Ichiro Toba/Eiko Segawa/Hiroshi Itsuki -- Wasure Yado

 

Over the years that I've been doing "Kayo Kyoku Plus", I've been gaining some more aural experience in terms of the sounds of certain composers and/or arrangers. With Ryuichi Sakamoto（坂本龍一）, it's that odd pleasurable quirk that he can slide into his synthesizers while Yumi Matsutoya（松任谷由実）can often put in that reassuring breezy melody. In the enka genre, I've realized that the late composer Toru Funamura（船村徹）may have always injected that distinctively pensive guitar of his, perfect for brooding over a tumbler of whiskey or a glass of shochu.

Funamura was responsible for the composition of this particular ballad by enka singer Ichiro Toba（鳥羽一郎）, "Wasure Yado" (An Inn of Forgotten Memories). The B-side to his 5th single "Wakare no Yado"（別れの宿...An Inn of Parting） released in April 1984, the lyrics by Daisaburo Nakayama（中山大三郎）talk of a woman somehow looking on or imagining her former paramour and his wife following a brief affair at their old haunt of an inn. Through the tears, the heartbroken woman is wishing them well as she tries to reassure herself that this is for the best. Couldn't get more enka than this. Meanwhile, that Funamura guitar hits right from the start going high and then low as Toba gives a woodsy and resonant delivery. The heart-on-sleeve strings which alternately glide and pluck adds to the melancholy atmosphere.

Toba's version is actually a cover of the original by Eiko Segawa（瀬川瑛子）whose "Wasure Yado" was released in November 1983. I couldn't find the recorded version of the song but listening to the above performance, Segawa gives a more emotion-drenched take and the arrangement sounds folksier. I can definitely hear the disappointment and mourning in her vocals.

I don't know whether Hiroshi Itsuki's（五木ひろし）cover of "Wasure Yado" was ever officially released as part of a single or an album in tribute to Funamura, and if it was, when it was released. That Funamura guitar sound still exists but the arrangement takes on a bigger presence because of some epic strings and other added flourishes.