You forget that 2008 was her 10th anniversy year. You can't compare this special year to another. Morevoer I don't think that she's in the black list. After so many years appearing in several TV show, I think Ayu want to do other things that always release a cd, go to TV to singing & so. It's why the number decreases year after year. I have the same view that Aderianu.

In parallell with that, Ayu is more in Europe & US to see her fans. She produced a single too. She designed contact lenses & false lashes. I really think she has other ideas in her head for the future.

yay!!! at least one peformance !!!

Thx god. Ayu confirmed that she will sing on Kouhaku....
I guess kouhaku will be the last tv performance for Ayu this year...

Hope for more tv performances next year...

Ayu may still perform at the CDTV Special no?

The list of songs that the NHK Kouhaku performers are going to sing has just came out...

Yay, good choice! has she ever performed this song live?

Progress is a hard song to sing
she struggle to sing it on her POM tour...but YAY!!! CAN'T WAIT!
i hope she will sing full version of it..

this is pre-recorded show and TA always receive invites
since it was not announced, I'm sure Ayu not going to participate

at POWER of MUSIC ^_^

for sure
she said this song cannot be cut to TV-size

Uhh...not on TV.

I'm not sure about if this will go full or not... For sure this is the live TV performance debut, but I don't know how it will go...

yey! i knew it that she's gonna sing progress!
it's a great song for opening act of the show =))
so can't wait!

I actually didn't think she did a bad job of it during PoM, so I'm excited to hear her sing Progress live :)

I can't wait to hear "progress" live! I LOVE this song! :smitten

yaay! finally we'll see progress on tv! I'm quite excited :D

progress was expected XD nice!

I wonder if it's also the performers list?
ayu's opening the shows was great but she will have more ratings if it's really the list.
On the other hand shouldn't she be performing in CDL around the same hours?

thanks! hope she delivers an awesome performance… really hope she could perform on MSSP but oh well…at least I have gaga to look forward to.

Cool! (I feel like it's been a while since she's performed an upbeat song on Kouhaku, but she did Rule... haha)

I'm glad it's progress.

progress is cool! i still hope she 'll sing beloved on another music show!~~!

can't wait to watch progress live on tv!! :D

Yay ! One of my fav songs in FIVE ! I can't wait !

progress has a hard opening but the high belt at the end is her best high note nowadays (she used to excel at D5s but now her C5s are her best...and really powerful at times) and the song is perfectly in her range, looking forward to a HQ recording. PoM sounded a little bad at times because of the recording quality(the video rip sounded just completely off, the better quality audio rip sounded MUCH better and I'm sure her real vocals sounded even better)
Also it's just epic.

I think..
If ayu will sing 'progress' so absolutely ayu will be opening performance (again, again, again, and again) for Kouhaku Uta Gassen ~___~
this song matching for opening perform.

I hope ayu'll sing just alone, without her bands.
NO Pecco, NO Yoko, NO Yo-chan, NO Enrique NO Shingo Kobayashi, NO orchestra, NO bands.

Just alone (ehmm... Or just with her dancers? ;p)

Just alone with beautiful (glamorous) gown,
and she'll change the gown with a rock costume on 'progress' interlude.
She'll broke the gown #giggle

progress is a band song, so I doubt she'll be alone. Anyway, if she really did a costume change on stage, she'll need dancers to help with that, so that dream of ayu performing alone just flew out the window. :P

I have a feeling that Ayu's going to start out the Kouhaku once again - for the fourth straight year...

(I still remember 2008, when Ayu started out a Kouhaku for the first time - the first performer of the Kouhaku...)

yyeeeyy she's going to sing Progress.i hope there is the choreography for the performance

I'm excited for progress! ~

progress!!!! :heart

yeah for Progress!!!!!

yes....
Ayu will sing progress....

Cant wait for kouhaku this year....

I think we're lucky that Ayu's not in MSSL, because apparently KeyHoleTV's not showing TV Asahi...maybe the guys there blacked out TV Asahi for the MSSL? (Maybe because of the very high potential of overcrowding?)

they block cos ayu wasnt in it :o

This does not make sense. We are lucky Ayu is not performing because if she was we wouldn'T be able to watch it live? You know we would still get a TV recording a few minutes to hours later, right? So it's still not getting a performance at all while, had Ayu performed, we would get one.

:thud dude do you think before you post stuff like this? Even if it's a joke...it's just...I can't :shakehead

Well, MSSL's over, but now the next thing is the Kouhaku...

Ayu will be once again the 1st artist to perform on Kouhaku
http://www9.nhk.or.jp/kouhaku/artists/index.html

I knew it again.

Great!
Progress will be a great opener for KOUHAKU =))

I guess Ayu was too much stressed with performing later, because her CDL is on the same day. I remember this video were she was rushing from Kouhaku to her CDL and giving interviews while getting styled. Perhaps she doesn´t want this rushing anymore.

They also like to end kouhaku with SMAP, and they get the most rating.
Oh well, ayu's gonna be with the lowest ratings (lowest rating belongs to every opening), but she is going to start the show with a bang!

I think Porno Graffitti are most stressed. They are performing as the 14th act, while they have to travel all the way to Chiba city for their count down live. Ayu's travel distance is less than 5 minutes.

Yeah, that's just NOT fair. :grumpy

In fact, most of the big artists are in the second half; the most would be more to the Johnnys' groups and the boys, which I'm concerned about, because this could end up the white team winning for the seventh straight year.

I just don't get it.

