Performance of an ayu song...

hanabiwings · #1 10th October 2003, 05:18 AM

My question to all of you out there:

Have you ever performed an ayu song in public?

I have two different performance types:

Karaoke

Real public performance

a.) Karaoke

When I was in Japan in 2001, I went to karaoke many times

No, just kidding. I didn't drink. But I did go to karaoke a lot. Even without alcohol, it was a riot. With my friends, I did ayu medleys and sang entire albums in a row. It took an insane amount of time, but it was done. Also, once, I went with some friends to the Tokyo Gas Building to eat dinner. There, they have a karaoke lounge and I sang in front of a crowd. Man I was nervous~

But I sang "Endless sorrow" in front of a bunch of business dudes. It was a little intimidating... Er, a lot intimidating. It was, however, very fun to sing with my friends duets and so on. My cousin's wife and I sang SEASONS on many occassions as a duet.

b.) Real public performances

This happened twice.

In my junior year of high school, we had two exchange students in the choral program--one from Korea and one from Japan. My teacher found a copy of Ahrirang and we were to sing this for the final concert to honor our classmate. She didn't, however, find any songs to sing in Japanese. Besides, it would be difficult enough to learn the Korean song in addition to the other foreign songs we were singing. So, she asked me to find a song.

Meanwhile, my friend got wind of this and was shocked the teacher didn't ask her to sing, too. So she said, "Why don't the two of you do a duet?"

We came back to my house that evening and listened to maybe two dozen songs. Then, she said to me, "I want to sing that song by Hamasaki Ayumi. You know, the one where she's like, 'Doushite naiteiru no?' I don't remember the name."

So we decided to sing A Song for XX during the final concert. My teacher, being the musical genius she is, created a great arrangement to accomodate our voices and worked on making it sound more like the acoustic orchestra version. I did a translation of the song, but unfortunately, she believed the song to be too depressing/dark for the audience and refrained from printing it in the program. I thought this was a big loss and was taken aback. It shocked me very much to know that she believe Hamasaki's music to be too "sad." Isn't music about being honest??

So, we practiced and sang with the choir backing us up. So we had 100 people in the background singing "Oo" during some parts. We even wrote in a little English transliteration for them to sing toward the end. When the time of the concert came, I was nervous because I felt I owed it to Hamasaki to present her music in perfect form. So I practiced any number of times to get the feeling behind the song correct and thought about my own experiences and what she was saying. When the concert came, we did a great job, I think. I watched the performance with the rest of my classmates the next day. It was GREAT. The audience applauded so loudly. Everyone was shocked to hear something so different from what they believed Asian music to be. That was one of my proudest moments as a student and a musician. We stood there in the midst of applause, the last chords ringing in our ears and the words... Those were beside us.

The more you said things like that...

(We used the words from ayu's live concerts, "Sonna fuu ni anata ga ieba iu hodo ni..)

The second performance I did was last year. We have an annual talent night. So, I took my instrumental track with me and sang another ayu song. This time, it was Voyage. I wasn't sure how it would go over, because it's so different from pop music from the States. After all, who has an orchestra with them on stage these days? Very few people. And what's more, the sound is very, very orchestral. Songs like "Love~Destiny~" had violins and so on, but didn't sound so "legitimate" as Voyage did. (I say legitimate to mean choral.)

Due to a time restriction, I had to crop the beginning music box intro. Anyway, the piano played as I stood on stage. I was nervous, still unsure whether it would go over well. But after the first phrase, I really let the music and the message become my focus. With such a mindset, I found myself gesturing on stage. I don't do this when I sing solos most of the time, but something about the emotion needed to be communicated in my mind. I really enjoyed singing it. The song just bumped 5 minutes, I believe. Everyone seemed to enjoy it and I had people coming up to me for weeks afterward saying, "Were you the one who sang that song in Japanese? It was a great song!"

Have you ever performed an ayu song? If so, let me know. If not, what song would you choose if you could and why? Also, have you ever seen someone else cover a song by her or heard a cover of her song somewhere? I'm always interested about this!!!!

De wa mata minna. ^^

(And to the mods, if this needs to go under general chat, feel free to move it. I apologize for not knowing how to distinguish!

)

#2 10th October 2003, 05:27 AM

That's awesome! I performed "evolution" in front of my school.

