Last night's edition of NHK's "Uta Con"（うたコン）was an extended one by half an hour partially because it was recognizing the 15th anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake on March 11th, so there were a lot of singers showing up. Of course, because of the tribute, everyone on stage and in the hall sang "Hana wa Saku"（花は咲く）. As the camera was panning across the stage to show all of the performers solemnly singing the ballad, I noticed one familiar face but wasn't quite sure if it was who I thought it was.
Well, she didn't appear again until the very end of the broadcast but it truly was who I thought it was. Up to now, I haven't seen much in the way of seiyuu appear on "Uta Con" aside from Nana Mizuki（水樹奈々） but Maaya Sakamoto（坂本真綾）indeed made her first appearance on NHK last night. I've known her for a while now since she's provided some of the theme songs for anime that I've seen with my anime buddy in the last decade such as "Koufuku Graffiti" (幸腹グラフィティ...Gourmet Graffiti) , and there was also her scintillating cover of "DOWNTOWN" for the 2010 "Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru" (それでも町は廻ってる...And Yet the Town Moves) which I never caught.
Sakamoto last night sang a brief medley including the third opening theme for the anime "Card Captor Sakura"（カードキャプターさくら）, "Platina" (Platinum), which came out as the seiyuu's 5th single in October 1999. It's hard to believe that it's been over 26 years since this was first released. Written by Yuuho Iwasato（岩里祐穂）and composed/arranged by Yoko Kanno（菅野よう子）, who incidentally created the aforementioned "Hana wa Saku", "Platina" is the type of song that I would enjoy as a breezy pop tune with a hint of soul and those swiftly flying strings. I never became a fan of the show itself though I know it's one of the more popular anime but I've become a fan of some of the theme tunes including Kohmi Hirose's（広瀬香美）aptly-named "Groovy" and chihiro's "Honey".
"Platina" went Gold as it hit No. 21 on Oricon.
It's been a hot minute since I last heard プラチナ or thought about Cardcaptor Sakura! プラチナ deserves all the fame it has gotten and maybe more. It is a really dreamy, moving, almost epic song. Oh, by the way, I wonder if we are watching Uta-con at the same time? The most recent episode, if memory serves correctly, started about 7:30 on Tuesday night. 三山ひろし & 山内惠介 collaboration performance of あゝ松の廊下 was fun to watch. I think my wife enjoys Chemistry and 坂本 冬美, more though.
ReplyDeleteHello, Brian. Most likely, we weren't watching the show at the same time since the live version was way too early in the morning here for us to catch. We saw the tape-delayed version later that night.
DeleteBut I do remember あゝ松の廊下 by Miyama and Yamauchi. It's basically the musical prelude to the "The 47 Ronin". What was rather poignant beside the performance of "Hana wa Saku" was Kenichi Mikawa's battle with Parkinson's...and what made it infuriating was that his performance of "Ikiru" was abruptly cut out of the telecast because Jme and NHK deemed it a foreign song (which it is) and therefore couldn't afford the copyright payments.
That is infuriating! I am sure NHK has enough money to cover the copyright payments!
DeleteSadly, it happens all the time. My parents don't seem to detect it, but I can see when a cut is made. The Kohaku isn't exempt either.
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