Kei Fukui - Kenji Miyazawa Complete Songbook - Import CD

Credits:

Kei Fukui

Description:

A First-of-Its-Kind Project Kenji Miyazawa Was a Genius in Music, Too! Kei Fukui performs the complete song cycle of this great figure from his hometown with a masterful artistry that cannot be imitated!! The latest album from Kei Fukui—Japan’s most popular and renowned tenor—is a complete collection of Kenji Miyazawa’s songs. For Fukui, a native of Iwate, Kenji Miyazawa—a great figure born in his hometown—held a special place in his heart. While he has long cherished “The Song of the Wandering Stars,” this time he has taken on the challenge of performing the complete collection. This marks the first attempt to examine Kenji Miyazawa from the perspective of his musical works. Kenji Miyazawa was a music lover; it is said that he had a record collection that was extraordinary for its time and that he played the cello. He also experimented with musical composition, and 28 songs he was involved with remain today. All of the songs are based on Kenji’s own poetry, and he composed the music for eight of them. The fact that the 19 songs—excluding “Kaze no Matasaburō”—were written to existing melodies makes them particularly valuable and undeniably works of literary creation. Among them are Beethoven’s “Pastoral” and Dvořák’s “New World,” and it is fascinating to see how he drew inspiration from musical imagery. “Taneyamagahara,” based on the second movement of “From the New World,” is particularly striking for its pioneering nature, as the poem was written more than a quarter-century before Keizo Horiuchi’s famous “The Sun Sets Behind the Distant Mountains.” This is the first-ever recording of all 28 pieces. Rich in variety—ranging from fairy-tale-like, traditional Japanese, and hymn-like styles to the Asakusa Opera style—the collection never fails to captivate the listener. The four songs from the play *The Hunger Camp*—featuring Kei Fukui as the general alongside three young performers in an operetta-style production—are absolutely side-splitting. In the ensemble pieces, too, they handle the counter melodies, faithfully recreating the score. Kenji Miyazawa’s flexible sensibility, genius, energy, and ability to entertain truly leave one in awe. Since only the melodies of Kenji’s compositions have been preserved, composer Setsuya Nakamura (1928–) edited them based on years of research. He added piano accompaniment to all the pieces, including those based on existing melodies. As a bonus track, Kenji’s masterpiece “Rain Cannot Defeat Me” is recited in the Iwate dialect. It is a masterpiece that draws the listener into a special world and moves the heart. This album is an exclusive production by King International (formerly the Tamayura label). No imported versions exist. King International