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12月25日出版
The Daily Yomiuri （読売的英語報章）
An animated Kohaku singer
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/features/ar ... Y12002.htm引言回覆:
J-pop singer and voice actress Nana Mizuki has had quite a year. It started with a January concert at Nippon Budokan and will end on Dec. 31 with her first appearance on NHK's year-end Kohaku Uta Gassen (Red and white song contest).
"I still can't believe that I'm going to perform at the Kohaku," the native of Ehime Prefecture told The Daily Yomiuri in Tokyo earlier this month.
Traditionally, NHK's annual entertainment extravaganza has defined New Year's Eve for many families in Japan, and the Mizuki household has been no exception.
"Every year we always looked forward to watching the program, so it was very special for us and I dreamed of being able to perform on the stage someday. It was a very special show for me and my parents," she said.
Mizuki's parents ran classes in singing Japanese pop songs, and her exposure to enka music had a profound effect on her as a child.
"As my parents love enka, the music was always playing in the house. I was always surrounded by enka music. I didn't have any special reason to start taking lessons in enka; it was very natural for me and part of my daily life," she said.
By her fifth birthday, however, Mizuki discovered another musical genre that was to have a big influence on her.
"I started listening to anime theme songs, as I love anime very much. I play piano, so I had the scores, too," she said.
With seven albums under her belt, a string of songs that have been used as anime themes over the years, and her 21st and 22nd singles due out early in the new year, Mizuki has made an impression on fans of pop culture. And while she comes across as the archetypal J-pop star on stage, she hasn't forgotten her singing roots.
"My experience as an enka artist is now helping me as a pop singer, and I think I can express my own personality and character through experiences that have only happened to Nana Mizuki. I think I have the mindset of an enka singer, so I can do vibrato or I can sing with dramatic expression and that leads to my being able to build my own character as an artist," she said.
With a national tour starting in February, it's a wonder that Mizuki finds time to branch out into other areas of entertainment. Yet she has made a name for herself as one of the most ubiquitous voice actresses in the anime world.
"The biggest appeal of voice acting is you can become anything you want. A baby, for example, a very old lady or you can be a man. And, of course, you can be something that isn't human," she said.
Almost a year to the day since her Budokan show and two days after her 30th birthday, the film Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha The Movie opens, with Mizuki in one of the leading voice roles.
"Nanoha is a very ordinary girl in the third grade of primary school, but she has the ability to do magic and her mission is to collect very dangerous items called Jewel Seeds, which are scattered all over the world. My role is Fate [Testarossa], who is Nanoha's rival, so they fight each other over the Jewel seeds. Although Nanoha and Fate fight each other, by the end they become friends," she said. "I wrote the theme song and sing it as well."
But Kohaku viewers should not count on hearing that particular song, as Mizuki has chosen to mark her debut with "Shin Ai."
When Mizuki played the song at Seibu Dome in July, she was accompanied by Mika Agematsu on the arpa or Latin harp, and a repeat performance by the two of them at Kohaku would certainly be a crowd pleaser. In July, Mizuki was adorned in a flower-covered party dress. How about this performance?
"My costume's being made just for the Kohaku. It will have a simple, pure and clean image, like myself, and it will also suit my song," she said.
While many Kohaku viewers will mark New Year's by visiting a shrine or temple near home, Mizuki will spend the start of the new decade far away from NHK Hall.
"I'm planning to go on a trip with my mother as we will still be excited after my performance at the Kohaku," she said.
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