Actually it's "Toki wo Koeru Omoi", a slightly different version of "Omoi no Hate ni", made for InuYasha's first movie. They started playing that track from InuYasha OST then went to Dearest with new arrangement made by Shanghai Fillarmonic Orchestra and that traditional chinese group.

Ayu sounded great!!! It’s amazing!!!! And it’s held in shanghai. I think her popularly isn’t as prominent as years ago. But she’s still so significant! :):)

Dearest performance is really good ! Her vocals sound really nice.
But, enough of the "u" prononciation ! She uses that way to say "u" as our French "u" instead of japanese "ou".

The intro was fantastic, loved the musicians, their costumes and instruments. It was nice that Ayu wasn't shouting for a change and I liked the filters they used on her voice, but overall there's nothing natural about her way of singing starting from the baby voice and ending with a forced vibrato.

The moment I read Dearest had a rearrangement I was like "Oh no..." but thank god it wasn't like that. The new sound is very pretty and she sounded lovely. I coudn't sit through MY ALL because, Ayu, I know you had to 2 babies, but you don't need to sound like one singing.

Yeah, I never liked it.

is that actually LIVE? coz that was amazing wow!!
minus the high pitched forced cutesy voice i think that was so good

At 0:10 of this clip, the “ne” part of “nemuri,” sounds EXACTLY like her old vocals. Like as if from the studio mp3 itself. It struck me very suddenly. The rest is good, but obviously sung in a more childish tone.

Listen to that moment at 0:10 and tell me if you hear it too.

Ayu posted photo at that outfit a week ago. Probably recording was made at that day

I do hear it 🥰

Such a beautiful performance. Again I don' care about baby voice !! Her new vocal is really nice with this arrangement. This is what Dearest deserves for years. Maybe it's pre-recorded maybe It's not totally live but... Oh god this is soooo beautiful ! I love it !!!!

She's not lip syncing, but this is definitely pre-recorded, she's pretty much on key 90% of the time, so that's a giveaway.

Sounds like it a lot, probably because they retouched it (but I'm sure it's not the same as the studio track)

^ I think Zeke was just trying to make a point that for a brief second she has managed to sound like 2001's ayu.

What a performance for Dearest !!

I know

Linguistically the Japanese and French languages both use the same u pronunciation marked by /u/ in IPA. That’s why it sounds the same because it’s phonologically the same sound.

They’re both made by a backward placement in the mouth and rounded lips.

When they're speaking, it's more evident, but when they are singing it's more common to use the "uh" sound.

In the studio version she does the “Uuuuu” thing lol it was a stylistic choice she often did back then personnally I don’t mind because the “ouuuu” often sound off to me.
Well this performance is really amazing with these arrangements and it’s so strange to heard Ayu singing that high after all these years ...it’s a bit disturbing but in a good way I’m proud of her.

Yes!
Everything has been prerecorded and edited since the pandemic (minus the Christmas live... and it showed) to make her sound almost perfect as in most live releases.
She could be offkey all the way and we wouldn't know unfortunately.
Crossing fingers her voice is indeed not so far from the result.
The latest Life unedited vocals (from the Return concert) were ok with noticeable offkey parts.

Me too!!! That’s cool. Her 2001 vocals always sounded powerful!