Satoshi Kishida -- Tasogare（黄昏）

 

Throughout this decade of "Kayo Kyoku Plus", I've become more sympathetic to those fans behind the so-called one-hit wonders. In the past ten years, I've not only written about superstars that I've enjoyed and new singers that I'd never heard of before with a catchy tune, but also those other artists who have been around for years but either never got that huge mega-hit or did gain fame for that one song before seemingly disappearing from the charts and the media. That last group of singers I've come to realize has had their dedicated fans because they (and I) have found other wonderful and worthy tunes by them. Maybe those songs didn't get used in a popular commercial or didn't climb up Oricon but they are just fine just the same.

As such, I've tried to spotlight some of those singers' material whenever I can, and one such song is "Tasogare" (Dusk) by singer-songwriter and actor Satoshi Kishida（岸田智史）. Whenever his name is mentioned on television or radio these days, it's because of that huge hit that he had in 1979, the comely "Kimi no Asa" （君の朝）, which spent five straight weeks at No. 1 and sold over half a million records.

Written and composed by the singer, "Tasogare" was actually his 2nd single from March 1977 and it's in that folk/New Music vein, as arranged by Koji Makaino（馬飼野康二）, as Kishida sings not about the daily sunset but the sad sunset of a relationship and one half of a former couple having to deal with the bittersweet aftermath. Kishida begins "Tasogare" introspectively before he lets his emotions come out during the refrain via that resonant voice of his. The setting might be in some big park in autumn in Tokyo but the introduction of what sounds like a quiet French accordion near the end could actually transport the grieving fellow to some other nation.

(short version)

In October 2016, a new version of "Tasogare" by Kishida was released with some added elegance. By the way, the kanji for his name was changed from「岸田智史」to「岸田敏志」by that point (the pronunciation remains the same). His real name is Hidehiko Inada（稲田英彦）, and his son, percussionist Shintaro Inada（稲田しんたろう）, was a co-arranger for this new version. Also, on the family front, Kishida's daughter is Mizuki Inada（稲田みづ紀）, a musical actress while his father was a famous calligrapher.