Oricon Top 5 Most Commercially Successful Arrangers (as of October 2020)

 

Earlier in the late summer, I put up a couple of Oricon Rankings articles: Top 5 Most Commercially Successful Composers and Top 5 Most Commercially Successful Lyricists. I figure that I have to put up one more related list before the year is out, that of the Top 5 most successful arrangers. I have to admit that this is the one area that I know the least about. Obviously, the composer takes care of putting together all of the notes into the basic song and the lyricist weaves the words into a story for the singer to sing about.

Just from the title itself, I had gathered that arranging is all about doing all sorts of things to the main melody by the composer so that it's happy for everyone involved including the singer and it's ready to be put onto vinyl or CD or website. I did find this definition at this place which goes into all the wonderful things that an arranger performs. So he or she satisfies questions such as: What should be the time signature? Are all of the instruments in synch with each other? If it's a cover of a song, what is the style?

Perhaps it's not the best analogy but I can envision that coming up with the basic melody is baking the chocolate sponge while the arrangement involves all of the shaping and then icing and other decorations to create the Christmas Log Cake rather than a Black Forest Cake (I adore both, by the way).

My source by the way is right from Oricon, and J-Wiki was able to place the chart of the top 5 arrangers into the article for the late great composer Kyohei Tsutsumi（筒美京平）who had also worn that second hat as arranger. The list, given in million of units representing the totality of each arranger's works' sales, will also be accompanied by the arrangers' most successful songs.

1. Tetsuya Komuro -- 61.2 million units: Can You Celebrate? (1997) by Namie Amuro

Not much more to say here since he's already up on the composers' list and the fans know all about the Komuro（小室哲哉）sound. However, I have to say that he really did make "Can You Celebrate?" sound worthy of a wedding celebration...pretty much anthemic, and not his usual technopop-dance wizardry. Makes me wonder whether the song is still played at receptions in Japan.

2. Motoki Funayama -- 42.3 million units: Dai Tokai (1979) by Crystal King

One reason that I was nudged and reminded to get that Arrangers' list up here was because of this man. I'd seen Funayama（船山基紀）involved in all sorts of songs but I never put him into the Labels section since up to very recently because I hadn't taken the arranger all that seriously. Not anymore and I'm making amends by tracking down those songs that he did arrange and including his name into KKP. I will be providing a Creator article for him before the year is up. BTW, speaking of anthemic, Funayama helped make "Dai Tokai" into a proud paean for the metropolis with those horns and guitar.

3. Mitsuo Hagita -- 39.9 million units: Ihojin  (1979) by Saki Kubota

Another reason for finally putting up this list is that Mitsuo Hagita（萩田光雄）has been a presence throughout the kayo era on a number of songs and I haven't really given him his tribute. I think that he will get his own Creator article sometime soon as well. I think that basic exotic kayo melody was provided by Kubota but I would also like to Hagita accolades for putting in that oomph into the proceedings including those strings coming down like daggers.

4. Kyohei Tsutsumi -- 37.8 million units: Miserarete (1979) by Judy Ongg

Also responsible for the melody of arguably Judy Ongg's most famous hit, Tsutsumi arranged "Miserarete" into this grand musical odyssey of yet another exotic kayo with those strings and other instruments of the region (bouzouki perhaps?). I wonder if travel agencies suddenly found themselves flooded for inquiries on vacations to Greece thanks to the wonder created by this song.

5. Takeshi Hayama -- 35.9 million units: Sekaijuu no Dare yori Kitto by Miho Nakayama & WANDS (1992)

I'll be honest. Until tonight, I had never heard of guitarist Hayama（葉山たけし）but he's arranged songs for pretty much everyone under the BEING studio banner including the bands WANDS, Field of View and T-Bolan along with Maki Ohguro and Mai Kuraki, so over the holidays I gather that I will be doing some back editing there as well. Plus, with the Komuro Sound, there was also the BEING Sound in the 1990s, so of course, Hayama was integral.