Saeko Chiba

Hometown: Hachinohe, Aomori, Japan Blood type: A Height: 160 cm Weight: 45 kg (2007-08-26) Married on her 30th birthday Saeko Chiba began studying ballet at a young age with dreams of joining the Takarazuka Revue. After failing the entrance exam for the Takarazuka Music School in her third year of middle school, she joined the Minami Aoyama Shōjo Kageki Dan (南青山少女歌劇団, South Aoyama Girls' Opera Troupe, also called Nanshō), a stage group for teenage girls. After playing several lead roles during the three years she spent with the troupe, Saeko was cast in the lead voice-acting role of Kotori Haruno in the Sega Dreamcast game Diamond Daydreams. Having gotten a taste of being a seiyū and realizing she preferred voice acting to stage performance, she decided to pursue it full-time. Some of her early roles include her seiyū debut as Tsubaki Sakura in Kare Kano, Kitsune no Akane in Angel Tales, and Elliot Chapman in Sci-fi Harry. Saeko became known for her long, straight black hair and seemingly cold outward demeanor, which led to many tsundere and “cool-girl” roles. She cut her hair short in the spring of 2005, a change that coincided with a noticeable increase in the variety of roles she took on, as she herself noted in the My-HiME fandisc interview. Saeko has also pursued a singing career with composer Yuki Kajiura, who wrote music for some Nanshō stage shows and went on to write and produce almost all of her material. Her first single was "Koi no Kiseki," the theme song for the PlayStation game Meguri Aishite. She has since released nine singles and two albums, along with various character song and drama CDs, and has performed theme songs for games such as Alundra 2 and Atelier Judie. Saeko was also part of the unit tiaraway with fellow Nanshō member Yuuka Nanri. Originally recording and performing as "Saeko Chiba & Yuuka Nanri" for Memories Off 2nd, the duo released three singles and an album before disbanding on March 6, 2005.