We Love Japanese Songs! 2014

What do a Hungarian guy who sings Showa-era Japanese pop songs to the sound of an accordion and Spanish girls who blend ‛enka’ ballads with flamenco have in common? They love Japanese songs. NHK invited viewers and listeners around the world to share their performances of Japanese tracks. People in 47 countries and territories sent 338 videos. Then two hosts plus the pop singer Beni and the group Kalafina got together in a sumo-theme pop-art virtual studio to check out 33 of those performances together with mini-reports on the way Japanese songs touch people around the world. Forty foreign residents of Japan joined them to offer their personal views on Japanese music and culture. The producers created a multilingual website to enable people to contribute their videos. They posted the videos there before the show went on and website visitors voted for their favourites and made comments.