2007 Kōhaku Uta Gassen

For over half a century, a popular New Year’s Eve tradition in Japan has been to listen to or watch the Kōhaku Uta Gassen (Red & White Song Battle). This year will be the 58th edition of Kōhaku. The show features two teams of the most popular music performers of the past year. The Red team (akagumi) is made up of all the female artists/groups and the White team (shirogumi) is made up of all the male artists/groups. Each team will perform at least 25 songs.

At the end of the show, a panel of judges (celebrities) and the audience (who gets one vote…so it’s majority rules) selects the winning team. Since 2003, audience voting has become more complicated with the addition of voting from ISDB-T (Japanese digital broadcasting standard) viewers, cellphone users (since 2005), and, in 2006, 1seg (a form of mobile terrestrial digital audio/video and data broadcasting service in Japan) users. I believe that, after experimenting with giving each type of audience a vote, the system is back to a majority head count of the audience as a whole. Anyway, whichever team gets the most votes wins. The White team has won the last two years.

Although the show’s popularity has been diminishing recently, it is still an honor to be a participant. All the artists are there by invitation by a selection committee organized by NHK. This year’s lineup was announced by NHK and features 56 acts:

• Red Team: aiko, AKB48, Angela Aki, Amin, Ayaka, BoA, Leah Dizon, Dreams Come True, Natsuko Godai, Ayumi Hamasaki, Hello! Project 10th Anniversary Kohaku Special Team (Morning Musume, Berryz Koubou, °C-ute), Ayaka Hirahara, Yo Hitoto, Sayuri Ishikawa, Miyuki Kawanaka, Sachiko Kobayashi, Kumi Koda, Kaori Kozai, mihimaru GT, Kaori Mizumori, Yoko Nagayama, Shoko Nakagawa, Ataru Nakamura, Mitsuko Nakamura, Mika Nakashima, Ai Otsuka, Fuyumi Sakamoto, Yoshimi Tendo, Akiko Wada
• White Team: Masafumi Akikawa, Toshihide Baba, EXILE, Akira Fuse, Gackt, Kiyoshi Hikawa, Ken Hirai, Hiroshi Itsuki, Saburo Kitajima, Takeshi Kitayama, Kobukuro, Kome Kome Club, Kiyoshi Maekawa, Noriyuki Makihara, Kenichi Mikawa, Shinichi Mori, Porno Graffiti, Masashi Sada, SMAP, Masato Sugimoto, Sukima Switch, Akira Terao, Ichiro Toba, TOKIO, Hideaki Tokunaga, w-inds., WaT

The photo above shows the artists/groups making their first Kōhaku appearance…left to right: °C-ute (in red plaid), Berryz Koubou (in green plaid), Masato Sugimoto, Toshihide Baba, Ataru Nakamura, Shoko Nakagawa, Leah Dizon, and AKB48 (in blue jackets and gray plaid skirts).

Three of these “rookies” are quite popular among the Akihabara crowd…AKB48, Shoko Nakagawa, and Leah Dizon. NHK is planning to have them be the “top batter” (opening act) for the Red team. The will sing their songs individually, then perform together for an “anime theme song medley”.

AKB48 is short for Akihabara48. They are an idol group who has their own theater in Akihabara. They have 48 members who usually perform in 16 person teams (Team A, Team K, and Team B…of course). For their Kōhaku appearance, they will perform as a combined unit of 48.

Shoko “Shokotan” Nakagawa is a multi-tarento (multi-talented) idol. Besides singing, she is an actress, seiyÅ«, and illustrator. She also has a love of cosplaying…she was the World Cosplay Friendship Ambassador at the 2007 World Cosplay Summit.

Leah Dizon is a model and singer from the US (born in Las Vegas). She moved to Japan in 2006. In addition to her modeling and singing, she has become a TV personality co-hosting Webtama and hosting Sakigake Ongaku Banzuke Vegas.

This year will have a rarity. The host for the White team will be rakugo artist Tsurube Shofukutei. The host for the Red team will be SMAP leader Masahiro Nakai, who was last year’s White team host. This will be only the third time in Kōhaku’s history both teams have been hosted by men. The first two times, Teru Miyata and Keizo Takahashi were the hosts…this was in 1955 and 1956.

Kōhaku’s overall hosts will be announcers Miki Sumiyoshi and Kazuya Matsumoto.

Pictures from the Kōhaku website: © NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation) All rights reserved.

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