Masako Mori -- Tachimachi Misaki（立待岬）

by Benlisquare via Wikimedia Commons

I heard this one several weeks ago on an episode of NHK's "Shin BS Nihon no Uta"（新BS日本の歌）and it was my first time with it. Not only that, I hadn't heard a Masako Mori（森昌子）song in quite a while, so I just had to add it to the KKP collection.

"Tachimachi Misaki" (Cape Tachimachi) is Mori's 39th single from August 1982 and it's a go-touchi song of the titular geological formation found just southeast of Mount Hakodate in Hokkaido (officially, it represents the city of Hakodate). As soon as I also read in its J-Wikipedia article that it juts out into the Tsugaru Strait, I realized right there and then that this would be an enka/kayo kyoku regarding lost love. After all, the Tsugaru Strait seems to be the go-to spot for sighing over heartbreak as in perhaps what is the most famous example, Sayuri Ishikawa's（石川さゆり）"Tsugaru Kaikyo Fuyu Geshiki"（津軽海峡・冬景色）.

Written by Ou Yoshida（吉田旺）, composed by Keisuke Hama（浜圭介）and arranged by Shunichi Makaino（馬飼野俊一）, "Tachimachi Misaki" has certainly got the dramatic brio as Mori pines for that one that got away (the wailing chorus helps). But then again, something as dramatic as this cape should get something equivalent. And it was lauded for it as the song reached No. 36 on Oricon and won the Grand Prize at the Masao Koga Memorial Music Awards for that year. Plus, it would serve as Mori's invitation for her 10th consecutive appearance at NHK's Kohaku Utagassen.