Miho Morikawa -- Blue Water/Yes! I Will

During the latter half of my time in Gunma Prefecture, NHK had actually placed an anime right after the 7 O'Clock News on Friday nights. Called "Fushigi no Umi no Nadia"（不思議の海のナディア...Nadia, The Secret of Blue Water), it was inspired by Jules Vernes' classic tale "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" and struck me as being a mix of Hayao Miyazaki and Haruhiko Mikimoto (who illustrated the original "Macross"). I didn't get to see much of it since, some weeks after its premiere, I was basically recruited into teaching community centre classes. However, from what I do remember of it was the "Indiana Jones"-type adventurous tone of the show and the opening/ending themes. Both of them were sung by pop singer Miho Morikawa（森川美穂）.

"Blue Water" is a power pop piece, in line with what was going on in part of Japanese popular music at that time with female groups such as Princess Princess and Pink Sapphire and singers like Mariko Nagai（永井真理子）and Kahoru Kohiruimaki（小比類巻かほる）at the fore. I loved the bursts of energy that Morikawa brought to the song (lyricist: Etsuko Kisugi [来生えつこ]; composer: Yoshimasa Inoue[井上ヨシマサ]) along with the synths and the electric guitar solo.

The videos above show both the opening and ending themes as they were played in the actual program itself. "Blue Water" was a great musical introduction to the adventure that was to play out in each episode. It went as high as No. 17 on the Oricon weeklies.

This is the full version for the ending theme, "Yes! I Will", a mid-tempo song written and composed by Morikawa. Not quite as catchy as the opening theme but still pleasant to listen to. Both songs are available on the album, "The Secret of Blue Water -- Vocal Collection" released in 1991 by Toshiba EMI.