, is a Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese folk

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

 and jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 singer. Her father is Hisashi Moriyama, a pioneer of Japanese jazz

Japanese jazz

Japanese jazz refers to jazz music that is played by Japanese musicians, or to jazz music that is in some way connected to Japan or Japanese culture. In a broader sense, the concept is often used to refer to the history of jazz in Japan. Japan has, according to some estimates, the largest...

. Her son Naotaro Moriyama

Naotaro Moriyama

is a Japanese pop singer-songwriter born on April 23, 1976. His mother is Ryōko Moriyama, who is a well-known folk singer. He came out with the album "Kawaita Uta wa Sakana no Esa ni Chōdo Ii" in 2002, and distinguished himself by creating the song "Sakura"....

 is a singer. Her first cousin Hiroshi Kamayatsu is also a musician.

She is known as the Japanese Joan Baez

Joan Baez

Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....

, or the Queen of college folk. Her songs tend not to become best sellers but her most famous song is "Satokibi Batake". This song is about a tragedy during the Battle of Okinawa

Battle of Okinawa

The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was fought on the Ryukyu Islands of Okinawa and was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific War of World War II. The 82-day-long battle lasted from early April until mid-June 1945...

. The song's full version is 10 minutes. When this song was first released, it was thought to be too long to air on the radio, but now the song is popular in Japan. Every summer, NHK

NHK

NHK is Japan's national public broadcasting organization. NHK, which has always identified itself to its audiences by the English pronunciation of its initials, is a publicly owned corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee....

 air a shorter version as a symbol of the 'No War Campaign'. In the song, an imitative word 'Zawawa' is repeated 66 times, because of this, it is often called 'Zawawa'. Moriyama often called "Satokibi Batake" 'Zawawa' as a joke.

Her 1969 recording of "Kinijirareta koi" ("Unpermitted Love") sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc

Music recording sales certification

Music recording sales certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped or sold a certain number of copies, where the threshold quantity varies by type and by nation or territory .Almost all countries follow variations of the RIAA certification categories,...

. A more recent hit song is "Nada Sōsō

Nada Sōsō

is a song written by Japanese band Begin and singer Ryoko Moriyama. It was first released by Moriyama in 1998, but achieved popularity through the cover version by Rimi Natsukawa in 2001.-Ryoko Moriyama version:...

," a poem set to music by Begin (band)

Begin (band)

is a Japanese pop group from Ishigaki Island in the Yaeyama Islands of Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Their sound contains many elements of traditional Ryukyuan folk music, and prominently features the sanshin.-History:...

, and sung by Rimi Natsukawa

Rimi Natsukawa

is an Okinawan singer. She is best known for her 2001 single "Nada Sōsō."- Childhood :Natsukawa was born in Ishigaki, the largest city in the Yaeyama Islands chain. From a young age she enjoyed singing, and wanted to be a singer after hearing her father sing Yaeyama folk songs, such as and...

.

Some of her songs, such as "Kono hiroi nohara ippai" and "Dona dona", now appear in school textbooks.

She sang a theme song at Nagano Olympics opening ceremony in 1998.

Inspired by "Satokibi Batake", a TV drama called Satokibi Batake no uta (Song of the Sugarcane

Sugarcane

Sugarcane refers to any of six to 37 species of tall perennial grasses of the genus Saccharum . Native to the warm temperate to tropical regions of South Asia, they have stout, jointed, fibrous stalks that are rich in sugar, and measure two to six metres tall...

 field) was made. Akashiya Sanma takes the lead role as a soldier who refused to kill.

Nada Sōsō also features in a TV program. Nada Sōsō means teardrops

Tears

Tears are secretions that clean and lubricate the eyes. Lacrimation or lachrymation is the production or shedding of tears....

 in Okinawa dialect

Dialect

The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...

. The song describes the experience of being unable to meet the person you love most. The song may refer to the death of Moriyama's brother.

External links

• (Japanese) Ryoko Moriyama Official Site