It's probably because I'm (extremely) biased, but I would describe Haruo Minami (三波春夫) back in the day to be quite the pretty man, especially when he began appearing with what looks like mascara. Admiring the cover photos of his earlier works showcased at his museum in Niigata only proved this point and the fact that he was very photogenic. In his live performances, he also oozed flamboyance, something I don't really see in other (male) singers of his sort at the time. Stumbling upon the above video of one such live performance some time ago, I have to say that he was spicy. Very. And I'm fairly certain that he knew he was so from the way he glided about that Kohaku stage... ... Some stills from this video actually functioned as my phone's wallpaper for a period of time.
The song Haru-san sang here is "Sado no Koi Uta" (Sado Love Song). It was released in 1963 and written by Shiro Hagihara (萩原四朗) and composed by Kazuo Harukawa (春川一夫), the latter a frequent collaborator with the singer himself. Because Takashi Hosokawa (細川たかし) has a discography entry with the same name, I did confuse it with Minami's work for a while, but it turns out that they are wildly different and Hosokawa's one was the more famous of the two, as I would find out when I went hunting for more information of Minami's one.
Minami's "Sado no Koi Uta" has a much stronger minyo flavour to it. I'm not as familiar with the Niigata minyo, the "Sado okesa" (佐渡おけさ), but Harukawa's melody sounds like it was based on that with a more dramatic touch. To the rather festive rhythm, I believe Haru-san relates the tragic love story illustrated in the rokyoku "Sado Jowa" (佐渡情話) by rokyoku artist Yonewaka Suzuki (寿々木米若), who based the narrative song on a local Sado folk tale. I shall now convey what I understood of the root tale from the J-Wiki:
O-Ben, the daughter of a local Sado fisherman, fell in love with Fujiyoshi (or Fujikichi? I'm not sure of the pronunciation), a man from Kashiwazaki city on the mainland who was temporarily on Sado island for work. When his job was done, Fujiyoshi had no need to be on Sado anymore, but O-Ben resolved to continue their relationship, so she would sail to Kashiwazaki on a tarai boat nightly just to see him... A tarai boat is essentially a giant cedar bucket fishermen on the Ogi coast of Sado would use for fishing ALONG the island's shores. Kashiwazaki is somewhat FAR down south from Sado. Fujiyoshi was clearly very special to O-Ben. Unfortunately for her, sentiments weren't alike. It seemed like the man was getting tired of O-Ben's persistence, and it surely didn't help that he was already married. And so, one night, he extinguished the light from a lighthouse that served as O-Ben's marker for the mainland, which caused the woman to get lost at sea. The next morning, Fujiyoshi finds O-Ben's body on the Kashiwazaki shores. Consumed by grief and regret, he throws himself into the sea to end it all.
... ... I mean... Love stories, am I right...? Geez, a letter would've sufficed. No need to resort to murder.
In the rokyoku tune, it seems like the main characters' names were changed, with O-Ben becoming O-Mitsu and Fujiyoshi becoming Gosaku. Haru-san's "Sado no Koi Uta" uses these names. Kashiwazaki city commemorates this story with a plaque, which you can check out on the city's website here.
Considering my previous post some time back was on Bin Uehara, the bookish Bin-san is a stark contrast to the spicy Haru-san from here.
Hi, Noelle. Good to hear from you again. Thanks very much for the article and the story behind "Sado no Koi Uta". It's an interesting insight about Minami being the pretty boy of the enka world at that time, considering it currently has Kiyoshi Hikawa and Keisuke Yamakawa. I always saw Minami as the beaming and almost holy presence on the Kohaku stage as a counterpoint to the tough and down-to-earth Hideo Murata.
ReplyDeleteI also have to say that your article has a good sense of timing. I was thinking of doing a couple of articles on the go-touchi kayo of Japan this weekend. "Sado no Koi Uta" would make for an ideal representative for Niigata Prefecture.