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Ginza Serenade (Ginza serenaade)


Apollo Special Music Sheet (Aporo tokusen gakufu) No. 24
アポロ 特選楽譜 二十四番 銀座セレナーデ
Designer: Imai Hisamaro (Japanese, dates unknown)
Composer: Sassa Kôka (Japanese, 1886 – 1961)
Lyricist: Saijô Yaso (Japanese, 1892 – 1970)
Publisher: Aporo shuppansha (Japanese)
Japanese
Shôwa era
1930 (Shôwa 5), April 30

Medium/Technique Color lithograph; ink on paper
Dimensions Height x width: 26.2 × 19.1 cm (10 5/16 × 7 1/2 in.)
Credit Line Gift of Mary and Robert Levenson
Accession Number2023.1113
NOT ON VIEW
ClassificationsMusical scores

DescriptionTranslation of lyrics from Japanese, by Kuniko and Kendall Brown:
"To and fro, strolling at night in Ginza, Strangers too
If you see them three times, it’s nostalgic.
(chorus) Right, right, pedestrians left and right.*
Ginza, flashing pedestrians left and right.
Anxiously waiting for someone, Above Matsuya’s tower
Looking at the lonely clouds’ color.
(chorus)
In spring, the flower sellers, On Ginza Avenue,
Don’t sell flowers but sell flirtation.
(chorus)
Coming and going the current trends, Are from Ginza
From the eyes of ‘shopgirls’
(chorus)
While being stood up, Electric ‘news’ type caught my eye
Finally I couldn’t see the letters through my tears
(chorus)
Going together, Happily to Matsuya’s concert hall,
Multi-colored lights fall on love
(chorus)
Quietly, all alone, Black tea and ‘cake’
Eat and go home, because of you
(chorus)
After long waiting I could cross, That intersection
When will open the checkpoint of love?
(chorus)
Spring is croaking, At the levee of Ginza
‘Modern’ frogs croak day and night**
(chorus)
Strange, a running ‘taxi,’ Stops without being hailed
It stops at the eyes of ‘modern girls’
(chorus)."
* the chorus plays on the word dōri (alright) and hitodōri (pedestrians).
** play on modern frog (kaeru) and modern girl (gāru).


Signed Hisamaro (lower right)
Marks “Hisamaro” lower right
ProvenanceBy 2019, Mary and Robert Levenson, Belleair, FL; 2023, gift of Mary and Robert Levenson to the MFA. (Accession Date: December 13, 2023)