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Jazz pianist, late Bill Evans is one of my music idol. I think more or less I’m influenced by his music.
I recorded a new song for a image of New York City, and the result was just a bit like Jazz taste. Not especially I had Bill Evans in my mind when I wrote this song, New York City Night, but something of his tune ” You and the Night and the Music” might have influenced me for playing this song.
This is not “Japanese music”, but as I’m Japanese, this could be one of them ??
This music is not one from any famous musicians in Japan but from my own works. I love creating music. When I used to work for radio media, producing music is one of my works then.
Not having been working for long time on music, something told me to start it again.
Today’s recording technique is really advanced compared to the one we knew before. If we prepared all the necessary recording equipments by ourselves, maybe it would have been more than 10 thousand dollars AT LEAST. For enough situation, actually we needed to pay more than 20 to 30 thousand dollars.
But now, DTP or desk top music changed our music creation style. Probably the cost needed for that is about one thousand dollars for starting, and all the melody and rhythem can be created inside the PC. This is really amazing.
That change of recording environment moved me to tackle music creation again.
Hatsune Miku is already a well known anime character in Japan and in the world of anime fans. It’s natural for anime fans that characters should have reality and fans often think as if the characters are alive in this real world.
That desire is already realized in the concerts. Some many know it but for anime beginners it could be a hard thing to understand.
Japanese people like to bring any kind of dreams into being, with the endless efforts, the engineers and animators again did such a great job.
They finally brought the anime characters into real world. Characters sing and dance in the concerts, which was not rare in the past either, but this time they look like real human with complete 3D figure. Faces changes along with emotion, and detail expression like hairs, fingers, foot steps, eyes blinks, and natural looking body moves impress us just like we are enjoying their concerts in the real world.
This concerts were already carried out in 2010, however, the rumors of this concerts never fade away from fans topics. Some say Miku and Luka should have shows in the 2012 Olympic games in London, which is not a joke but fan’s serious request.
Just one look at the show, like it or not, this instantly takes your attention and after all you would be surprised with the quality of the show. I, too, was amazingly impressed with this show, and I could not move from the screen for views by repeating many times.
Also about the music of Hatsune Miku or Megurine Luka is made by using Vocaloid machine, which was invented by Japanese music instruments company called Yamaha. Through Vocaloid, no singers for the CD is required. The voice is made by synthesizing the computer sound, however, the “voice” really matches well with the animation characters.
Actually, the CDs of Hatsune Miku were accepted all over the world, not only in Japan. This new production can easily go over the language barrier that used to exist when the real human voice was recorded.
As this way, the singers are sold through CDs, online download, and ” real concerts ” of 3D characters.
This time Yoshiki composed the theme song for Golden Globe Award of the United States for the first time in the history of Golden Globe Award. Yoshiki says that it’s such an honor to do that, and he added that he never dreamed this kind of event over himself when he started X JAPAN.
Yoshiki is already recognized as the icon of Asian rock stars, but fans and people around him know his talent is not limited only in rock music. Yoshiki’s talent has no border.
Together with the increasing popularity, Yoshiki once composed a song for Emperor of Japan. It means, at that moment, nobody in Japan can deny his irreplaceable talent of music. Also Junichiro Koizumi, the ex-prime minister of Japan, often said he is a fan of X JAPAN. After all, Prime Minister Koizumi invited Yoshiki to the welcome meeting for American President, George Bush in Japan.
As we all know, X JAPAN broke up in 1997. However, their fans never forgot their music. When they got back in front of us as X JAPAN by reunion, lords of fans filled the concert stadiums of Japan in 2007.
More than 35 countries gave them concert offers soon after the reunion. This is really incredible. Who imagined this phenomena when they said ” that’s it ” in 1997?
Yoshiki writes super hard rock music, moreover, he also writes tear-dropping beautiful songs that never leave from human heart.
He is already in the middle of 40′s in his age. But he never looks old. Anything related with Yoshiki, or X JAPAN never gets old. Fans know it.
A song of Okinawa by Rimi Natsukawa is one of my favorites among Japanese songs. This is really good in original version, however, it’s also nice to hear in covered version by some foreign artists.
Firstly, Okinawa is small islands situated in the south part of Japan being far from the main island. It’s a tropical weather place just like in Hawaii.
Long ago when I was first in Hawaii, I thought these 2 places, Okinawa and Hawaii, are pretty similar, especially in the heart of the people.
That’s why people in Hawaii also like this song of Okinawa, Nada sou sou.
There are 2 good cover versions, which are by Teresa Bright and Kealii Reichel. Both are really great Hawaiian singers. Please enjoy.
Ayumi Hamasaki, a Japanese female singer, was reported today to divorce her husband soon.
Detail of the news is not enough.
About a year ago, she got married an Austria born actor. The happy time for two of them were for 1 year only, and Ayumi Hamasaki expressed the reason for this result is because she does not want to leave Japan especially in this timing after the heavy damage of earthquake and tsunami in Japan.
They seem to have been planing to live in the USA together. Ayumi says that for the first time, it could be a kind of matter of place to live. If so, it could be overcome by traveling between Japan and the USA. But at the end, she says she noticed it’s an issue of minds of the two. It means she and her husband are no longer in love for each other.
I’m not sure about this news in the detail, so this information is just a quotation from Japanese news service.
Some months ago last year, a news arrived from L.A and it said that Yoshiki of X JAPAN would have a radio program in L.A.
