Calendar

The theme of our calendar this year is meant to take you on a lyrical journey to some of the romantic spots and scenes that come up in modern-era songs set in Kyoto. Out of the countless number of modern songs that have been written about this city, naturally only a small handful could be picked, and to an extent, the final choices were somewhat random. Chosen were nostalgic Japanese “oldies but goodies” from the mid-1960s to the early 1990s. They mostly originally came out as 45 rpm singles, and could often be heard on the radio. Those were the days when the folk music revival occurring in America impacted the Japanese music scene, and also, the unique Japanese genre called enka (see the Cover explanation below) reached its zenith. In those days of the old style picture tube TV, when the nation had largely recovered from its WWII defeat and was into its miraculous climb to prosperity, glamorous song shows featuring Japanese kayōkyoku pops and enka were hugely popular.

Since this calendar brings to you Songs, ideally we would like you to have a listen. People familiar with the song name and name of the individual or group that sang it may be able to recall its sound, though even that may be difficult without an audio hint. There are various audio videos of them available on the internet.
So, let us now consider the calendar scenes and the songs which they illustrate, beginning with the January-February page, which features a view of the Yasaka Pagoda on a snowy, dark winter’s night. This is for the song Kyoto no Koi (Love in Kyoto), sung by Yuko Nagisa. The catchy music for it was composed in 1970 by the famous American rock band called The Ventures, and may be familiar to fans of this band under the title “Expo ’70.” It was released in Japan as an “Expo commemorative” single, with the English title of “Kyoto Doll.” Japanese lyrics were put to it by Haruo Hayashi, and the resulting single that The Ventures and Yuko Nagisa recorded together during the band’s 1970 Japan tour ranked at No. 10 that year on the Oricon singles chart. The lyrics tell of a woman who has heard rumor that her lover has moved on to another. She is convinced that the rumor is true, and, heartbroken, she goes off on a journey to Kyoto, where she is met with rain falling on white snow. The sound of a temple bell reverberates in her heart as she tries to come to terms with her heartache. In her mind’s eye, she sees that man’s receding silhouette. He becomes a distant person who will not return. She becomes determined to stop crying, and to forsake the memories she made with him. She just wants to be there in a corner of white Kyoto, with her hurt feelings dying away for good,

The March-April page features a scene of cherry blossoms in full bloom at the Kamogawa, or “Kamo River,” to illustrate the 1981 song Kamo no Nagare ni (On the Flow of the Kamo) sung and played by the immensely successful folk band called Kaguyahime. This band was founded in 1970 and is a familiar name in Japan’s music scene to this day. The band’s founder, Kosetsu Minami, composed both the music and lyrics for this song, in which a young man recalls his first love, as if speaking to that young lady. They shared a tender romance during the spring in Kyoto a year ago. Amid a gentle rain in the downtown Gion area, he saw her reflection in the flow of the Kamo River, they looked into each other’s eyes, and that’s the moment he fell in love with her. They went to Kiyomizu on a misty moonlit night, where he touched her finger for the first time, and they tenderly made a promise. At Arashiyama, the cherry blossoms were scattering as the two of them silently parted. Now, a year later, his heart longs for the two of them to be together again.

On the May-June page, we see the famous path leading through the bamboo forest at Sagano, to illustrate the 1975 song Sagano Sayasaya (Sagano Rustle), the debut single of the folk duo, Tanpopo (Dandilions). The sweet voices of the duo belong to the Miyamura sisters, Hoshiko and Mitsuyo, who respectively were twenty-one and nineteen at the time. Asei Kobayashi composed the music, while the lyrics were by Akira Ito. All through the song’s four verses, we hear of the soft rustling sound of the bamboo grass leaves. The sound seeps through the heart of the lady of the song, who broke up with her boyfriend the previous day and is wistfully walking around in the rustic Sagano corner of Kyoto, She stops by at such secluded and serene temples as Jikishian, Rakushisha, and Gioji. She jots the word “love” in her travel notebook. She sits at a tea shop in the bamboo grove, and pens a letter to that person she parted from the day before. It was he who had changed his mind. Will her tears moisten the mossy path at Gioji? she asks. She places words of love on a little boat she makes out of a bamboo leaf, and as the wind blows and carries it down the stream, the Sagano bamboo grass leaves rustle softly.

