Translation: The Wind is Rising (Seiko Matsuda)

In the years after Happy End, Takashi Matsumoto became tremendously active as a lyric writer for younger "idol" singers, and hit an especially hot streak in the 1980s. I read somewhere that Seiko Matsuda had twenty-one consecutive number one hits, and that Matsumoto wrote the words to seventeen of them. Hosono, Ohtaki, and Suzuki all wrote music for Matsumoto-penned Matsuda songs (as did lots of (other) industry figures I know nothing about). There are several Matsuda albums that have no lyricist but Matsumoto. It sounds like a gold mine.

Granted, by the 1980s he seems to have simplified things. Hosono noted that, while it was difficult to set music to the might-as-well-be-poems Matsumoto was writing in the Happy End days, by the time they were regularly writing together for Seiko Matsuda, the words (which, in Hosono/Matsumoto co-writes, always came first) wrapped chords and melodies around themselves as easily as someone slipping into their favorite autumn coat. Matsumoto had learned what it meant to write a chart-topping pop song. That's not to say he wasn't writing other, more literary or pointed things too — that's for me to investigate. He's written words to more than two thousand songs, after all... 

So this is The Wind is Rising, and to contemporary ears, or at least to mine, everything about the song shouts "old chestnut." Or, well no... everything about the arrangement... but to some extent the tune as well. The words less so, but they too have a grandiosity of perspective and the kind of unabashed sentimentality that remind me of some old Polish and Ukrainian folk songs. In any case, they're a long way away from the miniatures of mood and setting that I know from Happy End. 

But there are still beautiful moments. For instance, in Japanese, "I want to return and I cannot return" is just two words, 帰りたい 帰れない, each four syllables long (as sung), with the first two syllables identical, the third sharing a consonant but diverging on the vowel ("ri" vs, "re"), and the fourth syllable rhyming ("tai," "nai"). The English allows for similar parallelism but isn't as compact. The compactness of the Japanese is perfect for how intense and basic the emotions are. 

The third verse ("I have to keep...") is wonderful too — so disarmingly direct — although I think other translations have preserved that sense better than mine. You can find several (!) other English translations if you dig around. Those tend toward the literal. To justify this new one, I decided I'd try to get the English as conversational and transparent as I could. Matsumoto's original is terser, and — particularly in the first verse, and in the image that always closes the chorus, 心の旅人 — more open to interpretation. You can think of my version as one such permissible interpretation. 

Another one comes up in the YouTube comment section, where several posters whose parents died when they were young discuss how forcefully this song speaks to them.

The tune is Eiichi Ohtaki's (you'll recognize his syrupy style if you followed up with How Nice the Weather Is), so this is one of those "Happy End in the '80s?" songs I mentioned yesterday. The falling melody on the words "autumn is here / 今は秋" is gorgeous. The arrangement is serious overkill, but today I listened to many stripped-down covers and none had the same power. So say what you will, the song does what it does the way it should. And the more I replay it the more I like it as is. 

Lovers of Ohtaki's "city pop king crooner" period (A Long Vacation, etc.) may refer also to this Matsuda/Ohtaki duet version.

:::

The wind is rising. Autumn is here.

Beginning today, I'll be a wanderer

along the pathways of the heart.

I didn't let you see me crying.

With the wind as my ink, I wrote a letter

on the violets, the sunflowers, and the freesias

swaying on the highland terrace —

"Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye."

Now if I turn around

I'll see the grassland changing colors.

I know, I can go on living by myself.

There's still a red bandana wound around my neck.

You'd given it to me, saying, "Hey, don't cry!"

So goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

The wind is rising. Autumn is here.

I want to return and I cannot return to your arms.

The wind is rising. Autumn is here.

Beginning today, I'll be a wanderer

along the pathways of the heart.

I have to keep my outlook bright

like the violets, the sunflowers, and the freesias.

I can't be weighted down with sorrow.

For isn't parting just a new point of departure?

Now it's goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

I plant kisses on the blades of grass.

I want to forget and I cannot forget your smile,

and when I cannot forget, I have to cast my eyes down.

The road from summer to fall is such a strange one.

The wind is rising. Autumn is here.

I want to return and I cannot return to your arms.

The wind is rising. Autumn is here.

Beginning today, I'll be a wanderer

along the pathways of the heart.