Sugahara Riko (Rittan) / 1st Generation

Reporting in again to give some more, new developments from the Yuusha no Utagoe show.

Episode number six, as announced in the preview, saw the last three remaining contestants (Sugawara Mayuka, Riko herself, and, I forgot to mention in the previous summaries, actress and singer-songwriter Momoyama Tsukika) engaged in a themed quiz for their third stage of auditions ("testing their love for the series", as it was duly introduced) before being admitted on to the actual finals.

(Original link)
In reality, I'd like to take this one as more of a bonus round, myself. The contestants proved themselves to be basically on the same footings in terms of knowledge of the lore of the Dragon Quest: The Great Adventure of Dai franchise (with Momoyama distinguishing herself in particular), so it made simply for a fun watch. As it turns out, all of three of them have watched the anime currently on air, enough to even have a favorite character of their own inside.
To make it a long story short, the contestants could choose from a table with a total of 20 hidden questions, spanning 4 categories about the series's settings: Monsters and appearing characters; Fight techniques and magic spells; Famous quotes; and Items, weaponry and landmarks. The more difficult, the higher the points awarded if answered correctly.
What's funny is that in this even standup comedian Seya participated as a contestant against the other three girls, meaning that the quiz was actually a challenge between the team of three united against him, made all the more competitive by some questions being a "fastest-button" battle. In the event the girls team would have lost the match, additionally, Seya would have had the duty to eliminate what contestant showed to have the least love and knowledge in the subject series during the quiz.
So was the plan at least, but in the end, nonetheless, the girls managed to stand their ground quite well against him down to the last question and won, which meant everyone passed the screening safely without anyone dropping out.

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Having passed this intermission, episode number seven, which has aired just the other day, moved on to the finals.

(Original link)
For this last examinations, the contestants finally got to deal with the now-completed theme song track itself, entitled "RISE".

Three days before the final round, the girls were given the music demo instrumental of it, with a stand-in singer track, to practice themselves with. It turns out to be a pretty challenging song with some steep variations in tempo, which got even the girls surprised upon initially listening to it.
As for the finals, turns out that the song was composed by Hayashi Yuukk, without him taking as a reference any song that the three finalists had sung in, so, as one crucial point, he was anxious to see what chemical reaction would result from the combination of their respective singing voices with the melody of the base track.
The criteria of judgement on part of the jury panel as a whole didn't stop at the performance results as it was, anyway, but also by keeping in consideration also potential for further improvement and one's idea of the finished product as based on that, as well as looking at the artist aspect especially in terms of how this would have fit into the series' world atmosphere.
The three contestants performed in the respective order assigned by drawing lots. Riko's turn was the second out of three, which you can watch starting from the 6:55 mark. Some little accident happened in the middle of her performance when Riko forgot her lines, a bit due to the tension making her mind go blank as she even said before beginning. Riko looked a little shaken and teary-eyed as a result. After a pause to look again at the lyrics sheet, she however resumed swiftly and successfully sang the piece to the end.
I must admit that, rather than sticking to a certain standard, each of the three contestants gave their own unique interpretation of the lyrics giving to the songs a very different (and, I'll add this one personally, often contrasting) taste respectively, as the commentators from the studio also rightfully noted.
That in turn doubtless gave the jury panel more of a difficult time to compare them, and indeed it gave the jury quite to chew on to draw a final judgement. Regarding Riko in particular, anyway, Takahashi commented on how she had the closest and most familiar feeling to herself. More in technical terms, Hayashi recognized that she fit right in the rhythm syncopation of his song with her own singing.
As it turns out, their discussion protracted for one full hour evaluating all the qualities of each singer, at the end of which the winner was announced in front of the three contestants.

And then, for the moment of the truth...


"The one who will be singing today's (mobile app game) theme song will be..."

Spoiler

"Sugahara Riko-san"


Riko looked rather in a state of shock and maybe disbelief at the announcement.
After a brief moment of speechlessness by Riko, Hayashi went on to ask about what her feelings are at the moment in all honesty, with Riko feeling somewhat sorry for having given in some respects a show of herself not appropriate for a singer right at the final examination, but thanking them for it and hoping to have their support even from there on.

