Tomohisa Yamashita

Tomohisa Yamashita (山下 智久, Yamashita Tomohisa?, born April 9, 1985), also widely known as Yamapi, is a Japanese idol, actor, and singer.

Yamashita joined the Japanese talent agency Johnny & Associates in 1996 at the age of 11 and made his official CD debut with NEWS in 2004. He debuted as a solo artist in 2006 with the hit single "Daite Senorita". Yamashita graduated from Meiji University's faculty of commerce in the fall of 2008 with a degree in marketing.

His first solo album, Supergood, Superbad, was released on January 26, 2011. Like all of his previous releases, the album debuted on top of the Oricon weekly charts. Yamashita left NEWS to pursue a career as a solo artist on October 7, 2011. It was announced on January 6, 2012 that Yamashita would be releasing a single entitled I, Texas (愛, テキサス?) under Warner Music Japan.

His recent works as an actor include the 2011 movie Ashita no Joe, the winter 2010 series Code Blue 2, and the summer 2009 series Buzzer Beat. Code Blue 2 and Buzzer Beat aired in Fuji TV's prestigious getsuku (Monday 9 p.m.) time-slot in Japan, making Yamashita the first person to have starred in two Monday night dramas with only a single drama season in between. Yamashita returned to the small screen with the winter 2012 drama serial Saikō no Jinsei no Owarikata: Ending Planner. He has been cast in TBS' upcoming autumn 2012 drama serial Monsters.

From January to March 2012, NTV aired Yamashita Tomohisa Route 66: Tatta Hitori no America (山下智久・ルート６６～たったひとりのアメリカ?), a travel documentary chronicling Yamashita's cross-country trip across the historic Route 66.

Yamashita began hosting the weekly Tokyo FM radio program Yamashita Tomohisa Cross Space on April 6, 2012.