Marcia -- Furimukeba Yokohama （ふりむけばヨコハマ）

Well, Happy Victoria Day to all my fellow Canadians. Hope you enjoyed your fair share of summer sun and fireworks this year. As for me, I got together with my anime buddy for another round of food and anime yesterday while today I was focused on my translation work (not a holiday in Japan) and had a good dinner with the parents.

Anyways, I wanted to contribute my entry today to Marcia（マルシア）. Her full name is Marcia Kazue Nishiie（西家 一枝 マルシア）and she's a 3rd-generation Japanese-Brazilian from Sao Paolo who came over to Japan with her grandfather a year after becoming a runner-up in 1985 as a teen at a singing contest sponsored by Japanese TV network TBS. She was then scouted into the geinokai and became a student of veteran composer Kosho Inomata（猪俣公章）.

Marcia has been a name ever since then, but my knowledge of her has mostly been through her status as an outspoken TV personality when I was living in Japan. From what I remember of her time as a panelist on various shows is that she has quite the rapid-fire delivery especially when she is upset or excited. However, from time to time, whenever a show is doing a retrospective on the lady herself or on Japanese music in general, I've seen her performance of her debut song, "Furimukeba Yokohama" (When I Turn Around, There Is Yokohama). 

Released in January 1989, this is a song that I have enjoyed since it sounds somewhat akin to the classy ballads that the late Teresa Teng（テレサ・テン）sang. Kudos to her former teacher Inomata who composed the song. And yep, since I'm also a fan of the city of Yokohama, it's nice to hear when I hearken back to my memories of walking through Yamashita Park and Chinatown. Lyricist Eiji Takino（たきのえいじ）provided the words of love lost in the capital city of Kanagawa Prefecture, and I could see the young Marcia sadly twirling a swizzle stick in her cocktail while musing about what was once a happier time.

I came across an interesting piece of trivia concerning Marcia's Japanese name. Apparently, according to her write-up on J-Wiki, her name of Kazue was given since her grandmother had been a huge fan of Hibari Misora（美空ひばり）whose real name was Kazue Kato（加藤和枝）although the kanji characters were slightly different.

I wrote this a few years ago early in the history of the blog, but it's about a couple of even more famous Yokohama-based kayo.