Ayota is the ongoing project of keyboard player & producer Ski Oakenfull. It was born out of Ski's love of all things ambient, experimental & Japanese, with artists such as Brian Eno, Steve Reich, David Sylvian & Ryuichi Sakamoto all being big influences. It was whilst on a holiday in Japan in 2004 that Ski was inspired by a Japanese friend's book of Poetry entitled 'Kumorizora no Helicopta' to write soundtracks to three of the poems. This quickly developed into an album project continuing the Japanese ambient theme, the result being 'Helicopter Cuts' which is due for release on the label 'Third Ear' in 2007. The Ayota project has also performed live at both 'The Big Chill' & 'Bestival' with Simon Palmskin, Jeremy Shaw & Shawn Lee all joining the stage! Recently Ski has been putting the finishing touches to the third Ayota album, entitled 'Kokoro', as well as collating his early experiments to form the 'Selected Ambient Works 91-98' album released on Primaudial.