GUILLAUME ERARD
6TH DAN AIKIDO - YOKOHAMA AIKIDOJO SHIHAN
Latest Articles
New Video: Interview with Ulf Evenas
In this interview, I sit down with Ulf Evenås on the sidelines of the last IAF Summit in Yoyogi for a wide-ranging conversation about aikido — his journey, his practice, and the ideas that have shaped...
Interview with Tony Smibert: Mastery via stewardship, not ownership
At 75, Tony Smibert moves through the Aikido world with the quiet authority of someone who has nothing left to prove, yet everything still to learn. His 45-year relationship with Sugano Sensei—from th...
New Video: Daehyun YOON, head of the Korea Aikido Federation
This interview with Daehyun Yoon 6th dan, head of the Korea Aikido Federation, was conducted during the Korea Aikido Federation’s 30th Anniversary Event held in Seoul in September 2024.
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Kagamibiraki 2026 at the Aikido Hombu Dojo
On Sunday, January 11, 2026, the traditional Kagamibiraki Ceremony was held at the Aikido Hombu Dojo in Tokyo, marking the opening of the new Aikido year. This major annual event brought together prac...
New Video: Guillaume Erard on La Reunion Island
This video shows some highlights of my seminar on La Reunion Island, a French territory located just between Madagascar and Mauritius.
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Guillaume Erard featured on French TV
I was recently featured in a video report by Réunion La 1ère TV channel during my visit to La Réunion Island, where I was invited by the École d’Aïkido du Sud to teach and share my experience of ...
Upcoming Courses
| 02 August 2026 Guillaume ERARD - Yokosuka (JAPAN) |
| Saturday 04 July to Saturday 04 July 2026 Guillaume ERARD - Paris (FRANCE) |
| Friday 26 June to Saturday 27 June 2026 Guillaume ERARD - Bayonne (FRANCE) |
| Friday 19 June to Saturday 20 June 2026 Guillaume ERARD - Emmendingen (GERMANY) |
| Saturday 21 March to Saturday 21 March 2026 Guillaume ERARD - Montreal (CANADA) |
| Sunday 14 December to Saturday 20 December 2025 Guillaume ERARD - La Réunion (FRANCE) |
| Saturday 12 July to Sunday 13 July 2025 Guillaume ERARD - Cambridge (UK) |
| 05 July 2025 Guillaume ERARD - Paris (FRANCE) |
Interviews
Interview with Peter Goldsbury - Part 2: The History of Aikido
This is the second part of my interview with Peter Gold...
Interview with Philippe Orban, 6th dan
Meet Philippe Orban, 6th dan Aikikai and very close stu...
Interview with Sameshima Motonari, 8th Dan Judo Senior Councilor of the Kodokan Judo Institute
This interview was conducted during the Kano Jirogo Ann...
Interview with Horii Etsuji Shihan: Aikido as a way for mutual growth
Horii Etsuji Shihan is an instructor 7th Dan Aikikai. V...
Interview with Hélène Doué from the Cercle Tissier
Hélène Doué is one of the most popular aikido teachers ...
Interview with Yoon Dae-hyun, founder and president of the Korea Aikido Federation
This interview with Yoon Dae-hyun Sensei, the founder a...
Newspaper Articles about Takeda Sokaku Part 1: The Recluse Bokuden of Our Times (1930)
Even though Takeda Sokaku was said to be rather reclusi...
Interview with Alan Ruddock, the first Irish Aikido practitioner
Alan Ruddock (1944 – 2012) was one of the few people wh...
Interview with Tada Hiroshi: A Lifetime Cultivating the Ki
Tada Hiroshi Shihan is one of the last living students ...
Interview with Ellis Amdur - Part 1: Martial Journey from Aikido to koryu
Ellis Amdur is one of the most prominent and prolific w...
Column: It Ain't Necessarily So
Banquo’s Ghost - It Ain't Necessarily So
Where do myths begin? Jungian psychologists assert that myths reflect primordial patterns within the unconscious. Myths, therefore, impose a one form of order on chaos. This order is based in both rea...
Revisiting Assumptions: Twenty Years to Hiden Mokuroku - It Ain't Necessarily So
Event though the extent of the technical curriculum of some martial arts schools can be quite extensive, fellow koryu practitioners often express surprise at how large that of Daito-ryu Aiki-jujutsu i...
Rendez-vous with Adventure - It Ain't Necessarily So
I trained for a short time at the Kodokan, and then, for several years, with Tokaidai Sagami high school’s judō team. Tokai Daigaku, a huge complex of university campuses was the pre-eminent judō powe...
Ueshiba Morihei's "Escape from Osaka" - It Ain't Necessarily So
I have previously written about Hisa Takuma and Nakatsu Heizaburo, who were both the students of Ueshiba Morihei, and then Takeda Sokaku, at the dojo of the Asahi newspaper in Osaka between 1934 and 1...
Kobayashi Hirokazu, a Daito-ryu Master? - It Ain't Necessarily So
Some time ago, Aikido Journal published excerpts from an email exchange between the late Stanley Pranin and André Cognard, who runs an independent Aikido group in Europe. The article highlights a so-c...
Where’s My Money!!!???? - It Ain't Necessarily So
Some might find this an essay on a trivial subject—a one-hundred-year old personal debt. How this debt is interpreted, however, defines the nature of the relationship of two men: Takeda Sokaku and Ues...
