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Nakajima Miyuki (born February 23, 1952, Sapporo, Hokkaidō, Japan) (1992). 9780851129396, Guinness Publishing. ISBN 9780851129396 is a Japanese singer-songwriter and radio personality. She has released 44 studio albums, 48 singles, 6 live albums and multiple compilations as of January 2020. Her sales have been estimated at more than 21 million copies.
In the mid-1970s, Nakajima signed to Pony Canyon and launched her recording career with her debut single, "Azami Jō no Lullaby" (アザミ嬢のララバイ). Rising to fame with the hit "The Parting Song (Wakareuta)", released in 1977, she has since had a successful career as a singer-songwriter, primarily in the early 1980s. Four of her singles have sold more than one million copies in the last two decades, including "Earthly Stars (Unsung Heroes)", a theme song for the Japanese television documentary series Project X.
Nakajima performed in experimental theater ("Yakai") every year-end from 1989 through 1998. The idiosyncratic acts featured scripts and songs she wrote, and have continued irregularly in recent years.
In addition to her work as a solo artist, Nakajima has written over 90 compositions for numerous other singers and has produced several chart-toppers. Many cover versions of her songs have been performed by Asian (particularly Taiwan and Hong Kong) singers. She is the only musician to have participated in the National Language Council of Japan.
Nakajima gave her first live performance during her third year in high school, playing a song she wrote titled "Tsugumi no Uta" onstage at a cultural festival.
In 1972, she played in a folk contest at the Hibiya Open-Air Concert Hall in Tokyo, winning the songwriting prize for her "Atashi Tokidoki Omouno." The song, included in the contest album, became her first recorded material.
After graduating college, Nakajima continued to pursue a career as a professional musician for nearly a year.
In May 1976, she released her first studio album, Watashi no Koe ga Kikoemasuka. In 1976, Nakajima composed her first number-one hit single, "Abayo," which was recorded by Naoko Ken, and sold more than 700,000 copies.
Throughout her over 40-year career, she has written over 100 songs for other artists, including "Shiawase Shibai" (recorded by Junko Sakurada), "Kamome wa Kamome" (a comeback single for Ken, released in 1978), and "If I Could Take to the Sky (Kono Sora wo Tobetara)" (performed by Tokiko Kato, released in 1978). Nakajima occasionally released retrospective albums, composed of songs written for other artists. The first one, Okaerinasai, released in 1979, has sold more than 500,000 units, and it became one of her best-selling albums.
Miyuki Nakajima's fifth single "Wakareuta (The Parting Song)", released in September 1977, became her commercial breakthrough as a singer. The song reached number one on the Oricon for one week in December 1977, knocking "Wanted (Shimei Tehai)" by Pink Lady from the top of the hit parade. "The Parting Song" has sold more than 700,000 copies.
Her fourth studio album, entitled Aishiteiru to Ittekure, reinforced her enduring popularity as a performer. The album, which featured "The Parting Song," also included a protest song entitled "Sejou (World's Context)," which became popular after it was used in the TV drama Kimpachi Sensei in 1981.
In addition to her career as a recording artist, Nakajima has appeared as a personality on radio programs. She hosted All Night Nippon, one of the longest-running programs aired by the Nippon Broadcasting System, from April 1979 through March 1987.
As a composer and lyricist, Nakajima continued to write for other artists. "Suzume (Sparrow)," the first solo single for ex-Pink Lady member Keiko Masuda, led the performer to the top 10 spot once again. In 1983, Nakajima won the 25th Japan Record Award for her songwriting on "Haru na no ni," a song sung by then-teenage pop icon Yoshie Kashiwabara.
"Cold Farewell (Tsumetai Wakare)," released as a single in 1985, was the first song she produced in countries outside Japan. The top 10-charting song features a lengthy harmonica solo performed by Stevie Wonder. He also played the synthesizer on Nakajima's subsequent single "Atai no Natsuyasumi," released the following year.
In 1987, Nakajima contributed lyrics for a composition by Tsugutoshi Goto, a bassist and a record producer who had been a longtime collaborator with her.
Nakajima wrote lyrics for pop song "Fu-ji-tsu" in 1988. It was released as a fourth single by teen idol Shizuka Kudo, who was also well known as an ex-member of Onyanko Club. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Nakajima and Goto wrote 17 songs for Kudo, and some of them topped the chart, including "Dōkoku" (I Cried All Night) released in 1993 and certified quadruple platinum by the RIAJ for shipments of in excess of a million copies. Her songwriting partnership with Goto ended in 1993, but Nakajima has continued to write several songs for Kudo in later years.
After enlisting a new collaborator, Nakajima launched the experimental musical Yakai at the Bunkamura Theatre Cocoon, in Shibuya, Tokyo. Yakai was composed of intricate story lines she wrote, and it started initially as jukebox music mainly comprising her previously released songs. Her idiosyncratic efforts gradually became stage performances which she performed every December for 10 years. Since the 7th act, entitled 2/2, in 1995, Yakai was composed of new songs she composed especially for the performance. Most of these performances have been released on DVDs.
