Gosanke Imagined: Vocal Group Gosanke

 

One of the first things that I realized when I started to explore kayo kyoku from the early 1980s was that there were vocal groups that struck me as being quite similar in tone to The Manhattan Transfer, a group that had already entered my mind with their music of jazz and contemporary pop stylings. Some Japanese folks did love their harmonies, I surmised. 

As far as I can see, there was never a Gosanke（御三家）created in the media about vocal groups although I think that it would have been pretty easy to concoct one considering that both Hi-Fi Set（ハイファイセット）and Circus（サーカス）had their heyday in the 1970s and 1980s. I discovered those two groups from "Sounds of Japan" episodes a few decades ago, but the quartet SOAP was an act that I found out about in the years of doing this blog, so once again thank you KKP!

Hi-Fi Set -- Koi no Nikki （恋の日記）

Circus -- Mr. Summertime

SOAP -- Shinjuku Transfer（新宿トランスファー）