Toshiyuki Nishida -- Jinsei Lullaby（人生ららばい）

 

It was less than a week ago that I paid tribute to seiyuu Nobuyo Ohyama（大山のぶ代）, the most famous voice actress behind anime icon Doraemon（ドラえもん）who had passed away on September 29th at the age of 90. Today, I discovered through NHK that another very familiar face on TV and movies has left this mortal coil. 

The national broadcaster devoted a quarter of its prime-time news broadcast today to the life and career of actor and singer Toshiyuki Nishida（西田敏行）who died earlier on October 17th at the age of 76. Nishida played a whole variety of roles from good guys to bad guys in historic and contemporary projects, with one of his most famous roles being Densuke Hamasaki, the central character in the comedic movie franchise "Tsuribaka Nisshi"(釣りバカ日誌....The Fishing Maniac's Diary [although the official English title was "Free and Easy").

Admittedly, I didn't follow his acting or singing career all that much but the one song in his discography that has stayed me with me since I first heard it over forty years ago was his big 1981 hit "Moshimo Piano ga Hiketanara"（もしもピアノが弾けたなら）. It was one of the songs that helped me get onto the track of enjoying kayo kyoku and I will always remember it for the elegant piano arrangement and his performance of the song on his first appearance on NHK's Kohaku Utagassen at the end of that year.

I also remember Nishida for his contribution in singing "Hana wa Saku"（花は咲く...Flowers Will Bloom）, the tribute song to the victims of the March 11th 2011 disaster which also affected the entertainer's home prefecture of Fukushima. He wasn't a classically-trained singer by any means but for both "Moshimo Piano ga Hiketanara" and "Hana wa Saku", there was an enormous amount of tender heart and enjoyment of singing that he put into those songs and onto his sleeve. Anytime that he performed either number, I would expect him to burst into tears.

In a number of ways, although as I mentioned above he played a lot of different roles, Nishida will always appear to me as that jovial and comical older brother in the cap, loose jacket, T-shirt and jeans with the slightly longer hair. There wasn't any pretension there; he was just folks.

Nishida's 14th single from September 1986 was "Jinsei Lullaby" (Life Lullaby) which was used as the theme for his starring vehicle, the TBS-produced drama "Naite Tamaru ka"（泣いてたまるか...Can I Stand to Cry?）. Written by Mitsuo Ikeda（池田充男）and composed by Hachiro Aoyama（青山八郎）, it's a jaunty and folksy pop song with a wonderful intro thanks to those strings and what sounds like a European string instrument.

My condolences to Nishida's family, friends and many fans.