J-pop

J POP

The full abbreviation of J-pop is Japanese pop. It refers to Japanese popular musicians, and coined by the Japanese media.
J-pop can be traced to jazz music. Jazz music introduced many types of musical instruments. It also added an element of "fun" to the Japanese music scene. As a result "Ongaku Kissa" became a very popular venue for live jazz music.

During World War II, the performance of jazz music was temporarily halted. Boogie-woogie, Mambo, Blues, and Country music were performed by Japanese musicians for the American troops. And Shizuko Kasagi's "Tokyo Boogie-Woogie" (1948), Chiemi Eri's "Tennessee Waltz" (1951), Hibari Misora's "Omatsuri Mambo", and Izumi Yukimura's "Omoide no Waltz" these songs became popular. 1952 was declared the "Year of the Jazz Boom" but the genre itself demanded a high level of technical proficiency and was difficult to play. Many amateur Japanese musicians turned to country music, which was far easier to learn and perform. This in turn led to a proliferation of country-based music.

In 1956, the rock-and-roll craze began thanks to a country music group known as Kosaka Kazuya and the Wagon Masters and their rendition of Elvis Presley's Heartbreak Hotel. The rock-and-roll movement would reach its peak in 1959 with the release of a movie featuring performances by a number of Japanese rock-and-roll bands. Some performers attempted to merge traditional Japanese pop music with rock-and-roll. One of few musicians to be successful in this effort was Kyu Sakamoto with the song "Ue wo Muite Arukō" known in other parts of the world as "Sukiyaki". The song was the first Japanese song to reach in the United States in its native language in America and also to receive a "Gold Record" for selling one million copies. Other performers learned to play the music and translate the lyrics of popular American songs, resulting in the birth of "cover pop." However, the popularity of these acts faded as radio and television gave every household the opportunity to watch the original musicians perform. The concept of karaoke and its subsequent popularity can arguably be attributed to the cover pop phenomenon.

From the early 1970s to the mid-1980s, the emphasis shifted from simple songs with a single guitar accompaniment to more complex musical arrangements known as New Music. Instead of social messages, the songs focused on more personal messages, such as love. Takuro Yoshida and Yosui Inoue are two notable New Music artists.
In the 1980s, the term City Pop was used to describe a type of popular music that had a big city theme. Tokyo in particular inspired many songs of this form. It is difficult to draw a distinction between City Pop and New Music and many songs fall under both categories. Wasei Pop quickly became a common word to describe both City Pop and New Music. By the 1990s, J-pop became the common term to describe most popular songs. Rockers like Eikichi Yazawa, a singer who remained popular for decades with a rabidly loyal fan following, loosely fell into this category, along with more mainstream female pop idols such as the "Dance Queens" Yoko Oginome and her successor, singer/songwriter Chisato Moritaka. Hikaru Genji, the highly influential rollerskating boy band, also became popular during this time, with some of its members growing up to fame on their own. In 1980, Eikichi Yazawa, seeking worldwide success, signed a contract with the Warner Pioneer record company and moved to the West Coast of the United States. He recorded the albums "Yazawa," "It's Just Rock n' Roll," and "Flash in Japan," all of which were released worldwide, but were not very commercially successful. Mega-idol Seiko Matsuda, extremely popular through the 1980s, saw a bit more success with English-only songs released on her 1991 album "Eternal", and was hounded by U.S. tabloids for having a relationship with then red-hot Donnie Wahlberg of New Kids on the Block, who sang the duet "The Right Combination" with Seiko Matsuda. Seiko used to hold the record for most consecutive number 1 singles for a female artist in Japan(currently 25). That record was recently shattered by the singer Ayumi Hamasaki. Along with Seiko Matsuda, the latter 1980s were dominated by idol singers such as Miho Nakayama, Akina Nakamori, Chisato Moritaka, Minako Honda and Shizuka Kudo.

The late 1980s, saw the emergence of Chage and Aska, a male singer/songwriter duo consisting of Chage and Ryo Aska. They released a string of consecutive hits throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Their "Asian Tour II / Mission Impossible" tour was the single largest concert tour ever put on by a Japanese group – the tickets for all 61 concerts in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan sold out on the first day. However, with the advent of the Japanese dance-pop music pioneered by Namie Amuro and Tetsuya Komuro in the mid- to late-1990s, the popularity of rock groups like Chage & Aska has declined. This period also saw the rise of the female duo Wink. Wink debuted in 1988, surpassing the popularity of the then most popular female duo, BaBe. Also the Famous J-POP IDOL CoCo made there debut hit with the 1989 single for the hit anime series.

In the early 1990s, the music scene can be split up into different parts. 1990-1993 was dominated by the Being artists, B'z, and the Southern All Stars. 1994-1997 was dominated by the TK family. 1996 is known as a year where the Okinawan Actors School became dominant, with Namie Amuro, MAX and Speed leading the charge. Every Little Thing lso rose to success in the late 90's after their debut album sold over 2,000,000 copies. 1997 saw the introduction of Morning Musume.