Marie -- Ki ni Naru Anata（気になるあなた ）

 

I'm in the middle of what I call the Holiday Tunnel, that time of revelry and tourism between Canada Day on July 1st and America's 4th of July. My family had their get-together last night which involved copious amounts of Swiss Chalet and then a carrot cake for dessert. For those living in Eastern Canada, they know that my repast wasn't quite light dining...tasty, mind you.

Well, it's nice then that I can hear something as light and refreshing as Marie's（麻里絵）"Ki ni Naru Anata" which literally means "You That I've Fallen For" but frankly, it sounds better if it were "I've Fallen For You" even if the latter translation targets more of the action rather than the topic of said action. OK, we're kinda getting into heavy stuff here...back to light and refreshing.

By the way, Marie is actually not one woman but a duo consisting of Akemi Furuta（古田明美）and Keiko Yoshikawa（吉川恵子）. They lasted between 1976 and 1979, and their duo name came about thanks to another folk duo Bread & Butter's（ブレッド&バター）song "Marie"（マリエ）according to a July 2008 interview with Furuta and Yoshikawa on a TV Asahi show. The jaunty "Ki ni Naru Anata", which was penned by Takao Onoda（小野田孝雄）, was their first of four singles released in August 1976 and in the previous year, they used this song to get into the 10th Annual Yamaha Popular Song Contest. No prizes there but Marie did win in 1976 with another song "Mou Ichido Anata to"（もう一度あなたと...Once More With You）.

That TV Asahi show also revealed a sweet story in which a woman named Marie（麻里絵）had been given her name after her mother listened to the duo's fourth and final single. The lady named Marie asked whether Furuta and Yoshikawa couldn't make a comeback, and for a short time, Marie the duo was back performing. 

As one final aside, there is another Marie（マリエ）here on the blog but she has no connection with the folk duo. She's been a mystery lady who happened to sing a duet with enka singer Hiroshi Itsuki（五木ひろし）for "Duo Shinobi Ai"（デュオしのび逢い）in 1984. I've therefore inserted Furuta and Yoshikawa as "Marie (folk duo)" in Labels.