For the July-August page, we have the entrance to the atmospheric stone-paved lane called Ishibe-kōji, or “Stone-walled Lane,” located near the Gion District. This is to illustrate the 1972 song Kyō no Niwaka-ame (Rain Shower in Kyoto) that was sung by the actress and singer, Rumiko Koyanagi, and reached No. 1 on the Oricon chart. The music was composed by Masaaki Hirao, who was among Japan’s most popular rockabilly singers in the 50s and 60s and then rose to become a highly successful songwriter. The lyrics, by Rei Takahashi, are in the voice of a woman in mourning, who is melancholically strolling about the town of Kyoto searching for vestiges of her departed loved one. A raindrop falls on her cheek as she stands under a temple roof. A rain shower falls throughout the day, and she has neither an umbrella nor anyone to hug her close. The sun goes down and the ravens return home. Everyone hurries on their way home, but as she prays for the happiness of her loved one, she is all alone in the rain, The temple bell resounds even on a rainy day, and, and as she counts the tolls on her fingers, she feels that the sound is suffocating. She feels that a rain shower is falling in her lonely heart

On the September-October page is a scene of Sanzen’in Temple, in the far northeastern rural area of Kyoto known as Ōhara. This brings us into the song Onna Hitori (Woman Alone), sung by the Duke Aces, a Japanese male vocal quartet whose repertoire includes spirituals, kayōkyoku (Japanese pops), and jazz. The quartet was formed in 1955, and was active for an amazing sixty-two years, until 2017. Their smooth voices and harmonies are familiar to most people throughout Japan, and it would not be an overstatement to say that this owes in part to their "Nihon no Uta" (Songs about Japan) series of original local songs created for each region of Japan. To create the series, which was released between 1965 and 1969 by EMI Music Japan, lyricist Rokusuke Ei and songwriter Taku Izumi traveled to each of the forty-seven prefectures in the country, to actually experience its unique traits and customs, and the Duke Aces often joined them on those travels when their schedule allowed. A number of the fifty-two songs that were created, including Onna Hitori (Woman Alone) for Kyoto, became big hits.

Each of the three verses of Onna Hitori brings the listener to a Buddhist temple that is located away from the city center and is known for its elegant beauty. What is especially unique and notable in this song about Kyoto, however, are the references to the kind of kimono and obi that the woman in the verse is wearing. Those in the know about kimono fabrics and obi types can picture her gracefully dressed in her informal yet very tasteful kimono. We have, in the first verse, the song’s well-known opening words, “Kyoto Ōhara Sanzen’in, a woman alone, tired by her lovelife.” She is wearing a pongee kimono and shiose silk obi with sketch-like design, and her reflection is swaying on the surface of the pond, Next, at Togano'o Kōzanji, a woman alone, tired by her lovelife, is dressed in Ōshima tsumugi kimono and tapestry-weave obi, Her shadow is cast upon the cobblestone path of that temple. Then lastly, at Arashiyama Daikakuji, there again is a woman alone, tired by her lovelife. In this case she is dressed in a Shiozawa kasuri kimono and Nagoya obi, and if you listen carefully, there is the sound of a waterfall.

The page for November-December features a scene of the famed cedars of the Kitayama mountains that enclose the city of Kyoto on the north, to illustrate the 1974 song Kitayama Sugi (Kitayama Cedars), sung by the legendary Umematsuri folksong group. The group had released its debut single the previous year, and this was its third single. Naturally, as the lyrics were set in Kyoto, it could often be heard on the local radio station. Kyoto has many colleges and universities that attract students from around the country, and many students who were studying in Kyoto in those days when folk songs were the rage, and who now are of the older generation in Japan, count this as among their favorite nostalgic tunes from their university days in Kyoto. Its lyrics speak of a man nostalgically walking along one of Kyoto’s main downtown streets, Shijo Street, on a winter’s day. He has on a black duffle coat and is hunched forward by the cold. He reminisces about how, in the days of his youth, he slowly walked around places in Kyoto with his girlfriend. He thinks to himself, “Back then, the two of us climbed up and down the long stone stairs at Kiyomizu, gazing at the town of Kyoto in its colors of youth.” He recalls how the cold rain turned to snow when the two of them went to Kitayama, saw the cedars, and touched the snow-laden stone Buddhist statues, there in Kyoto in its colors of youth.

Gretchen Mittwer