[Music | Utada Hikaru]

Introduction:

Utada Hikaru, nicknamed Hikki, is the daughter of singer/producer Utada Teruzane and Fuji Keiko. Her father was in a rock band for some time and then went on to produce music for other artists. Her mother was a traditional “enka” (ballad) singer who had a lot of hits in the 1970s (her style of music is much like that of Teresa Teng). Hikki was born on January 19th in 1983 in New York city. She would spend her childhood going back and forth between Tokyo and New York, and she would spend a lot of time in the recording studio with her parents.

At the age of 3, Hikki started taking piano lessons, and she started her career as a solo singer at the age of 13 after an attempt to perform with her parents failed. Her first albums scored very low in Japan, however she was noticed and approached by Miyake Akira, a producer for Toshiba EMI who was working at a recording studio nearby. Impressed with Hikaru’s rich voice, Miyake asked her to work for Toshiba EMI and try her hand at Japanese music. In 1998, she was introduced to the public during a talent-show called “Music Talk”. She performed the song Sukiyaki and her debut single Automatic. The crowd loved Hikki and her first singles were featured on music request shows across Asia. Her debut album with Toshiba EMI, First Love sold a record amount of 3.5 Million copies after one month. It currently holds the record as the best sold Japanese CD with more than 9 Million sales.

Hikki quickly became a pop-culture phenomena and scored hit after hit. Her constantly changing image and soulful live performances worked miracles for the young artist, and her popularity went above anything she ever imagined. Up untill now, Hikki has always written all of her songs, but when asked to describe her own music style, she would shrug and say “I just try to make good music.” Hikki’s second album DISTANCE and her third album Deep River both sold more than a million copies and are now triple platinum.

Hikki’s busy schedule of performing, recording, and writing left her little time to spend in front of the media. She would attend the prestigious Columbia University in the US and was rarely seen in public. Right now Hikki is taking time off from Columbia to focus on her career in the United States.

Coming October 5th, “Utada” will be releasing her new US album, completely in english. It was already released in Japan on Septemeber 9th 2004 where it already sold half a million copies. The album is produced by Timbaland and published by Island Records. Utada promises a completely new style for her american audience.

Apart from being a full–time singer and producer, Hikaru created her own comic character Chuichi, if you can read Japanese, check out the website created by Hikaru for Chuichi.

Official Utada Hikaru Sites:

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