Foorin/Kenshi Yonezu -- Paprika（パプリカ）

Over the past several months, I've had these two songs treated as if they were siblings. It's easy to do so because the parent, so to speak, is singer-songwriter Kenshi Yonezu（米津玄師）. One of the "kids" is "Kite" by Arashi（嵐）which may still remain the official NHK song for the Tokyo Olympics as long as there's the chance for them to be held next year.

The other "kid" is "Paprika" by 5-strong children's song-and-dance unit Foorin. I'd also thought that "Paprika" had been meant to be another NHK song for the Olympics, but as it turns out, this was a product for the national broadcaster's "2020 Ouen Song Project"（2020応援ソングプロジェクト...2020 Cheer Song Project）. 

Foorin's members are Hyuuga Yoshida（吉田日向）, Moeno Sumida（住田萌乃）, Takeru Narahara（楢原嵩琉）, Ririko Ikeshita（池下リリコ）and Chise Niitsu（新津ちせ）who are currently of elementary school and junior high school age. Apparently, songwriter Yonezu named the group as such since he felt that their cheerful singing and dancing reminded him of a foorin（風鈴）or wind chime, according to J-Wiki.

"Paprika", which was released as a CD single in August 2018, got plenty of attention as Foorin appeared on a number of shows including "Music Station" and the 2019 FNS Song Festival last year. As well, I saw the kids regularly perform the song as a part of NHK's "Minna no Uta"（みんなのうた）series. Moreover, Foorin got to appear on the year-end Kohaku Utagassen both in 2018 and 2019, and on the latter show, they were joined by international versions of Foorin on the Shibuya stage to perform "Paprika".

I remember watching that mass Foorin performance and found that one of the members in one of the groups just seemed to be trying a little too hard for the camera, so I kinda reacted like Dr. Evil did at about 1:00 in the above video.

The CD went Gold and in its digital download format, "Paprika" went Platinum, as it peaked at No. 16 on Oricon. It would also end 2019 as the No. 7 single on Billboard Japan's Top 100. Yonezu himself provided a slightly funkier cover as a digital download-only single in February 2020 (which has also gone Gold) and also as a track on his 5th studio album "Stray Sheep" that is due to be released in August this year. One commenter (Jurist) for the above video for Yonezu's "Paprika" gives a detailed explanation about how the original songwriter's take on the song adds further deeper dimensions in the meaning.

Ah, just before I finish off, I just wanted to let you know about another feat that Foorin pulled off by winning a Grand prize at the Japan Record Awards last year according to a few sources including a "Nikkan Sports" article via J-Wiki. Since the average age of the group was 11.2 years, the five of them collectively became the youngest recipients of the award, and three of the group were the first-ever elementary school students to get it.