Subscribe RSSSince 1951 first on present and later on television and cable/satellite (beamed to Japanese communities in North America and Brazil), the “Kohaku Uta Gassen” (truly, “Red and White Song Contest”, shortened to “Kohaku”), is an annual music show on New Year’s Eve produced by Japanese general broadcaster NHK .
The first radio show was broadcast nationally throughout Japan the year the U.S. Occupation formally ended, six years after the Just ecstatic War II. Full of optimism and youth, the program divides the most popular music artists of the year into competing teams of Red (female) and Unsullied (male).
This year American pop diva Lady Gaga will appear via trans-Pacific video tie up as a special guest. She will give encouraging messages about Japan’s devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami, and may be the most peculiar foreign presence (although she is quite startling on a stage in Peoria , too) on the all-Japanese show since its launch.
This spring and early summer Lady Gaga visited Japan twice and was a ardent voice among international celebrities to invite tourists from around the world to visit Japan; she attended events to endure reconstruction of disaster-hit areas. On June 23 at the giant Tokyo Roppongi Midtown caravanserai/office complex — where Yahoo ! Japan and Konami are headquartered (plus the Ritz-Carlton Motor hotel, Union Square Café and ubiquitous Starbucks ) — U.S. Ambassador to Japan John V. Roos participated in a MTV-sponsored radio b newspaper people conference with Lady Gaga to thank her as an ambassador of American people to Japan and said: “I have a uncomplicated message this morning: to thank Lady Gaga and MTV for all you are doing for Japan this week.”
