Yuji Mori and Southern Cross -- Suki desu Sapporo（好きですサッポロ）

Though I did make that one trip to Sapporo on the northernmost major island of Hokkaido many years ago, that was in June since I was trying to make some attempt to escape some of the humidity of Tokyo. I loved the city but one thing that I've regretted is that I never got to attend the annual Sapporo Snow Festival in February. My experience with it has merely been through news highlights with the festival highlights being the massive and expertly carved ice sculptures. I can only imagine that reservations are scarce and prices are pretty high during that time which has fairly blunted any keen desire to attend it.

Apparently this song was used as the theme song for the Sapporo Snow Festival way back when and became a huge hit for the Mood Kayo group Yuji Mori and Southern Cross（森雄二とサザンクロス）. Released in 1981, "Suki desu Sapporo" (I Love You, Sapporo) is a pretty jaunty example of the genre. Often when I think of Mood Kayo numbers with famous place names in the titles, the music is somewhat languid introspective and even sorrowful, but "Suki desu Sapporo" has a beat and a boss horn section which remind me of some theme songs for tokusatsu shows. Indeed it works as something advertising the merits of a festival.

Written by lyricist Tetsuro Hoshino（星野哲郎）and composed by Hiroyuki Nakagawa（中川博之）, "Suki desu Sapporo" has become one of the trademark songs for Southern Cross. You can also take a look at one other song by the band, "Ashide Matoi"（足手まとい）which had also been created by Nakagawa a few years earlier.