SAYAKA -- ever since

 

Back at my computer after lunch, I was checking email and other SNS feeds as I usually do, when I saw a tweet from fellow KKP contributor Joana Bernardo and it was extremely shocking and saddening. I found out that actress and singer-songwriter Sayaka Kanda（神田沙也加）, the daughter of 80s aidoru and actress Seiko Matsuda（松田聖子）and actor Masaki Kanda（神田正輝）had suddenly passed away at the age of 35 yesterday. I got confirmation from Kanda's J-Wiki article and then saw a number of tweets and YouTube videos addressing the tragedy.

From what I could translate from the Japanese sports newspaper "Sports Hochi"（スポーツ報知）, Kanda had apparently fallen from one of the top floors in a Sapporo hotel at around noon on December 18th, Japan time, and despite being taken to hospital, her death was confirmed soon after. The cause has yet to be officially given although suicide hasn't been ruled out. She had been scheduled to perform in the stage musical version of "My Fair Lady" that day in the main role of Eliza Doolittle.

Joana was actually the first contributor on the blog to bring in Kanda through her "The First" article which was also her first article for "Kayo Kyoku Plus", and in that article, she noted her work as the vocalist for the band TRUSTRICK.

Kanda was involved in a number of projects including singing for TRUSTRICK, doing cover tunes of Vocaloid songs and voice work as a seiyuu. However, today I wanted to present her debut single from all the way back in May 2002 when she was just 15 years old and had gone with the stage name of that time, SAYAKA. "ever since" was written by the singer and composed/arranged by the brilliant green associates Shunsaku Okuda（奥田俊作）and Motoki Matsuoka（松岡モトキ）respectively. Not surprisingly, "ever since" does sound like an epic and hopeful BuriGuri tune and that main refrain sparked my memories in familiarity since I used to see the music video on the countdown shows and music video programs back in Japan.

"ever since" was also the theme song for the Fuji-TV drama "Big Money!"（ビッグマネー！）which was broadcast in 2002. The song also did very well as a single on the Oricon charts, peaking at No. 5. It would also eventually get onto SAYAKA's first original album "Doll" from February 2005 which got as high as No. 47.

My condolences to her family, friends and fans.