Kotomi Maki -- Koi Mangetsu（恋満月）

 

Before folks start inquiring about the lady whose CD cover is up in the celebrity photo corner at top-right this week, I ought to cover her song.

Kotomi Maki（真木ことみ）is an enka singer who hails from what is now known as Sagamihara City in Kanagawa Prefecture along the border of Yamanashi Prefecture. With her parents loving enka, she pursued her dreams of being an enka singer and in April 1991, she made her debut with "Aishuu no Doushigawa"（哀愁の道志川...The Sorrowful Doushi River）. The river happens to be right by her hometown.

However, the song for this article was her 4th single from March 1995, "Koi Mangetsu" (Love Full Moon). Although it was released over a quarter of a century ago, that electric guitar among the strings in the melody by Chiaki Oka（岡千秋）still makes me think of it as a contemporary enka. Maki has got some steel under her silky vocals as she sings Eiji Takino's（たきのえいじ）lyrics about the delicious aches and pains of love. According to her J-Wiki profile, she has made appearances on television but as such, I have never seen her on any show such as "Uta Con"（うたコン）, but she has been releasing singles up to 2021.