The second OP of Aquarion aired in its 16th episode. It is entitled “Paradoxical ZOO”, with lyrics by Gabriela Robin and Yuho Iwasato, sang by AKINO with bless4, composed and arranged by Yoko Kanno. This song will be included in the upcoming release of the Aquarion OST on May 23, 2012.

Episode 15 of Aquarion EVOL has a new ending song. The title is “Yunoha no Mori (trans: Yunoha’s Forest)”, lyrics by Gabriela and Akino Arai, sang by Yui Ogura.

Thanks to MidnightReverie, Yyrkoon for the news!

The very first vocal piece we hear in Aquarion EVOL is confirmed to be Kanno’s piece!

News, image contributed by Yyrkoon

The new Aquarion PV that was premiered today contained many pieces of news regarding Kanno’s involvement in production. The music composition to the anime series is credited to Yoko Kanno, and Akiko Otsuka. The OP, which also plays as background to the PV, is entitled Kimi no Shinwa [trans: Your Legend]. The song is sang by AKINO with Bless 4, with lyrics by Gabriela Robin.

Funny tidbit – the character that Megumi Nakajima voices in this anime is named “Sazanka”. Rhymes with…?

UPDATE: CD jacket and contents image added. I wonder if Kanno gets her own write-up in that “Artists” section of the booklet.

The Gundam franchise will have yet another song compilation, this time including insert songs that are not OP’s or ED’s. The tally of the songs are 145 in total, and will be contained in 10 SHM-CD’s. Can you see the price on this thing?

Details:

Release title: Gundam 30th Anniversary Gundam Songs 145 (tentative)
Catalog No. VTZL-30
Price: 28571yen (30000yen Tax incl.) US$ 317.24
Release Date: 2010/02/24
Description: Thirtieth anniversary CD box set release from anime series “Gundam.” Includes 10 discs featuring the high-fidelity SHM-CD format (compatible with standard CD players). Also includes 260-page booklet.
The compilation will include all theme songs starting from the original Gundam series, to the newest ones, 145 theme songs and insert songs in all. The box illustration will be done by Yasuhiko Yoshikazu.
Purchase through CDJapan.

Track List:
View the full track list here.
Kanno-related, from Turn-A Gundam:

Aura (ED1 / Shinji Tanimura)
Tsuki no Mayu (ED2 / Aki Okui)
Nagirinaki Tabiji (Final ED / Aki Okui)
Moon (Featured Song / Gabriela Robin)
Yoigoshi no Matsuri (Featured Song / Everyone in the White Doll Festival)
Gekka Bijin (Featured Song / Hideki Saijou)
Until (Featured Song / Maryanne Murray)
The song of stone (Featured Song / Souichirou Otsuka)
Tsuki no Tama (Featured Song / Let Group)
After All (Theme Song/Donna Burke)

(more…)

UPDATE UPDATE: There’s already transcripts of what might be part of the talk, read here and here. You may also see more pics here.

Please treat the fan reports as rumors until we get official reports and sources. I’m basing the next lines on what I can read off these fan reports: digi☆panda, 2ch, 手をつないで一歩前進.

As previously reported, Kanno, along with Shinichiro Watanabe and Kenji Kamiyama attended the Japane Media Arts Festival in Hamamatsu today (November 3, 2009). Here are some reports that I understand:

Fan accounts:

- The event lasted for 2 and a half hours
- Kanno was the one who planned the event
- As expected, they discussed the music in working with the two directors. For Watanabe it seems that she really didn’t do music as directed to her. For Kamiyama, she was made to do angsty music.
- She doesn’t know anything about the Bebop live action movie
- She understands only a little French
- Robin comes up when she can’t find a suitable singer
- She will make the music to a live action film next year
- She played several pieces of music on the piano, including “i do”
- There was a question and answer portion, in which someone asked about Robin, and at the mention of the word, she visually frowned like “oh no”. The question was, “There are a lot of singers, when does Gabriela Robin appear?” to which she answered, “Aah, of course, she’s not here, but I’ll ask her…” to which everyone laughed.

The only real “news” here seem to be the one for Bebop, which is a negative, and the other live action film next year. So if these turn out to be true, then I’ll not be surprised

Anime Anime.jp:

Summary:

- The symposium had Dai Sato as the host.
- The hall was in full capacity.
- Watanabe and Kamiyama talked about Kanno at first. Watanabe met Kanno before Bebop, which is in Macross Plus, and at that time, he could not think of how this “self-professed composer” (as opposed to a “learned composer” I think) could make music. He found out that he should reserve judgement before he heard the music. Conversely, Kamiyama met Kanno when she was already popular, so he was nervous when he was asked to meet her. (more…)