Emi Igawa

About Emi Igawa

A top young pianist whose playing is driven entirely by emotion, soaring when she feels it, collapsing when she does not. Emi began piano after hearing the young Kosei play with his heart, and she was bitterly disappointed when he became a machine-like metronome. His return to competition awakens her again, and her performances, passionate speeches made through the keyboard, are among the series' musical highlights.

Appearance

Emi is a striking teenager with long, straight black hair and a cool, composed beauty that makes her emotional playing style a surprise. She dresses neatly and carries herself with a performer's poise, until she reaches a piano. At the keyboard her composure cracks open completely: she leans into the music, expression shifting with every phrase, playing less like a competitor and more like someone delivering a confession she could never make in words.

Personality

Emi is proud, sensitive and gloriously inconsistent, and she knows it. Her performances rise and fall with her feelings, which makes her unreliable by competition standards and unforgettable by any other. She is honest about her bitterness toward Kosei: the boy whose heartfelt childhood playing inspired her grew into a machine, and she took it personally. Under the rivalry is gratitude she struggles to express, Kosei is the reason she plays at all, and his return gives her back the fire she had been performing without.

Background & Story

Emi's musical life began at a childhood competition where she heard the five-year-old Kosei Arima play with his whole heart, a performance that moved her to tears and decided her future on the spot. She devoted herself to piano, rising through the same competition world, only to watch her inspiration transform into the cold, exact Human Metronome and then vanish entirely after his mother's death. Years later, Emi is a leading young pianist whose own playing has gone stale with disappointment. Kosei's announced return to competition hits her like a challenge from the past itself: the boy who started her story is back, and she intends to answer him at the piano.

Powers & Abilities

• Emotional Performance: Emi plays entirely from feeling, producing performances of rare passion and colour when her heart is in them, speeches delivered through the keyboard.
• Competition Pedigree: Despite her inconsistency, Emi is one of the most decorated young pianists of her generation, a regular at the top of major competitions.

Key Relationships

• Kosei Arima: Her inspiration and her disappointment in one person, the childhood pianist who made her take up piano, and whose return she meets head-on.
• Takeshi Aiza: Her fellow rival, bonded by the same obsession: both of their careers were shaped by chasing Kosei Arima.

Quick Answers