It was for a competition called "Mr. Riverview". It was awesome though! I was like, "Wow, people are going to think I'm crazy", but I got a LOT of people liking her music that way. LoL! A lot of people who saw it from other schools remembered me as the kid who sang the japanese song, too. LoL!

hanabiwings · #3 10th October 2003, 05:30 AM

Really Samurai? I don't know if I could sing evolution. It moves too fast through most of it. LOL I guess if I memorized it... But still. I can sing Fly High, but not that one. ^^

Shiso · #4 10th October 2003, 07:48 AM

Well.... I performed "Free & Easy", "UNITE!" and "End roll" on manga/anime convents... well I wasn't scared but.... I'M NOT SINGING WELL but I LIKE TO DO IT

but it was OK.

Etto... in my school I once sang M and Trauma but it was a'capella and I tried to learn all the people the Trauma dance, but they didn't want to learn (boring people!)

Well... on some of our pack of friends meetings we have karaoke ocasually and I sang "ourselves" once and I'm going to perform "forgiveness" soon. Can't wait for the karaoke version of "no way to say" now...

Ah! Please notice that these performances weren't done for an ENORMOUS public. The convent ones were for 50 people, school ones for 60-100 people I think... it's not a crowd but it was fun

gakkun · #5 10th October 2003, 10:33 AM

I've never sang an Ayu song in front of people, just in my own room.

And my school would never let someone go up and sing a Japanese song. >,<

**Calico** · #6 10th October 2003, 08:18 PM

I've always wanted to. Especially a song like Evolution, Ourselves, Free & Easy, Endless Sorrow, or M. Lol, our Drama Club is putting on a talent show later on in the year, and I'll definitely be busting out some Ayu. ^^

destiny_ayu · #7 11th October 2003, 03:09 AM

Some songs that are slow

xxjihyexx · #8 11th October 2003, 08:34 AM

talking about kareoke; it wasnt like in front of thousands of people but i did go to kareoke with my friends very often and sing japanese songs..But my friends have no clue to what I am singing since none of them know japanese but me lol

I also went to kareoke in Japan when i went there this summer...I couldn't read most of the kanji(cuz i'm korean) that was coming out on the screen but i knew some of the hiragana and katagana so that helped me a LOT...and i did memorize most of ayu's songs...

But I don't think I would be able to sing in public....My face would probably turn into a tomato..

averageone · #9 11th October 2003, 08:42 AM

I don't exactly have the voice... but we performed "Real Me" and I was a back-up singer/dancer. My friend was the singer.. lol. That gurl can SING! It was fun though.. that was Variety show..

...but, non-Ayu related, I'm doing a show in the next month or so.. and dancing to BoA songs while back-up singing. And another one of my friends is singing. It's AWESOME. I know coreography for... "Sara" "No.1" "Amazing Kiss" "kimochi wa tsutawaru" "Kiseki" "Shine We Are!" "Listen to my Heart" "ID: Peace B" "VALENTI" and "DOUBLE" .......lol. It's funny..because we know enough to throw an entire BoA concert~~ lol! Well.. a 10 song one.. but that's long. >.< lol!! My faves have got to be.. "Sara" "VALENTI" and "DOUBLE"

....anyways! Yes.. I think we're going to do a repeat of "Real Me" soon for a cutural thing at my old high school. I think. Oh! And I consistantly perform Ayu songs in the shower. ^_- Yay! ..get your tickets now..

hanabiwings · #10 11th October 2003, 07:22 PM

LMAO av1. I do the same thing. Though, I'm singing all the time when I'm studying and stuff like that, too. >_< I think my parents get annoyed. Obaachan thinks it's funny.

jihye, I had the same problem in karaoke... With songs I didn't know very well, I sometimes was like, "lala soshite anata ni sasagemashou" or whatever. Depending on the song. ^^

You should have seen me singing enka. I went with my aunt and uncle and sang some serious enka with kanji I had no idea the reading for. So, it sounded like, "Kawa wa ummm no nagare no you ni..."

It was okay, though. Everyone started whispering the kanji to me. But as soon as I don't know one kanji, they assume I don't know any of them.

I kept insisting, "I know everyday kanji, but not the kanji for lovers' suicide!" but no one believed me.

I wonder why. Baka hakujin kamo ne.

Findlay · #11 11th October 2003, 07:59 PM

I only remember singing "monochrome" & "immature" in my school's singing contest and I won that one, hehehe...

Other than that I also did sing Hikki's "Movin' on without you" and "For You", hoho. ^_^

narusegawa · #12 11th October 2003, 09:27 PM

ive always wanted to sing ayu songs infront of a BIG audience but sadly none of my friends/my school wanna hear it...
instead we get losers singing eminem songs and 50 cent...grrrrr. if only ayu was no.1 here.....

