The Nostalgia Series - Old drama theme songs: "Kira Kira" by Oda Kazumasa

Coincidentally, this post is about the theme song from another Winter 2002 drama. Back then, I was a fan of Fukatsu Eri after watching her in "Odoru Daisousasen" (and still is, although she's hardly seen on TV these days) and had grown to like Tsutsumi Shinichi after watching "Yamato Nadeshiko". As such, when news of them being paired together in the drama "Koi no Chikara" was announced, I was looking forward to seeing sparks between them and hoping that the love story won't be a messy affair with wishy-washy people not knowing who they love or being so caught up in their love affairs that nothing else matters including work, life and family. Nonetheless, I also had my misgivings as Yada Akiko was in the relationship equation again and it was obvious then that she would get dumped onscreen by Tsutsumi again which was exactly what happened in "Yamato Nadeshiko". Sakaguchi Kenji was not really known for his acting skills then so it made me wonder if the supporting leads could make things more interesting in the drama. As it turned out, Fukatsu plus Tsutsumi alone was enough to keep me tuning in till the end. Not to say that Yada and Sakaguchi were bad but their characters didn't have much going to make them memorable, at least to me. The drama excelled in the fact that it wasn't all about love and that the parallel theme of how the strength which people get from one another in their pursuit of dreams plus Fukatsu's portrayal of her struggle in life and at the workplace once she hit 30 was easy to relate to even though I was still far from that age at that time. I think I would have felt the impact from her down-to-earth acting more if I rewatch this drama now.

Oda Kazumasa's theme song for this drama "Kira Kira" which literally translates into "Sparkling", has a rather uplifting melody and very encouraging words about someone who promises to bring his lover along in his journey to pursue a dream ahead and how thankful he is for the lover's presence all this while. That seems to coincide with the situation in the drama where Tsutsumi's character manages to achieve success in his career, thanks to the support of Fukatsu's character. What also makes this song special is the fact that it was Oda's first drama theme song in 11 years since 1991's "Tokyo Love Story". It was rare that big names like Oda would sing drama theme songs by the time we got to the 2000s so having a song of his to be the theme mattered a lot in terms of catching people's attention. At the same time, the success of this single also helped in Oda's music career because his albums released before "Kira Kira" all achieved rankings within the Top 10 but his singles except one in 1995 did not manage to do the same. After "Kira Kira", Oda achieved a consecutive run of 8 singles which made it into the Top 10 charts and also boosted his album sales to a great extent. Goes to show how a good theme song can be mutually beneficial for the singer and the TV station producing the drama.

If you are keen to hear this song, please view the PV here.