Do you know the song "Shimauta", a song written by a band called "The Boom"? It became the Argentina soccer team's official theme song for the world cup. "La Cancion de la Isla" is a cover song by Alfredo Casero: sung in Japanese. Many of the Nikkei people in Argentine a are descendants of Okinawa immigrants, and of course the tune feels familiar to them since Shimauta is based on Okinawan music.
Okinawan music has a very unique scale: do mi fa so shi do. This plus their language also being very different from regular Japanese, we can't help noticing that they have a different heritage. That said, though, music is a universal communication tool, as has become obvious from the Argentinean experience.
If you read the lyrics of Shimauta along in context of the history of Okinawa: then you start to understand the significance of the terms. "Deigo no hana ga saki (Deigo flowers came to bloom)" is the time around when the war started, the US occupation was "Arashi ga kita (storm came)", "Deigo ga saki midare (Deigo flowers run riot)" denotes the war between Japan and US being started by the fierce Peal Harbor attack. By the time "Deigo no hana mo chiri (Deigo flowers die, falling as fluttering petals )" in June, the resistance in Okinawa was over. Deigo is Okinawa's state flower, also called Erythrina Orientalis Murray. I hope the "Towano yunagi wo (forever the calm water)" will be delivered "Umiwo watari (across the ocean)" with this song.
Okinawan music has a very unique scale: do mi fa so shi do. This plus their language also being very different from regular Japanese, we can't help noticing that they have a different heritage. That said, though, music is a universal communication tool, as has become obvious from the Argentinean experience.
If you read the lyrics of Shimauta along in context of the history of Okinawa: then you start to understand the significance of the terms. "Deigo no hana ga saki (Deigo flowers came to bloom)" is the time around when the war started, the US occupation was "Arashi ga kita (storm came)", "Deigo ga saki midare (Deigo flowers run riot)" denotes the war between Japan and US being started by the fierce Peal Harbor attack. By the time "Deigo no hana mo chiri (Deigo flowers die, falling as fluttering petals )" in June, the resistance in Okinawa was over. Deigo is Okinawa's state flower, also called Erythrina Orientalis Murray. I hope the "Towano yunagi wo (forever the calm water)" will be delivered "Umiwo watari (across the ocean)" with this song.
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