" from 2009 was originally supposed to be a breakup of the duo, but their management had persuaded them to only announce an "indefinite hiatus."

In May 2014, police arrested Aska after finding MDMA and other drugs in a room of the singer's Minato ward apartment. He was convicted with a three-year suspended sentence. He was arrested again in 2016 for alleged drug use, but was eventually released without being indicted due to lack of evidence.

After Aska's 2014 arrest, Walt Disney Studios Japan announced that the 13-disc Miyazaki Hayao Kantoku Sakuhin-shū (The Collected Works of Director Hayao Miyazaki) Blu-ray Disc/DVD collection of director Hayao Miyazaki's works will no longer have "On Your Mark," the music video of a Chage and Aska song, as a bonus. Walt Disney Studios Japan also halted shipments of the 2005 Ghibli ga Ippai Special Short Shorts DVD, which featured "On Your Mark" along with other shorts that Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli produced. Studio Ghibli would later directly offer the music video to buyers of the box set, after the set's release. Walt Disney Japan would later make "On Your Mark" available in the Ghibli ga Ippai Special Short Short 1992-2016 Blu-ray Disc collection of shorts on July 17.

Chage and Aska debuted in 1979, and began to gain attention with their songs "Banari no Kawa" and "Morning Moon" in the 1980s. In 1992, the duo's television drama theme song "Say Yes" sold more than 2.7 million copies. Their song "Yah Yah Yah" set records two years later and gained the duo popularity across Japan and in several Asian countries. Two decades ago, Chage and Aska approached Studio Ghibli to make a music video for their "On Your Mark" song. The music video — which Hayao Miyazaki conceived, wrote, and directed — became an "experimental film" shown in theaters with Whisper of the Heart in 1995.

In 2013, Chage and Aska delayed and later cancelled their "On Your Mark" reunion concerts out of concerns that Aska had a transient cerebral ischemic attack (TIA). Weekly publications later reported that Aska may have been using drugs, but the singer denied the claims. He commented about his illness on his official website and said he was "absolutely not doing illegal things."

Aska and Chage have not performed together since 2009. Before the cancelled 2013 concerts, the duo had been on hiatus, during which Aska and Chage continued to pursue solo careers. Aska released Boku ni Dekiru Koto Ima Utau Series in March 2013. Chage also formed a new band called 1/6 (pronounced "one slash six"), which went on tour beginning in September 2014.

Source: Aska's official blog via Hachima Kikō