Multingual Seiyu/Voice Actor appreciation thread

[sa547]

Originally Posted by Yu Ominae

The only few ones mentioned out there are for example Sayaka Ohara and Mari Iijima.

Iijima? She's not going to hear from anyone talking to her about Macross anymore (recently I got blocked on both Twitter and Facebook simply because I mentioned that show, went to MacrossWorld, asked why and got an answer -- she's tired of Macross), apparently insisting strictly that her fans should talk only about her music.

Meanwhile...

In an interview at last year's anime-related event at Singapore, Chiwa Saitou revealed that she knows some English, as a result of her sometimes traveling overseas, especially to New Zealand.

[GDB]

Originally Posted by Yu Ominae

Ryo Horikawa here. He learned English from an American girl when his family hosted her for a homestay. In return, Ryo taught the girl Japanese.

His English is good actually.

Indeed, he even used it in an episode of Detective Conan and most fans thought they switched him with an english sound-alike. Just youtube for "Heiji english" and it's the first result. Not sure what Conan's current license status technically is, so not going to post the link directly.

[Yu Ominae]

Thanks! Was able to view that on YT. Pretty cool too.

I guess I ought to maybe give some shoutout to Yuko Miyamura. She's friends with Tiffany Grant since they both played Asuka and Tiffany and her husband Matt visited her and her daughter in Hello Kitty Park a few years ago.

I'll assume that Yuko can speak enough English to be understood since IIRC she's staying in Australia...

[sa547]

Okay, here's the Chiwa Saito interview that was conducted during last year's AFA11 in Singapore:
http://ani-culture.net/2011/12/afa11-chiwa-saito-2/

Chiwa Saito: This is a very difficult question, I have no idea what to do, even thou sometime I do think about it. I still have no answers for it. But it would be great if I can travel.

In fact I studied overseas.

Ani-Culture: Oh? Where did you study overseas?

Chiwa Saito: New Zealand.

Ani-Culture: I see! No wonder you can understand English so well!

Wow.

[Yu Ominae]

I must mention Christelle Ciari. She's French-Japanese with her father being French singer Claude Ciari. She's trilingual, being able to speak English, French and Japanese.

Christelle used her French skills on Yakushiji Ryoko no Kaiki Jikenbo.

Her Aoni website mentions that she's been used to be the voice in announcing information in English for various JR stations.

Funny, I thought that she was a tarento due to her Caucasian looks initially.

[Coldlight]

Originally Posted by sa547

In an interview at last year's anime-related event at Singapore, Chiwa Saitou revealed that she knows some English, as a result of her sometimes traveling overseas, especially to New Zealand.

Very interesting. So that explains why Hitagi's "Parent-Teacher Association" and "I love you." lines in Bakemonogatari sounded surprisingly good. Clearly recognizable English and not Engrish as I was resigned to expect from many others. After hearing the delivery of those lines, Chiwa Saitou had distinguished herself to me from the many other seiyuu names that I knew, and she went up several places in my book as a result.

[sa547]

Originally Posted by Coldlight

Very interesting. So that explains why Hitagi's "Parent-Teacher Association" and "I love you." lines in Bakemonogatari sounded surprisingly good. Clearly recognizable English and not Engrish as I was resigned to expect from many others. After hearing the delivery of those lines, Chiwa Saitou had distinguished herself to me from the many other seiyuu names that I knew, and she went up several places in my book as a result.

Such is the great wonder of HomuHomu.

[Same_Shark]

Originally Posted by yezhanquan

Kudos for even managing to speak to her in the first place.

Anyone knows if Sakamoto Maaya is at least fluent in English?

No, she's not. She actually mentioned at her first convention here that she didn't speak it very well, but could sing in it due to her love of American music.

Chie Nakamura, Sakura Haruno's seiyuu, speaks English & Korean.

[Yu Ominae]

Indeed. Some of us did mention that Sakamoto's English isn't that good, but she's trying.

This youtube post shows Christelle Ciari singing in English. Not to mention that it's fluent too and her singing's good thanks to her father's influence.

[Mazryonh]

I'm glad that more seiyuus than ever are trying to learn English and other non-Japanese languages to be fluent. I've had enough of the "Engrish" in anime and Japanese media in general, frankly, so I've always been of the persuasion that if you can't do it without much of an accent or with more-than-passible wording, you really should stick to your native language.

The recent kerfuffle about Aki Toyosaki's attempt at singing "Hey Jude" by John Lennon is a reflection of how people don't like to hear badly-accented English, especially if it's used to sing a famous song. I'm glad that there are several Japanese singers like HeartsDales, Hikaru Utada, or Angela Aki are fluent in English, though.

[Siegel Clyne]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

I'm glad that more seiyuus than ever are trying to learn English and other non-Japanese languages to be fluent. I've had enough of the "Engrish" in anime and Japanese media in general, frankly, so I've always been of the persuasion that if you can't do it without much of an accent or with more-than-passible wording, you really should stick to your native language.

The recent kerfuffle about Aki Toyosaki's attempt at singing "Hey Jude" by John Lennon is a reflection of how people don't like to hear badly-accented English, especially if it's used to sing a famous song. I'm glad that there are several Japanese singers like HeartsDales, Hikaru Utada, or Angela Aki are fluent in English, though.

Tokyo-born sisters Sugiyama Yumi and Sugiyama Emi of the defunct Heartsdales grew up in Yonkers, New York. Yumi currently lives in New York City, where she runs her own design studio, Studio Yumi.

Angela Aki was born in Itano, Japan to a Japanese father and an Italian American mother. She moved to Hawaii at the age of 15 and graduated from George Washington University in Washington, D.C. with a degree in political science.

