Yoshimi Tendo -- Chindo Monogatari（珍島物語）

 

In recent months, "Kayo Kyoku Plus" has covered enka singer Yoshimi Tendo's（天童よしみ）more recent discography in the 21sth century. However, I've now got the opportunity to go a little further back finally when it comes to her songs.

The reason is that I was able to catch the NHK regular special "Waga Kokoro no Osaka Melody"（わが心の大阪メロディー...The Osaka Melodies of Our Hearts） the other night, and of course, anyone who's anyone in the Japanese music world from the Kansai district appeared to perform. One of those must-appears happened to be Tendo who hails from the ancestral home of my family, Wakayama Prefecture.

Possessing one of the finest voices this side of Hibari Misora（美空ひばり）, Tendo performed the song "Chindo Monogatari" (The Tale of Jindo Island) which was released as her 28th single from February 1996. Written and composed by veteran Daisaburo Nakayama（中山大三郎）, who had come up with the lyrics for Chiyoko Nakamura's（中村千代子）"Jinsei Iroiro"（人生いろいろ）and Takashi Hosokawa's（細川たかし）"Onna no Juujiro"（女の十字路）, the singer delivers a smooth heartfelt message of yearning for a loved one separated by an ocean with South Korea's third-largest island as the motif.

My highlights for "Chindo Monogatari" include those strings, that trumpet and that singing by Tendo. The singer can provide plenty of throat-rumbling brio into other songs but for this particular enka, I was pleasantly surprised by her clear and smooth vocals this time around. They could be compared with the finest sake, if I can make that analogy. 

The song peaked at No. 35 on Oricon but more importantly, it provided Tendo with her first million-seller with more than 1.3 million copies sold. It also earned her a Best Performance prize at the Japan Record Awards at the end of 1996. With her career going all the way back to 1970, I ought to check out one of her very early singles when she was just a teenager.