I don't get why AKB48 has to be after NYC, which is after Ayu. Why do they have to schedule it like that???

it seems like Kouhaku does it on purpose. they want to keep the rating all the time, so they start with a super-star, then give a way to OK-performers and end with super-stars.. erm, you got what I want to say :D

what video??! I want to watch it!

Wait, so no Xmas live special this year?

Xmas show is over since 09.

http://www.ahsforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=70846

[01-12-31] Backstage clip.mpg
Japan Record Awards → Interviews → Kouhaku → CDL

^ thank you, Zemus!!

She's had some of the highest opening ratings of recent years though~

What?! She struggles so much trying to hit the refrain notes even in the studio version of this song ...Her vocals sound very forced and strained during refrain/chorus. It's an amazing song though and I'm very excited to hear it live again:D

progress goes to either D5 or D#5, not exactly sure about which of those, but both are perfectly in her range. The chorus of forgiveness basically consists of D#5s and she did perfectly on POWER of MUSIC. BRILLANTE has lots of D5s in it, M goes even higher, she needs E5 and hit those in POWER of MUSIC.
The reason she struggles on the studio version of progress is that it was recorded BEFORE her new vocal lessons, D5 and D#5 are both at the top of her range, but they are her go-to high notes literally in half of her songs, she can hit them well, she just needs to be in a good condition that day and support her voice properly. But when she supports it properly for the quiet parts of progress it sounds like screaming to many people with no musical knowledge whatsoever.

So yeah she may **** up since she doesn't seem to warm up her voice properly before TV performances, but it's the perfect song for her voice so as long as she concentrates on hitting the notes she can sing it very well.

Ayu's marriage to Mannie made it to a top 100 list of news stories at #14.

http://i.imgur.com/Q15O0.jpg

From http://photozou.jp/photo/photo_only/1718800/114988696.

I think it's a good position as we hear nothing about the couple since their wedding.

wow! #14 top news! that's great :yes

oh ! it's possible to have the link for see this video please ? =)

Those photos are cute!

This is last year's CDTV~

^Oh, sorry. That explains it. Too bad. :( You can delete your post if you want and I'll delete mine, I don't want to confuse people.

Can i watch Kouhaku online ???
is there any link??
thanks in advance :)

Try KeyHoleTV - but be aware NHK may be VERY CROWDED during the Kouhaku...
http://www.v2p.jp/video/english/index.html

at that time does Kouhaku start??

At 19:15 JST. If you are confused when that is, check this page.

Two hours to go.

hmm, only 25 minutes left, yaay!! ayu ayu ayu, waiting for you!

Lol, the image froze on my Mac at the "Born in the year of dragon" information. Still sound thoug. =D

It's about to start! :-))) So excited to hear Ayu live!

NOOOOOOO

I had it open but closed it to see if I could get video, and now it says "Selected Program has reached User Limit" =(((

I can only hear the sound. Ayu is to sing very soon ^_^

I got back in, yay! Damn choppy though ;p

Ayu is singing but I can't see her I have just the sound!

Same here, only sound!!

She is singing now! :love

She wears a big dress! So far she sounds not bad. (The stream is bad so I can't really tell, though)

keyhole doesn't work for me :(

Is it just me or did she just sing the wrong lyrics in refrain?

she cut the bridge I guess

Maybe she changed them?

I thought it sounded ok, vocal wise. Of course I have to wait for the HDTV rip, because it was choooooooppy, hehe.

I gave up on KeyHole years ago, the stream is so bad that it's not worth it. Ruins the viewing experience. The HD performance should be up soon anyway.

I saw ustream here http://en.justin.tv/bearschannel?#/w/2338409680
she was gorgeous!!!!!Her vocals were OK though...

^ yeah waiting for it at JPS :P

I wish you shared this link earlier:D

I think the performance is soso... but her dress is cool... well i didnt realise that they are not part of her dress at first


http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b7...h_IMG_7939.jpg

One person send me it when ayu was already singing u_______u Sorry...

yeaaah me too :thud this one works well

http://p.twimg.com/Ah_FuDBCAAAN2Cr.jpg
Ayu Kouhaku perf.... Perfect vocal ...

She looks like a queen *_*

GORGEOUS!!!!

http://i.imgur.com/zXv6V.jpg

Such royalty....

OMG she's gorgeous!!!!!!

OMG!!! i miss it!!!
i want to see it!

showed who's da queen here lol :laugh

which song has she sang?

I missed her dresses that were larger than a small apartment.

She is singing progress.

Onaji mirai shinjiteru ... and then some new lyrics which I can't get. "Nippo"/"Nippon"?

I think that is the best part.. Very cool!

Probably something about Nihon / Japan believing in the same future?

http://p.twimg.com/Ah_GYCACQAA_7SS.jpg different angle ...

yeah, Nihon/Nippon/ aka Japan would make sense:yes

The Queen! can't wait to listen to the performance!

What a dress! Omg! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNZkjksfarU

watch it...FAST..before avex remove it

i just got up and I MISS IT! :thud:thud:thud i wanna see Ayu live on Kouhaku :headache

someone please hsare the link soon!!

Ayu's progress performance on Kouhaku....

http://img249.imageshack.us/img249/3293/2z6ov.jpg

http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/1772/yq2oj.jpg

http://www.mirrorcreator.com/files/0MXEZGVF/ Download the clip here.

Thank you!
So it's really "Nippon" :-)

her voice is FANTASTIC!!! very controlled!
OMG!!! i miss ayu so much...i almost cry watched that performance...
she is trully the queen...she looks beautiful!
the transition from calm to rock is so amazing! the dress is a human!
10/10