Shiso · #13 11th October 2003, 09:33 PM

John-san... are the tickets still available? I'm willing to see the "performance"

AyuCrazy2003 · #14 12th October 2003, 07:33 PM

I've performed a few Ayu songs along with a few friends, we're part of this little JPop tribute group we put together we named ourselves 'VELOCITY' the plan was to just perform Ayu...then we started BoA and then we decided to perform lots of other artistis (hopefully getting more people to listen to JPop)
We've performed quite a few Ayu songs now.. our first was UNITE! We were nervous in this first performance, our vocals were okay but the dancing sort of looked very..I dunno..we were too tence I guess.
The second was Dearest, this was basically me singing the Verses then being backed up on the Choruses by my two friends. People seemed to like it alot which I was very very pleased about..
Then came Evolution, I set myself the task of actually learning it which was pretty hard but we managed to pull it off in the end and our dancing was getting less tense and had more flow.
We've also performed, Real me, Independent, July 1st, YOU, and End of the world...and in about a weeks time w'ere performing Ourselves which I've just finished learning and now know by heart so yeah, I'm looking forward to that.
Ah...performing Ayu songs in public is so great.. *Skips off singing Ourselves to himself* XD

ruixiong89 · #15 13th October 2003, 02:44 PM

I've performed "Independent" in front of my school... rather embarrassing but I got them to do the 11 clap thing

Hehe ... Nice song and they applauded so loudly but I had to cut the song down to 3:50 mins ... Grrr ... Could have clapped more and then I was bouncing around on stage and gesturing here and there haha!

But I think I pulled it off VERY BADLY ... hehe ...

narusegawa · #16 13th October 2003, 07:34 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by averageone
I don't exactly have the voice... but we performed "Real Me" and I was a back-up singer/dancer. My friend was the singer.. lol. That gurl can SING! It was fun though.. that was Variety show..

...but, non-Ayu related, I'm doing a show in the next month or so.. and dancing to BoA songs while back-up singing. And another one of my friends is singing. It's AWESOME. I know coreography for... "Sara" "No.1" "Amazing Kiss" "kimochi wa tsutawaru" "Kiseki" "Shine We Are!" "Listen to my Heart" "ID: Peace B" "VALENTI" and "DOUBLE" .......lol. It's funny..because we know enough to throw an entire BoA concert~~ lol! Well.. a 10 song one.. but that's long. >.< lol!! My faves have got to be.. "Sara" "VALENTI" and "DOUBLE"

....anyways! Yes.. I think we're going to do a repeat of "Real Me" soon for a cutural thing at my old high school. I think. Oh! And I consistantly perform Ayu songs in the shower. ^_- Yay! ..get your tickets now..

how much r da tiks?

Hamasaki-Kurumi · #17 13th October 2003, 09:23 PM

sugoi na ~

xiaohui · #18 14th October 2003, 02:46 PM

never but i wanted to bt dun have the chance leh.......hope to perform a Song For XX

averageone · #19 14th October 2003, 04:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by narusegawa
how much r da tiks?

baka~

Ugh!!! I'm learning "Milky Way" now.. -_- I hate that song.. and I just finished learning "Atlantis Princess" ARGH! This needs to stop.. lol~~ >.< I'm drawing the line if I have to learn "Don't Stop Now" <~~ BoA news.. sorry. XD

But yes.. the "Real Me" performance is being called for again.. -_-;; ugh. The Asian American Community in the surrounding 5 suburbs.. are throwing a little h00t-n-annie~ and now.. we're doing "Real Me" and "Valenti".... -_-;; And they want me to sing Karkoke.. ACK! I think I can't can't sing for BEANS... -_- but they think differently.. ugh. So yeah.. I dunno what to sing.. O.o;; Maybe... M? Dearest? Evolution? I have NO clue.... O.o;; Maybe I'll sing "Appears" its one of the top favorite songs. ^_-

hamayu · #20 30th March 2005, 02:16 AM

Hmmmmm well the talent show is coming up so i htink i might sing an ayu song. its either gonna b Trauma, M, Who..., or Seasons. Maybe Moments or No more Words. ITs the ONLY songs i can actually partially memorize.... i feel sad

but neways i think i might be the only one to do a japanese song and dat just creeps me out cuz this other person who was gona do a hikki song decided not to cuz my other friend was gonna move soon so shes gonna do this comedy act with them... not exactly wat i wud perferrr.... comedy over songs but oh well...