Hayashi asked right after that if Riko must have felt a lot of questions popping up in her head the moment she heard that she had been chosen, then he explained that it's not through today's results that the panel decided whether to give a pass mark or not, but to say it straightforwardly, he felt her singing voice, more specifically her timber, and her way to go pick up the rhytm to be excellent.


Adding to this, Takahashi remarked that she felt that every contestant who entered may succeed in their own particular environement and so she never felt like that this or that person was no good. However, having prefaced with that, she also goes on to tell she thinks that it's the first few words coming from someone that help capture (or not) the other people's heart, and thus she concluded that Riko would have been the right person for it.

And with it, that wraps up this two-month long audition process.
What else is left for me to say now but "Congratulations"?


As Takahashi Yuko pointed out during the video, the project isn't over with this yet: from now on the audition winner will go on to undertake special lessions to train specifically for the theme song, as well as to strenghten those aspects that feel still somewhat uncerain, even in terms of mental preparation, or finding time to dedicate on it. And Takahashi herself says she would be helping out as well.

So here's me looking forward to listening to the finished product.

 

Wrapping things up with the last two episodes of Yuusha no Utagoe's program.
After a speedy 10-minute retrospective episode retelling back the entire audition progression (which you can still find on SquareEnix's channel), the program then carried on with a behind-the-scenes close coverage of the recording process of the theme song. Of course, no need to keep it a surprise anymore, the one who will be singing it is none other than Riko.


(Original link)
Picking up from the vinner's announcement, episode number eight starts off with a little interview video where Riko talked about her personal experience with the audition. She showed the work she had done practicing for it, writing down the lyrics of "RISE" and annotating the sheet to the brim with indications on how sing it, adding that her sensation upon stepping onto the stage for the final screening was such that it suddenly caused her memory to go blank.
She said to be incredulous at her being selected and that she couldn't quite bring herself to rejoice at the time.
Riko then goes on to tell how on the day ahead of the examination she went together with her mom and dad to the shrine to give a prayer, and shows how after the end of the audition her mother was impatient to get to know of the results flooding her with message posts.
Riko revelas that, due a combintion of sadness and lack of confidence about her singing performance there, she avoided telling her the result until then ...which gave her an opportunity to finally give her a video call and announce the news to her live on camera~!

Following up, more footage is shown of the last three contestants bonding together and supporting each other while in the backstage room, with Riko recalling how Sugawara and Momoyama really helped building a very cordial and welcoming atmosphere there.

After than, we rapidly move through the special lessons that were already mentioned in the last episode.

First we have a look into Takahashi Yuko's training, which turns out to be centered on physical preparations.
One of the exercises had Takahashi teaching a stretching technique for muscle distension, which has the effect of facilitating vocalization. While at it, Takahashi also eplained to Riko the importance of putting into words one's designs for the future, as well as to always set one's goal points higher and higher by thinking of one's current objectives more as a waypoint towards the future.
The other exercise in the list involves throat distension with the purpose of reducing the strain when getting one's voice out, and included some practice with singing out notes both continuously and in a staccato fashion while in that position.
Lastly, an additional exercise had Riko learning how to handle the perceived "distance" that her voice has from the standpoint of the listener, by working on the intensity and pitch of the voice with Takahashi's indications.

The direction then passes on to Yokoyama Hiroaki and they continue with his other personal set of training lessons.
Yokoyama explains that his concept of the song "RISE" involves a great deal of variations in pitch, which means that both one must be especially careful about pause, as well as rythm.
As such, his training consists broadly of two points:
One is to familiarize with the rest marking on the musical sheet.
Another is to accustom oneself to checking the proper pitch by using ears and eyes. This involves being able to interpret the notes on the score, something which Riko says she hasn't done before, and most importantly to look at the keys that Yokoyama is pressing on the piano to accompany the singing.