Since the 1990s, Nakajima gradually began to appear on several television programs and commercials, although she continuously rejected offers to appear on the pop music television shows. In 1992, Nakajima appeared on the television drama Shin'ai Naru Mono e (titled after her 1979 studio album), performing a role as a doctor on the first and last episodes.
From 1993 through 2000, Nakajima appeared regularly on TV commercials for the Japan's Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. The commercials (most of them featuring a new rendition of her early song, "Time Goes Around," recorded in 1993) were aired during the Bon Festival and holiday seasons in Japan.
"Asai Nemuri (Shallow Sleep)," a theme song Nakajima wrote for the drama Shin'ai Naru Mono e, was released as a single and found success, selling more than a million copies and peaking on the charts at number two. It was included on her studio album East Asia released in October 1992. The album also featured " Ito (Thread)," one of her songs that has been covered by many artists, especially famous for the interpretation by Kazutoshi Sakurai and Takeshi Kobayashi's charity supergroup Bank Band. Nakajima's song lead=yes is the inspiration of the 2020 film . Regarding the film adaptation, Nakajima commented: "Every time I hear different people sing the song I'm amazed at how it takes on different colors. I'm looking forward to seeing a new version of 'Tapestry' through this film."
In the middle of the decade, she wrote a couple of theme songs for Ienakiko, the TV drama series starring Yumi Adachi, which was aired on the NTV. The song, titled "Sora to Kimi no Aida ni (Between the Sky and You)," was released as a single in May 1994, and debuted at number one on the Japanese Singles Chart. The song became her most commercially successful record to-date, selling in excess of 1.4 million copies. The other song, her composition "Wanderers Song," was featured on the sequel of the drama series aired the following year. It also gained similar success, reaching number one on the charts and selling over 1 million units.
In March 1996 she released a greatest hits compilation, Daiginjo, which reached number one on the Oricon album chart, making her the oldest female artist to produce a number one album on the Japanese music chart at that time (the record was overtaken by Yumi Matsutoya and Mariya Takeuchi in later years).
However, each of her studio albums released in the 1990s were commercially lackluster, and some of them failed to reach the top 10 on the charts. and released in 1999, were her lowest-selling albums. Both albums have sold less than 50,000 copies.
She is known as the first and the only musician who was a participant of the National Language Council of Japan, in which she took part in the late 1990s.
In 2006, Nakajima wrote the song "Sorafune (Ship in the Air)" for the boy band Tokio. The song was used as the closing theme for My Boss, My Hero, the TV drama starring the group's frontman Tomoya Nagase. It became the second most commercially successful material for the band, which followed their debut single, and remained on the Oricon chart for more than a year, selling approximately 480,000 copies. "Ship in the Air" was also the first chart-topper to which Nakajima contributed both lyrics and melody for other artists in 30 years, since "Abayo" was recorded by Naoko Ken in 1976. A month after the release of her studio album Lullaby Singer, which featured her own interpretation of "Ship in the Air," her contribution for the Tokio won "best lyrics" of the 48th Japan Record Award.
The studio album entitled I Love You, Do You Hear Me? was released on October 3, 2007. The album debuted at number four on the Oricon with in excess of 39,000 copies sold in its first week of release, and it provided Nakajima with her 34th top ten hit on the Japanese albums charts.
In 2014, Nakajima wrote and composed the song "Naite mo Iin Da yo" for the Japanese idol group Momoiro Clover Z. It was released on May 8, 2014. The song was used as the theme song for the film .
Nakajima performed the opening theme song to the 2014 NHK Asadora Massan, entitled "Mugi no Uta" (Wheat Song). She performed this song at the 64th Kōhaku Uta Gassen in the same year.
| Fairy Musica (voice) |
| Bar hostess |
| Doctor Iwaodake |
| Itoko, the Fortune-teller |
| Junko Mamiya |
| Japan Record Awards | |||
| 2006 (48th) | "Ship in the Air (Sorafune)" | Best Lyrics | (Performer: Tokio / Lyricist and composer: Nakajima / Arranger and producer: Motoki Funayama) |
| Japan Gold Disc Award | |||
| 1989 (4th) | "Kousa ni Fukarete" | Five Best-selling Singles of year | (Performer: Shizuka Kudo / Lyricist: Nakajima / Composer, producer and arranger: Tsugutoshi Goto) |
| 1994 (9th) | "Between the Sky and You (Sora to Kimi no Aida ni)"/"Fight!" | Five Best-selling Singles of year | (Performer, composer, lyricist and producer: Nakajima / Co-producer and arranger: Ichizo Seo, Takayuki Inoue) |
| Second Finale,Returned after 12 years |
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