#vba3

Shionoya Sayaka, one of the finalists from VBA3, joined Fukuoka’s EXPG right after the contest and in a year (2012) she took a new audition that the label KING RECORDS had organized: KING RECORDS Presents Dream Vocal Audition. From 10.000 contestants, Sayaka Shionoya was chosen as the winner.

She won the prize Dream Vocalist Loved by ViVi (promoted by the magazine ViVi) in the final that took place on May 26th at the Akasaka BLITZ. 

Later in August that year, Sayaka performed in front of 30.000 people at the Saitama Super Arena, during the Tokyo Girls Collection as a reward from the prize that she won. 

This event she performed is one of the most prestigious fashion shows in Japan that also showcases promising and established talents from the music industry. She was also selected for the Tokyo Girls Collection by girlswalker.com 2012 Autum/Winter The Best Vocal Audition, and in October 13th she would get the recommendation to be in the plan for new music acts that the Tokyo Girls Collection offers, being labeled as an upcoming star to look forward to. The TGC Best Vocal Audition chooses singers from the auditions that are celebrated all over Japan to give them a special recommendation on their website, being one of the most influential websites, that is followed by young and teenage audiences.

Sayaka Shionoya had a digital single release, ONE, a ballad song with some R&B/Pop flavor, that showcased her vocal skills that had already brought them to the finale of VBA3, which got her into LDH even after failing to win that competition. 

The song was written by Tai Sho, Erik Libdom and Kanata Okajima (lyrics). The single dropped in October 24th 2012 as a teaser to introduce EX FAMILY’s newest singer.

Her Major Debut would follow in January 23rd 2013, with KING RECORDS, she released the song Dear Heaven physically. 

The song is written by MATSUCO TASHIROU, whom has also written songs for DEEP, with lyrics by Masato Odake.

The same month she launched her major debut song on January 18th she embarked into her own Musha Shugyo, in order to find a way to communicate with the crowd as well as to polish her vocal skills and show her talent, touring the 47 Prefactures while promoting her first single and other songs. The name for her own Musha Shugyo was Uta Shugyo. As the other challenges LDH acts had done, it was followed by Shukan EXILE’s TV show, as well as reported by Sayaka herself on her blog.

In May 15th, she released a double A-side single, Katakoi/Smile Again, showing two different sides of her with two ballads, one that had a sad feeling and slow tempo (Katakoi), and the other that had a happy feeling into it and a more cheerful mid-tempo (Smile Again).  

Katakoi is a song by Jin Nakamura and Juri Ono, while Smile Again is a song by the same people that wrote the song ONE.

To commemorate the release of this second single, she held her first One Man Live at Tokyo, at the Shinagawa Stellar Ball (June 15th )

She was surprisingly chosen the most promising rookie act by digital charts site RECOCHOKU with the “Breaking Act to Look For” prize.

In August 21st her third single, Ocean Blue, was launched. This time, the song was a mid-tempo but still containing some nostalgic flow into it, a sound pretty close to FLOWER’s songs, written by Erik Libdom and Jeff Miyahara, with lyrics by Kanata Okajima. 

The b-sides for this new single had two different styles that hadn’t been approached by her yet: Sign and True Love, weren’t the typical ballads that she usually offers. Sign is an electro-dance up-beat song written by FAST LANE, Erik Libdom, with lyrics by P.O.S., that is original by singer JUJU; while True Love is a cheerful track, that reminds us from the type of lively songs that the vocal duo LOVE used to sing, the song is written by SKY BEATZ, SHIKATA and Lisa Desmond, with lyrics by MOMO”mocha”N.

In November 6 2013 she launched another double A-side single, Snow Flakes Love/Ichirinbana. The first one, a mid-tempo nostalgic song that reminds of FLOWER’s style again, while the second one is a slow R&B song with some Latin flavor on the chorus. 

Snow Flakes Love is a song by Erik Lidbom, Charlie Mason, with lyrics by Kanata Okajima, and Ichirinbana is written by Hiroki Sagawa from Asiatic Orchestr and produced by Jin Nakamura. 

