My mother has often asked the question, "Where is Harumi Miyako（都はるみ）? I haven't seen her in ages." Well, looking the legendary enka singer up on J-Wiki, I found out that she basically stopped any public appearances in the mid-2010s, and as of 2021, she's been living with a former actor in an old countryside inn somewhere in the Tohoku region. So, let us just assume that she has finally retired without any great bombast.
Some weeks ago, when I was watching the kayo program "Shin BS Nippon no Uta"（新BS日本の歌）on NHK, I noticed one of the guests singing a Miyako song that I had never heard of before. It started out as one of the more traditional enka but then the carpet was pulled out from beneath us listeners, and it became an old-fashioned rock n' roll tune, reminiscent of the Group Sounds days of the 1960s.
This would be "Mukashi" which literally translates as "Long Ago". However, considering the lyrics by Yu Aku（阿久悠）, perhaps a better and more pragmatic translation would be "Yesterday's Man". This was Miyako's 119th single from New Year's Day 2003 and looking at that cover of a triumphant-looking singer with the big hair and her smiling visage emblazoned all over her kimono, this isn't an ordinary Miyako single...especially with Ryudo Uzaki（宇崎竜童）handling the composition, him being the grizzled rock master.
Along with the GS sound, Miyako is more than happy to be singing about washing that man right out of her hair...just to reference another old American song from way back when. She's free, I tell you, free of the shackles of the old relationship and ready to tackle new adventures, but not without some gleeful verbal stomping of the former pathetic paramour.
I think of have you might have mentioned Harumi Miyako before because I remember hearing the story of her living in Tohoku. Well, I did not know too much about her so I did some research and found out that she is a whole lot more interesting than I had thought. She is bicultural, then was the first to win a partiuclar award I forget without and she retired a few times but came back.
ReplyDeleteHi, Brian. I remember when Miyako retired the first time right on New Year's Eve. So of course, the big retirement crying fest happened to occur on NHK's Kohaku Utagassen. She, most of the other singers and probably most of the audience were left as puddles of tears. But then, she unretired.
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