The episode then fast forwards to the day prior to the studio recording of the song, when they'll first have a tentative recording, where Riko meets Hayashi Yuui waiting for her at the recording room.
Riko tells how in the meantime she had been practicing repeatedly on the piece on her own even while at home, following the indications given by the professionals. Both the show commentators first during her initial try-out, and Hayashi later at the end of it, agree that she had improved enormously since before.
Still, to better express the song, Hayashi then goes on to explain to Riko the sentiment behind each separate section inside of the song, describing to her in concrete examples, for each of them, to picture herself first being motionless in a dark room, then opening the curtain to let light in, and finally to open the room's door and run free to the outside.
On another note, speaking on the theme of "bonds" that both the game and the song are inspired by, he says it's not just about reaching all together hand-in-hand the goal line like good friends, but also, when one remains on one's own, to also be able to take in the energy and abilities of one's friends with oneself to be able to reach out the next goal. Expanding on that, what Hayashi proposes in his talk is to take as a reference also the singing style of the other contestants, exemplifying to her what points of the song he thought they gave their best show of themselves at the time of the finals, and thus "sharing" what is each their personal interpetation of it.

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(Original link)
The final episode continues on with a look at the work inside the recording room, with Riko this time joining as an exclusive the two commentators in the studio to comment on it.
Preparations are proceeding relentlessly and to further complement the base track, live instrumentals are also added to it, and we have finally reached the day of the song recording proper. Besides that, it looks like that Riko's self-training had gone on for a week since the special lessons, and the jury professionals are looking forward to seeing the results of it.

While the staff is concluding the preparations for the recordings, Riko waits in a separate room where she finds Sugawara and Momoyama waiting for her as a surprise, saying they have come to her to give their encouragement and energy.

The episode proceeds on through progressive trials and improvements on the song, with the professionals occasionally intervening in to provide to Riko further advices and instructions, like for example on what pitch and intensity to use on specific syllables and so on.
A comment from Momoyama, who along with Sugawara were following Riko's recording session from the other session, said that Riko's song felt like it had a life of its own breathed into it. Besides that, she also pointed out how it sounded like it incorporated also the same kind of melodic nuances that she had in mind to sing to, as well as and Mayuka (Sugawara)'s character in it, and praised Riko for the improvements she made.
I'd say this means that Riko managed to successfully realize what Hayashi intended to do with the song, in the end.

After Riko enters the backstage room where Momoyama and Sugawara are to take a break, Hayashi also walks in to announce he would like to sample the last instrument for the song, and was wondering if to take this occasion to record the sound of "cheering voices" to serve as a a background chorus. He asks Riko to guess whose voice he would be recording, and it finally dawns on her that it'll be exactly those of Sugawara and Momoyama.

After a brief look at the recording sessions of the two, and Riko expressing her thanks to everyone from the commentator's studio, the show concludes with an exclusive presentation of the finished song (which you can see starting from 19:39), as a compilation of clips of most significant scenes from the program roll on screen. Enjoy, everyone!

 

On more updates today: Riko's theme song "RISE" received itself a music video too, which has just been released a few moments ago on the YouTube channel of SquareEnix. You can freely watch it here:

if the video does not show watch the video here

Also, the new commercial for the Dragon Quest mobile game that will be broadcast on TV from here on is also up on the channel, now featuring the new song as well.

(Original link)

As a reminder, other than being of course listenable inside of the game itself, the song is also already available for streaming and/or purchasing as a standalone track on most of the major digital distribution platforms.
Check out below for a list of them:
https://lnk.dmsmusic.co/yukihayashi_rise

 

Rittan will be having 1-1 online talks on 3/13:
https://sugahara-riko.com/news.php?id=1098129

The price is 2,500 JPY for 60 seconds and it'll be done via WithLIVE. Applications will be FCFS from 12:00 JST on 3/5 at this link:
https://www.withlive.jp/cast.php?id=rJG71nnRFUUfSzlGbk0j6Gx7KLb2