Hitomi Kaga -- Tokyo Flamenco（東京フラメンコ）

 

Feeling a bit dozy right now since I'm still digesting a hearty ramen lunch along with a gelato dessert. My gastrointestinal fortitude has been faltering of late, I'm afraid.

Anyways, commenter YMOfan04 has been giving me some names of rather obscure kayo kyoku singers from long ago, so I've been perusing them. One such person is Hitomi Kaga（加賀ひとみ）. There is a J-Wiki article on a Hitomi Kaga (same kanji) but it turns out that the name belongs to a mezzo-soprano opera singer whose high school years were in the 1980s, and looking at the thumbnail featuring the single cover above, this is definitely not the same Hitomi Kaga.

Nope, this Hitomi Kaga, whose real name is Masako Nishikawa（西川雅子）from Ishikawa Prefecture, released seven singles in the latter half of the 1960s before taking a long sabbatical until 1984. She then put out another three singles up to 1989 also throwing in her first album. Koga's third single was "Tokyo Flamenco" and not surprisingly it's got quite the Latin beat within the Mood Kayo setting although its intro sounds like a rather dramatic beginning to an ancient European war movie. "Tokyo Flamenco", which came out in November 1966, was written by Sakae Kouda（幸田栄）and composed by the legendary Minoru Endo（遠藤実）.