Masato Honda

Honda is a visiting professor at Showa University of Music. He was previously employed by Kunitachi College of Music as a professor of saxophone and jazz. His name was removed from the faculty list in 2020.

On the alto saxophone he uses a refaced 7* Yanagisawa mouthpiece, as well as a model made specifically for him by the brand Saxz, and a Meyer 5M. He used a Selmer Mark VII saxophone for most of his career, but switched to the more renowned Mark VI at some point in the 2010s For his time in T-Square during the 90s, he primarily used a synthetic Fibracell reed, but now uses Vandoren's Green Java reeds.

Since his work with T-Square, he has led and been a part of several other bands. Honda founded the group B.B.Station as a "train station" between the styles of jazz fusion and swing music. Trumpeter Eric Miyashiro is part of this group. Honda has also been a member of the Blue Note Tokyo All-Star Jazz Orchestra that Miyashiro leads. Honda has been in a number of other fusion acts besides T-Square such as Four of a Kind, which participated in the 2004 JVC Jazz Festival in Seoul, and Voice of Elements, which live-streamed performances because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In his 2008 solo album, Across the Groove, he featured jazz keyboardist Bob James. Also significant is his second solo album, Carry Out, in which he played every instrument and composed every song on the record.

After the album Blue in Red, Honda left T-Square for unknown reasons and pursued a solo career. He participated in the 20th Anniversary Performance at Yaon de Asobu, and Farewell & Welcome Live 1998, which was recorded on April 28, 1998 and released on VHS the following July. Berklee alum Takahiro Miyazaki replaced him starting with the album Gravity, however Honda still contributed to it, playing on the song Japanese Soul Brothers.

Honda debuted as an official member in T-Square Live - "Farewell & Welcome" in 1991, which was Itoh's official send-off from the group. Prior to this, Honda began recording his first studio album with T-Square in January 1991, New-S, where he composed the opening track, Megalith. It would release on March 21 that same year. Also in 1991, the group recorded the album Refreshest as T-Square and Friends, the first album under that name. It was composedly mainly of arrangements of previous songs, one of which was a version of It's Magic. Following the death of racing legend Ayrton Senna in 1994, T-Square released SOLITUDE, also as T-Square and Friends. David Liebman, Michael Brecker, and Mike Stern joined T-Square and Friends for the album Miss you in New York in 1995.

The 1990 live, T-Square Live (featuring F1 Grand Prix Theme) theme was Honda's first time working with T-Square as a session musician. The then-current saxophonist Takeshi Itoh stepped down from the group to pursue a solo career soon after.

Masato Honda started playing the saxophone in the 3rd grade under the influence of his father, after trying out both the flute and clarinet. During his high school years at the Kochi Prefectural Nakamura High School he participated in a pop band where he played guitar and sang. Afterwards, he went to Kunitachi College of Music, where he studied classical saxophone until he won the 14th Yamano Big Band Jazz Contest in 1983. Afterwards, he turned his focus to jazz and fusion styles. In 1985, he graduated from Kunitachi College of Music at the top of his class and joined Nobuo Hara's Sharps and Flats. Afterwards, he worked as a session musician, notably working with Toshiki Kadomatsu, Hiroshi Sato, and the Katsumi Horii Project, and formed the group WITNESS with Masaharu Ishikawa and Jun Kajiwara.

Masato Honda (本田雅人, born November 13, 1962), is a Japanese saxophone player, composer, and multi-instrumentalist. Born in Nakamura City, Kochi Prefecture (now Shimanto City), he graduated from Kunitachi College of Music. He is most well known for being a member of the band T-Square and appearing on Cowboy Bebop's soundtrack with The Seatbelts.