Anime "Once Upon A Witch's Death" ED 「花咲く道で」produced by Yuki Kajiura sung by Aoi Teshima

It's quite calming, and once I got past my initial thoughts on Teshima's performance I started to appreciate her emotionality.
That’s the overall vibe of her vocal, calming and somewhat unaffected (or differently affected than usually expected from a singer).

It’s like she allows her voice to be somewhat transparent for the underlying music and arrangement to be “seen through” her performance.

I am pretty sure she can sing more connected but chooses this now-signature style. Her voice really shines with high-level, acoustic instrumental arrangements.

Another singer that uses lots of breath for effect is, of course, ReoNa, though differently and for different purposes and styles of music. I wonder if she was influenced by Aoi …
 
But then again, I've been listening to a lot of classical music in the past with my parents, including to stuff like Wagner where sometimes the key changes every couple of bars...😅
I can imagine that.
However, the problem is, that the "false end" sounds too final here.
Yeah, the way Aoi ends the vocal and the floating backing vocals and the instruments fading away was very final (no lingering strings to connect back to the last modulated verse). I don't know if that decision from Kajiura is tied to something in the story. It just seems too intentional to throw us off.
 
There was a simple solution. Just don't introduce a shite keychange for the middle verse. :p

but it is what it is. I have to say I don't go back to the song much (as of now). :/
 
Ok, so I've listened to the song a good amount of times now. I still love it in general. The string arrangement is chefs kiss with some really nice cello sections and even violin trills, which as far as I can remember are a rarity in Kajiura arrangements. I also really appreciate the real harp here (I'm 99% sure it's not synth). Also, I actually have no issues with the key change, also because the keys are closely related to each other (full tone up and then down), so I don't find it jarring at all actually. But then again, I've been listening to a lot of classical music in the past with my parents, including to stuff like Wagner where sometimes the key changes every couple of bars...😅

However, I agree with the "false end" and restart issue. Kajiura kind of likes to throw in stuff like that. Maybe tomorrow specifically comes to mind here, but also nocturne sounds like it could've almost ended in several places if I remember it correctly. So I'm kind of used to it and therefore I wasn't too surprised that she pulled a move like that. However, the problem is, that the "false end" sounds too final here. The fact that the following section then starts identically to the beginning of the song doesn't help either, since it really does sound like the song just repeats from the beginning. She could've just played some extra filler notes on the piano there and I think that would've already helped the issue quite a bit. But most importantly, the false end should've been shorter and less drawn out. The way the song is now, it just isn't really connected there.

Otherwise, I really don't have any issues with the song. It's super soothing, relaxing and a treat to the ears.
I was just listening to the performance of "four rings" from Kanagawa YKL20 and there was definitely a "false end" in the song where every musical went down to near-zero (strings last), then there was a cymbal wash leading to everything coming back, and then all of a sudden the strongly-chanted chorus and instruments came back up. There was no key change though so that was the only difference technically to "「花咲く道で」".

You're right that it isn't a new thing for Kajiura. Now I am just wondering in which other songs she used that option. 🤔
 
How about 'maybe tomorrow' at around 4:12 ? https://youtu.be/LfAOQL7iqm4?
It was almost identical to 「花咲く道で」in terms of returning to the original key after the "false end", unlike "four rings" I mentioned earlier.

Kajiura's keys came back in just as the synth faded out, so it was a smooth handover like in a relay race.

Who was the vocalist in this "maybe tomorrow" track? I am really curious.
 
^ Original vocalist was Emily Curtis https://canta-per-me.net/yukis-vocalists/#Curtis Emily , she is the one you hear in that recording from 2006.. https://canta-per-me.net/discography/xs3/ (last track of disc 2) after it came out on Fiction 2 as well. https://canta-per-me.net/discography/fiction2. FJ cover came much later.

(Actually the Lalala in bridge is only on Fiction 2 https://youtu.be/J3_2YGa-gUo?si=Npu2KVuF2Rd7lS3B ( in the xenosaga 3 ver it had a whole instrumental medley in-between the 2 parts)
 
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