The single was released in two different types: A and B, containing two different b-sides depending on the Type. Type A’s b-side was the song GET SET, GO by FAST LANE, while Type B’s was the song to you, a song where Sayaka herself contributed to the melody and lyrics, written with Jeff Miyahara and SKY BEATZ.

Before 2013 was over, Sayaka Shionoya held her second One Man Live concert, with two different dates for Osaka (December 11th at Abe no ROCKTOWN) and Tokyo (December 13th at Roppongi’s Nicofarre).

Despite not being a top artist and one of the LDH acts that still has a long road to go, Sayaka has always managed to chart her single releases at Oricon, with increasing results (going from a modest #32 with her debut single to a #16 on the last one we’ve listed in this chapter). Although she is a very competitive market, filled with female vocalists from the same type of style (from veterans May J, Tiara, JUJU, BENI, etc. to more recent acts like Kana Nishino or Ms Ooja), she still has a lot of room to improve and explore herself. With the right support, she could surpass the likes of Yuna Ito (whom has been missing for years now, but an act she got often compared to on her first steps) or even get more on the creative side like Miliyah Kato or JASMINE. By now, she’s been using similar styles to LOVE, FLOWER and JONTE, but from her first year to now, she has evolved a little bit.

With all the single releases from 2013, she paved the path to her first album, but that is something we will leave for a future chapter.

Sources:

https://www.ldh.co.jp/artist/musician/shionoya_s/

http://www.musicman-net.com/artist/23885.html

http://www.musicman-net.com/artist/29105.html

http://www.musicman-net.com/artist/32557.html

http://www.vanitymix.jp/music/shionoya-sayaka/

http://matome.naver.jp/odai/2137613085840292901

http://mfound.jp/news/2012/05/011835.html

http://okmusic.jp/#!/images/news/48235

http://okmusic.jp/#!/news/26899

http://www.barks.jp/news/?id=1000095242

http://okmusic.jp/#!/i/collections/1995781

Official links:

One of the purposes of VBA3 was to create a performance group of girls that were in middle-school age. Back then, it was supposed to train to an upcoming debut, however, the group never debuted and, instead, the girls became part of the mega-unit E-Girls as we will see later.

The audition where Flower new members were recruited, also recruited 10 girls to form a group that would consist of 1 singer and 9 performers. The vocalist Yuzuna Takebe, and the dancers Anna Ishii, Rio Inagaki, Miyu Oishi, Kyoka Takeda, Mira, Mizuki Hanayama, Nonoka Yamaguchi, Misato Hagio and Runa Yamamoto were the winners of that audition’s category. 

Although Kyoka Takeda had originally auditioned for the vocalist spot, she was selected to become only a performer. 

The new group’s name was BUNNY and they would join the new mega-unit E-Girls during the EXILE TRIBE LIVE TOUR 2012 ~TOWER OF WISH~ that was celebrating from April to July in 2012. The new group even had its own dance segment in the E.G. Anthem instrumental song that showcased the mega-unit groups during that tour.

Below, Runa Yamamoto.

Before we got to see the group in any music video, the dancer Runa Yamamoto left the group. Later on, the concept for BUNNY got somehow lost into the E-Girls’ activities and its priorities to promote the already debuted groups and the mega-unit, rather than venture to debut a new group with middle-schoolers in a market that still seemed reluctant to groups like BUNNY. 

Below, group Fairies. Also with girls that debuted in mostly being from middle-school age.

If we seek for comparisons, back in the day, the best reference would be the idol vocal & dance unit Fairies (from Rising Production) that weren’t having its best moment either –despite a successful debut and first year-. E-Girls were barely starting off into gaining popularity, and its other groups, except for Flower, didn’t seem to be gaining enough attention or promotion for themselves.

The members of BUNNY (minus Luna Yamamoto) appeared as a whole in EXILE TRIBE’s Kodomo version of the 24karats TRIBE of GOLD music video. 

*Members as guessed with the help of DanseryuZ, Blindandmusical & Lendy*

Vocalist, Yuzuna Takebe.

