Yeah, we're breaking heat records today! Most likely, a 78-year-old one is going to fall by the wayside by sunset since we'll probably go higher than 90 degrees Fahrenheit. The fan is most definitely on in my room and I've got a bottle of water at my side.
Anyways, I found this 1968 single by a teenage Judy Ongg（ジュディ・オング）titled "Sayonara Juu-nana Sai" (Goodbye 17). Her tenth single to be exact from September that year, it was written by Tokiko Iwatani（岩谷時子）and composed by Shosuke Ichikawa（市川昭介）, and it's quite the maudlin ballad about what I'm assuming is a girl's first heartbreak. The arrangement is pretty interesting in that it starts off with some haunting echoes from an American 60s love ballad which then takes on a folksy tilt thanks to that European stringed instrument. However, along the way, it also combines some French jazziness and a fairly rocking drum. Intriguingly enough, the main melody even reminds me of a more downbeat version of "Bei Mir Bistu Shein", popularized by the Andrews Sisters. I gather that "Sayonara Juu-nana Sai" could be set either in Tokyo or Paris.
Fortunately for me, my 17th year on Earth was filled with my burgeoning interest in kayo kyoku and Western music in general so I was taping the heck out of the radio stations including CHIN-FM which had "Sounds of Japan".
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