Zard

About Zard
ZARD is a Japanese pop group. Originally a group of 5 members, with lead vocalist Izumi Sakai (aka Sachiko Kamachi) as group leader. She is part of the record label B-Gram Records, Inc.

Career
ZARD made their debut in February 10, 1991 with a single Good-bye My Loneliness. By their third album, it appears that the only member left in ZARD was Izumi Sakai, and from that point on, she has been the only member in that group. While she is the only member left, the band's name did not change.

Sakai is also a very prolific songwriter. She has written all her own lyrics (except for one song, Onna de Itai (女でいたい, Onna de Itai?) from their first album, Good-bye My Loneliness, which was written by Dariya Kawashima (川島だりあ, Dariya Kawashima?)[1]), and has released several books of poetry as well. She has also written songs for other artists, most notably, for JPOP groups Field of View, WANDS and DEEN. She also wrote the lyrics for and participated in the collaboration for the single "Hateshinai Yumewo" featuring JPOP groups ZARD, REV & WANDS. The single also featured famed Japanese baseball hero Shigeo Nagashima. Some of her singles have been used in Anime, such as Dragon Ball GT and Detective Conan.

ZARD is also known for being mysterious. This is partially because her record label does not release too much personal information on their artists, and also because she does not make that many personal appearances. She has rarely appeared on any live TV music programs (eg. Asahi TV's Music Station, Fuji TV's Hey Hey Hey Music Champ), which the main public relations tool for the record industry in Japan, since 1993 or do any public appearances. Her first concert was in 1999, which was held on a cruise ship for a mere 600 people in her fan club (300 entries x2 among 2 million concert ticket requests). Her first real concert tour, "what a beautiful moment tour", was held in 2004, 13 years after her debut. Almost every single concert was sold out at the time. The tour ended up having 10 concerts spanning 4 months from March to July 2004, with a final concert held in the famed Budokan.

ZARD is one of the most successful female singers in the 1990s, with her record sales being #1 for female singers, and #3 for overall total, just behind the groups B'z and Mr. Children. She has had 11 singles reach the #1 spot on the Oricon Singles Charts, and 9 albums reach the #1 spot on the Oricon Album Charts.

She will have released 40 singles and 16 albums as of 7 September 2005.

Death
Sakai was diagnosed with cervical cancer in June 2006; the cancer went into remission, but despite this onset, on April of 2007, the cancer was on the move again. On the 26th of May, while being treated for this cancer, Sakai fell three meters from a hospital staircase while returning to her room from a routine walk around the hospital. She was found at 5:40am. She suffered severe trauma to the back of her head (brain contusion), and on 3:10pm she died due to the cerebral contusion. The slippery surface of the staircase due to rain the previous day was blamed for her fall. Some rumors about suicide were being considered, but in the end probably discarded.

On June 27th 2007, a memorial funeral was held at Aoyama Cemetery. · close