Anna Ishii

Rio Inagaki

Miyu Oishi

Kyoka Takeda

Mira Watts

Mizuki Hanayama

Nonoka Yamaguchi

Misato Hagio

This is the only real full group presentation that we have, since the dance skit that they performed later in E-Girls’ Gomennasai Kissing You music video was already with less members and mixed with other EGD (EXILE GIRLS DANCERS from EXPG) that had been added into the mega-group.

We will eventually get to know exactly how BUNNY faded off slowly into E-Girls and two EXPG units, as well as what became of their members. But, meanwhile, we refer you to the piece Bunnies & Rabbits that explained a little bit of this mess.

Members Social Netwoks:

Yuzuna Takebe (still in E-Girls)

Anna Ishii (still in E-Girls)

Rio Inagaki  

Miyu Oishi  | Instagram

Kyoka Takeda  | Grik agency profile | Instagram | Ameblo | TwitCasting

Mira Watts 

Mizuki Hanayama 

Nonoka Yamaguchi (still in E-Girls)

Misato Hagio 

VOCAL BATTLE AUDITION 3 ~For Girls~ started on February 2011, that was the first audition for girls that would follow the previous format used for the VBA 2006 (TAKAHIRO, COLOR’s new members, JONTE) and VBA2 (3JSB’s vocalists, GENERATIONS’ vocalists). The audition was celebrated for three different purposes, the main one was to find more members for EXPG’s dance group, FLOWER, so it could become a performance group and debut; The second goal was to find 10 girls that would become the members of a new group of middle school age (around 12 and 13 years old) and the third purpose of that audition, was to find vocalists of talent that would participate in a project that Kana, Dream’s recently graduated leader. That audition, like the previous ones, was also followed with small documentaries at EXILE’s weekly show: Shuukan EXILE.

The first round for the contestants aiming to become new vocalist members of group FLOWER, consisted on auditioning choosing between the songs Friends by Happiness and I WISH U ~Egao no LOOP~ by Dream. 

The ones that would get selected for the final round had to prepare the song Still, written by Daisuke Kawaguchi and Kiyoshi Matsuo. The song was a new one used for the audition which demo had been recorded using the voice of Misaki from vocal duo LOVE. The girls auditioning for the performers’ spots had to learn the choreography for that song for the final rounds.

Below, the finalists for the final round for vocalists of both groups, Flower and the new unit.

The girls auditioning for the new group had also to choose between the same songs by Happiness and Dream for the first round. However, for the second round onwards, they had to prepare another new song, titled Why? , written by Matsuo and Nao Tanaka. Misaki was also in charge for the vocals of the demo of that song used for the contest.

The girls taking part on Kana’s special Project contest had to prepare the new song Boyfriend for the final rounds, a song written by JUNE.

On May 14th 2011, the final round took place as a concert celebrated at SHIBUYA-AXI, to select all the winners. We will go on detail later, in new separated chapters, about all the different winners’ names and destinations.

Among the finalists, there were the girls Shionoya Sayaka, Mako Kouno and Aragaki Juri (all of them auditioned for FLOWER vocalists’ spots). We also find girls that in a future would become part of EGD and E-Girls’ mega-unit, such as Ruri Kawamoto, Reina Kidzu, Anna Suda, Ikuta Risa and Watanabe Marina.

In a last note for readers that might be curious about other contestants, from that audition, there was a group formed under the name of Bijou that is currently active in a more underground circuit for vocal and dance units.  The contestants, Reina Kobe, Kirari Matsunaga, Aika Iwamoto and Yuna Watanabe (this last one, we haven’t been able to find whether she also participated or not, but the whole group is usually showcased as contestants from VBA3). All the girls are from Osaka, but the group doesn’t belong to LDH although all the members are supposed to be graduated from EXPG.

You can check their youtube channel. Bijou is just another of many groups that stay active without a major label, yet have regular activities.

Image sources:

http://topicstock.pantip.com/chalermkrung/topicstock/2011/06/C10690341/C10690341.html

http://m.ex-m.jp/q?i=static_renew_before/sppg/vba3/vba3_1_3

Sources: http://www.dailymotion.com/user/pyokoxile/43 *source disappeared a while ago, but the Shuukan EXILE videos were uploaded in this channel*