The Red Balloon--A Sudden Release into the Sky (1973)

The Red Balloon--A Sudden Release into the Sky (1973)

Tokiko Kato's "Akai Fuusen" (Red Balloon) is a poetic piece from her 1973 album "Ai no Kurashi" (The Life of Love). The gentle melody and narration have a warmth that evokes some distant memory, but at the same time, at a moment in time, a shadow of deep loss looms over the song.

The red balloon flew into the sky.

The passage describes how the balloon, a symbol of dreams and hopes, is quietly but irrevocably released into the sky. Yet, against this backdrop, we can also read that the balloon was released "suddenly" on the street one day.

In the early 1970s, Japan was in the midst of its rapid economic growth. In 1970, more than 16,000 people were killed in traffic accidents in Japan, one of the worst in the world at that time. Roads without pedestrian crossings, intersections without traffic signals, and unpaved sidewalks - the blind spots that lurk in the everyday landscape are innumerable.

In those days, children flew balloons in front of their houses. In a split second, away from their parents' eyes, a bicycle or a passenger car would pass by. And before anyone noticed, only the balloons were floating in the sky.

Kato's "Red Balloon" was born in the atmosphere of that era. Even though she does not directly talk about the accident, between the lines of the lyrics, there is a sense of sorrow for the "things that will never come back. It is a parting that is etched in her own life, and at the same time, it is a requiem for the unreasonable separation that anyone living at that time could have experienced.

The balloons soar high in the wind. There are no tears in her eyes as she looks away. We can only stand there looking up at the sky. Such a break in time may be the heart of this song.

And we still wonder. Where did that red balloon go, and from whose hands did it leave? With these unanswered questions in our hearts, we silently look up at the sky, feeling the direction of the wind.