Fuji Ayako Saishin Hit Zenkyokushu'06

This album is worth purchasing for the first song alone, especially since the single seems to be no longer available. Minato Komoriuta is based on the Madame Butterfly story. Fuji Ayako is accompanied in this nine minute song by Futaba Yuriko, a legendary singer who is considered a mentor to several well-known Enka performers. Her rokyoku (narrative singing) performance is very moving. Rokyoku is a dying art in Japan. It's nice to hear it in Minato Komoriuta. I have several Fuji Ayako albums and this one is my favorite.

Time and time again, Fuji Ayako continues to bring out the best of enka magnificence. This is another good collection of her hits. One of my favorites here is "Hanayo Inochiyo", which albeit unsuprisingly similar to other of her hits like "Onna no Magokoro", it just never ceases to fail pulling my ears towards my earphones! What's more, if you've missed her CD single "Minato Komoriuta", which features a lengthy version of the original. Then this is your chance to listen to it. In the first track, you can get to really appreciate the versatility of Ayako's voice. The vocal fluctuating quality of enka is pure excellence here. No wonder Aya-chan is one of the most popular (if not 'the' most popular) enka artists out there. However, there are still several of her old favorites like "Kokorozake" which seem to appear repeatedly in most of her albums. I now have 3 copies *each* of "Kokorozake", "Murasaki Ujou" and "Yuki Shinshin". For that reason (owning several CDs), some of the songs here are not new, hence the 4/5 rating.