I think it already started, as I didn’t check it, I hope it’s still running OK.
I found one of the radio programs which was recorded with Toshi, the vocalist of X JAPAN, as a special guest.
As far as I hear that, it seems a good program for X JAPAN and Yoshiki fans. The talking style is pretty casual and he also plays the piano suddenly in the program. That’s cool for listeners.
On the recorded program, Toshi also sang the new song, Jade, accompanied by Yoshiki’s piano. Toshi’s vocal is really beautiful in this program, although it’s not the live act or recording sound, Toshi can gives us his amazing voice right away at request. It’s an amazing thing, as we know, it’s also really hard to keep high note of X JAPAN songs whenever the vocal play is requested. But Toshi is capable on any requests as he proved in this program.
Not many fans of X JAPAN know that Toshi is not only a vocalist but also a real good player of guitar, piano, or even drums. He is also highly admired musician in Japan, but when Toshi appears with X JAPAN members, he needs to take the lead vocal part, that’s why we scarcely see his musical instrument playing scenes.
As my personal impression, I think Toshi respects Yoshiki as the leader of X JAPAN, so Toshi doesn’t often claim his requests to Yoshiki although they have been real good friends since they were kindergarten kids. ( Please refer to this page for more info )
We know Yoshiki speaks good English as he lives in Los Angeles. He often takes interviews from media or at some events in English without interpreters. Only some Japanese accent still remain in Yoshiki’s English but no problem for us.
Again, Toshi also speaks English in this program and it’s clear and good both in conversation and in the song !
I, again, think Toshi is a little shy in spite that he acts strongly on the live stage. In any interviews, he is really quiet and refrains from talking aggressive. He is always gentle in the interviews.
Of course Yoshiki knows well about Toshi’s character, so I understand Yoshiki handles Toshi with care in the radio program. Also it’s easy to know their friendship here in this conversation.
Anyway, it’s a nice program. I hope they will keep on !
Ryuichi Sakamoto is one of the best composers of Japan. Probably he and Joe Hisaishi are both admired highly by all Japanese people.
Ryuichi Sakamoto’s works are really touching in our heart and its range is really wide.
Some may remember that he used to be a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra, which was the first active Japanese band also in other countries. The band was using Japanese taste melody in the music but the they made use of all the possible techniques like computer, synthesizers, or new electric skills in the works they created. Yellow Magic Orchestra was the first Techno POP music in Japan.
After the success of the YMO, Ryuichi Sakamoto became a famous Japanese music maker among the advanced music fans in the world.
Next, he played an actor’s role in the movie, Merry Christmas Mr. Laurence. In this movie, he composed a really beautiful theme song. Also this movie created a sensation in Japan or in the world with more talented actors like David Bowie and Takeshi Kitano. Director was Nagisa Oshima, one of the Japanese highly acclaimed directors.
After that, Ryuichi Sakamoto kept producing more great works.
In 1987, he worked for Academy winning movie, Last Emperor. The theme song he composed got the Academy music award.
Ryuichi Sakamoto never stopped after that huge success in his music life. He often collaborated with other unique musicians in Japan and in the world. More hit songs were born from his never lasting talent, and that was a real contribution to the music industry of Japan.
He is a very smart person. Often he has talks with his friends on Japanese TV programs, through which we understand how he thinks of music and his life with his clear explanation.
If you’ve never experienced his music, please check them. His music has something deep that we never forget once the music he plays flows through our heart.
Joe Hisaishi composed many masterpieces. Among them, probably the most acclaimed works are his film music.
Many of good films can’t get enough understanding without good background music. Movie directors in Japan, including even the genius director, Hayao Miyazaki, were very lucky that they all lived in the same time with Joe Hisaishi.
Joe Hisaishi expresses any kind of human emotion in the music, it means his scores for films helped movie viewers feel the correct emotion in the movies and Joe’s music led them into the world of screen play.
Joe Hisaishi’s frist work on Hayao Miyazaki film was Nausicaa of the Valley of the Winds. Joe Hisaishi still says that Nausicaa is the most unforgettable among his works. He also says maybe he can’t compose that level of music now.
Probably he would keep on composing more masterpieces, however, the music quality of Nausicaa is still outstanding in Japanese film musics.
While, for fans, the most popular work of Joe Hisaishi seems ” Summer ” which was written for the film, Kikujiro, by Takeshi Kitano.
Apparently this melody has Japanese taste. And through this music, most of Japanese fans, me too, remember our summer days with bright sunshine, beautiful rivers with transparent water, the chirp of a cicada from woods, and nostalgic scenes we played with friends.
SUMMER seems to be liked by foreign countries’ people. The feel of summer might mean the same over the countries’ border.
Also some fans say that the most tear-dropping work of Joe Hisaishi is ” One Summer’s Day”, which was used in the highest grossing movie of Japanese film history, called Spirited Away. This tune gives us a real sentimental feeling. Some say they remember the time when they were innocent and naive to anything in the world in their childhood, and they tried their best in their life. In the movie this song is played when Chihiro eats a rice ball in the movie, and she starts crying when eating it. Many had the same kind of experience in the past Japanese time, so they become sympathetic to Chihiro also by the magic sense of music.
When we listen to Joe Hisaishi’s music, recently we don’t need such memories in background because the music is already independently fantastic enough. But it’s also true that his music bring us such memories of movies and our life with tremendous amount of emotion.