Utada Hikaru (or Hikaru Utada in Western order, as she is a natural-born American) was born in New York City to native-born Japanese parents, record producer Utada Teruzane and enka singer Utada Junko. That makes Hikki a Shin-Nisei - a term that most Japanese Americans, including most of the Shin-Nisei themselves, are apparently unaware of.

Utada grew up both in the United States and Japan. In Japan, she attended The American School in Japan.

A number of Japanese-born individuals who grew up/lived overseas in English-speaking countries and/or who attended American or other international schools in Japan or overseas where the curriculum is taught in English are fluent in English.

You can see a number of these individuals on NHK WORLD English, speaking English with flawless American, Canadian, English and other accents, along with those who speak English with varying degrees of a Japanese accent.

Many, but not all, Japan-born persons of mixed Japanese and non-Japanese descent speak English.

An example is Japanese R&B/pop singer-songwriter May J, host of the English-language television program J-MELO on NHK WORLD.

According to the Profile section on her official website:

A multi-lingual J-pop singer-songwriter and TV host May J. has her roots in Japan, Iran, Turkey, Russia, Spain and the UK. From a young age, May J. dreamed of becoming a singer. She took up piano, dance, voice training and opera lessons, and whilst attending high school at “American School In Japan”, she belonged to the vocal Jazz club. She has done a wide range of activities from song writing to modeling for clothing brands.

May J. Hashimoto was born in Yokohama, Japan to a Japanese father and a mother of Iranian background. The middle initial "J." in May J. stands for "Jamileh," Farsi (modern Persian) for "Beautiful."

Like Utada Hikaru, May J. attended The American School in Japan.

Another example is Japanese R&B/pop singer Aoyama Thelma. Born in Nara, Japan, Aoyama is three-fourths Japanese and one-fourth Black; she has an Afro-Trinidadian grandfather.

Aoyama attended Osaka International School, The American School in Japan, and Sophia University. As a youth, she spent a couple years living in Torrance, California, USA when her family moved there when she was 12, attending Calle Mayor Middle School there.

Here are a couple of videos featuring Aoyama Thelma singing a cover version of Mariah Carey's 1993 hit song, "Dreamlover," the second video featuring both her and Mariah Carey in a mashup, with Mariah up first, followed by Thelma:

DJ MAKIDAI feat. 青山テルマ [Aoyama Thelma] / Dreamlover

Direct YouTube link for above video since embedding has been disabled by request: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90zkxmJ0J8A

Dreamlover - Mariah Carey vs Thelma [ 青山テルマ ] {Aoyama Thelma}

[NoemiChan]

Originally Posted by Coldlight

Very interesting. So that explains why Hitagi's "Parent-Teacher Association" and "I love you." lines in Bakemonogatari sounded surprisingly good.

I love that line..especially the "I-LOVE-YOU", direct, shocking yet cute....!

Multilinguistic VAs deserve recognition and a lot of applause... Banzai!!!!!

[totoum]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

IThe recent kerfuffle about Aki Toyosaki's attempt at singing "Hey Jude" by John Lennon is a reflection of how people don't like to hear badly-accented English, especially if it's used to sing a famous song.

I don't find it that bad though,there's an accent but I can still understand the lyrics

YouTube

https://youtu.be/HZYIy2szkIY

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

[Yu Ominae]

On the count of the North American-based voice actors, I know that Yuri Lowenthal, Samantha Hart-Inoue and Karen Strassman are bi/multilingual.

[Mazryonh]

Originally Posted by totoum

I don't find it that bad though,there's an accent but I can still understand the lyrics

If you check the Likes/Dislikes ratings on older versions you'll see that you're in the minority. This is why I stick to the position of "if you can't do it without an accent or mangling the wording/pronunciation, please stick to your native language." Maybe Toyosaki would have saved herself all this trouble with her fans if she sang a Japanese-translated version of the song instead.

[totoum]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

If you check the Likes/Dislikes ratings on older versions you'll see that you're in the minority. This is why I stick to the position of "if you can't do it without an accent or mangling the wording/pronunciation, please stick to your native language." Maybe Toyosaki would have saved herself all this trouble with her fans if she sang a Japanese-translated version of the song instead.

I couldn't care less about being in the minority
Hell few people can pull off beatle covers without getting a sizable amount of dislikes anyway.I'm not surprised that Toyosaki isn't one of them.

[Tri-ring]

Although not in any ways bilingual I felt a cold shiver down my spine when I saw this;

The strength in his voice and the way he carried it out in real action is very chilling.It would have been more affective if he wore a uniform.

[speedyexpress48]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

If you check the Likes/Dislikes ratings on older versions you'll see that you're in the minority. This is why I stick to the position of "if you can't do it without an accent or mangling the wording/pronunciation, please stick to your native language." Maybe Toyosaki would have saved herself all this trouble with her fans if she sang a Japanese-translated version of the song instead.

Ehhh...it doesn't look like she got into trouble with her own fans...she just pissed some Beatles fanboys instead...

Personally I think it's cute, even though the end result wasn't close at all...nice try though

[Ithekro]

It always seems more like her character Yui is singing the song rather than Toyosaki. And considering the parallels that have been put between the Beatles and K-On's HTT...it fits way, way too well, regardless of accent problems.

[Yu Ominae]

Originally Posted by sa547

Iijima? She's not going to hear from anyone talking to her about Macross anymore (recently I got blocked on both Twitter and Facebook simply because I mentioned that show, went to MacrossWorld, asked why and got an answer -- she's tired of Macross), apparently insisting strictly that her fans should talk only about her music.

Guess we can't do anything about that now, can we?

Seems that she wants to move on and be known for her music "aside" from her Macross role in Japan.