Popular Music in Japan

Reviews / Votes

In this magisterial march through the history of Japanese popular music, Toru Mitsui shares with us the fine, fun, and surprising details of the happy marriage between Japanese makers of music and the music they loved, mastered, and elaborated. He tells the story of one of the 20th century's great and joyous achievements of profligate cultural synthesis. This is a Japanese story, an American story, and a global story. * Alan Tansmen, Professor of Japanese, University of California Berkeley, USA * Here is the first in-depth account of Japan's popular songs and music spanning the whole century and a half of its modern and postmodern eras. Woven together with mini lectures providing historical contexts, Toru Mitsui's thoroughly researched chapters reveal untold and often hilarious facts about how West met East in a nation's singing. * Yoshiaki Sato, Professor Emeritus of American Studies and Pop Culture, University of Tokyo, Japan, and author of The Evolution of J-POP (1999) * An exhilarating map of the development of an entire nation's songs, singers and fans, providing ample signposts of further ideas for your listening pleasure. * All the Anime *