Hiroshi Itsuki -- Koiuta Sakaba（恋歌酒場）

This week, this song popped up twice on NHK's "Uta Kon"（うたコン）and "Gogo Uta"（ごごウタ）, and I was already sold on it when it appeared on the former so here it is on the blog tonight.

Hiroshi Itsuki（五木ひろし）is looking dapper as he has been for the last number of decades. Hard to believe that he has just turned 70. "Koiuta Sakaba" (Bar of Love Songs) was released earlier this year in January as a single, and what initially caught my attention about the song is the fact that it is using words by the late lyricist Yu Aku（阿久悠）who had passed away back in 2007. They are a tad saucy and flirtatious in that the protagonist seems to have gone so gaga for a fellow female drinker in the bar that he would be willing to hide his wedding band.

Another notable point is that Koji Tokuhisa's（徳久広司）melody doesn't follow a Mood Kayo pattern as a song in a bar would often go with. However, although it goes more for the enka, even then it's not quiet that either. I might even say that it has more of a European enka flavour, to use a term that I used to cite early in the blog's history. In fact, I would say that it has a folksy, perhaps woodsy, taste to it maybe with a dash of whimsy thrown in as the bar attendee wonders what possibilities there could be to this potential "two-boats-passing-in-the-night" affair.

Y'know, I could even picture the late folk/pop singer Kozo Murashita（村下孝蔵）tackling this one without anyone showing surprise. It's just a relaxing kayo to be nursed like that desired glass of mizuwari. Good to hear Itsuki and hopefully other singers still posthumously interpreting the creations of Aku.