As many people will have already heard, the seiyuu agency 81 Produce announced on Monday last week that Matsuki Miyu (real name: Matsuki Mieko) passed away on October 27, at the tender age of 38. She’d been ill since the start of the year, and had stopped working in July to undergo hospitalisation and treatment for what turned out to be acute pneumonia (edit: later revealed by her family to be Chronic active EBV infection, so as to raise awareness of the disease).
Some fans today will probably know her as Shimoneta’s Anna Nishikinomiya. However, one of Matsuki’s most endearing projects was not an anime, but rather, Cherry Bell, a radio show that she had hosted alongside Sakurai Takahiro and Suzumura Kenichi since 2003. And, as a testament to the fact that she was one of its three pillars, her fellow hosts took to the airwaves one final time last Friday night to remember the bubbly, vibrant colleague who had somehow managed to keep them in line.
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| The ‘Matsuki Miyu gets married?!’ photoshoot from the 2011 JOQR calendar… |
As someone who has not seen many of the series Matsuki was in, and who had to put Cherry Bell aside to try and finish her studies, sharing the words that came from Sakurai and Suzumura and the staff of the show is about all that I can do. You can listen to Cherry Bell‘s final episode yourself on niconico, but if you don’t know Japanese, here is some of their tribute, as written up on yahoo.
There are some who hope that we will carry on. But we’ve thought about this deeply, and could only come to this conclusion. This is something that the three of us worked so hard on together, and we had a lot of fun doing that… But without all three of us, it’s just not Cherry Bell anymore. We’re sorry, so sorry, that this is the conclusion we have to ask you to accept.
Back in July, when Matsuki was hospitalised, it was actually at her bidding that they kept going with the show:
Please continue making the silly program that is Cherry Bell. Please keep it as a place that I can return to, as if nothing happened.
It’s because we wanted to protect this place, the place that Matsuki could return to, that we were able to keep Cherry Bell going.
They related that they often visited her—including for her birthday party in September—and texted her their encouragement and support.
She also kept us updated on how she was going. But she asked us not to tell you, and we wanted to respect that. She always told us:
I don’t want to worry them all. No matter how difficult this is, or how long it takes, I want to come back as if there was nothing to it, and just laugh when I report that ‘Actually, it was pretty tough, haha’.
She would also say:
I want to get over this, and write a book on it someday. I want to encourage all the people who are fighting the same illness as me.
She always fought with that amazingly strong will. She truly believed that she would recover. She was an entertainer right up to the end, going about her work with her great, positive spirit.
Holding back their tears at the end, Suzumura and Sakurai sign off on Cherry Bell for the last time:
| We will always remember our time with Matsuki. |
| She will be with us for as long as we live. |
| We hope that it will be the same for you. |
Rest in peace, Matsuki Mieko-san. I’m sure that you will always be remembered, both by those who knew you, and also by those who may learn of you henceforth.
HOT CHOCOLATE IN A BOWL 
10 things I learned from the Eupho Quartet!!
December 16, 2016 3 Comments
Besides my Anime Writing project, another thing that my YOI obsession derailed this year are several Sound! Euphonium posts I’d planned to publish during the fall season. Admittedly, it’s taken me many fits and starts to get this done, largely because of what it involved. Listening to Eupho’s extras in the past year, especially after Aldnoah.Radio, I reaffirmed something for myself: I don’t really like listening to female seiyuu. Sakamoto Maaya, Komatsu Mikako, Paku Romi and Sawashiro Miyuki are amongst the exceptions, because they don’t have those high, cutesy voices. Hence, trying to finish the Eupho radio shows1 and the cast commentaries was a bit of a challenge, especially since I could not always tell these four ladies apart by their voices alone:
What can I say? I’ve always been more of a male seiyuu fan, after all… But if there’s one thing I like about listening to the girls, it’s when they start discussing which (male) characters they like, or who’s popular amongst the cast. Why? Because they tend to have a fresh perspective that’s different from most viewers in the West. For example, have a listen to them rave about “our angel, Chikao!” from the 4th episode commentary!
They also bring up Sakurai Takahiro (Taki), Tsuda Kenjirō (Gotō Takuya) and Ishiya Haruki (Tsukamoto Shuuichi) a fair bit. I especially loved the incredibly embarrassing anecdote about what Chikapet did to Sakku XD. But in terms of popularity amongst the four of them, Chikao definitely won hands down.
However, voice actor shenanigans aren’t the only reason I kept listening. I don’t have the time to write all the radio shows and episode commentaries up, but let me enumerate on the 10 other things that I came away with. Read more of this post
Filed under Anime, Episode Commentary, Radio Show, Translation