by 2005 was a big turning point for the anime song scene. One of the most memorable works of the year was “AIR,” released as a TV anime and a movie.
The opening theme, “Tori no Uta,” is a timeless masterpiece that shines brightly in the history of anime songs, and at the same time, it is a song with a special meaning called the “national anthem” on the Internet. It is a work that genuinely built a new culture of anime songs, and it is an indispensable piece in this series, “20 Years of Anime Songs: Tracing the Evolution of the Scene.” In this article, I would like to talk about the “innovation” that “AIR” and “Tori no Uta” brought about.
However, to discuss this work, we need to look back not only to 2005, 20 years ago but also to its prehistory. First, “AIR” is a PC version of a romance adventure game, a so-called “bishoujo game,” released on September 8, 2000. “Tori no Uta” is unique in that it was released not as an anime song but as the theme song for a bishoujo game.
“AIR” is the second game that Visual Arts’ game brand Key released. It is set in a rural seaside town and depicts the encounter between the protagonist, Kunizaki Oto, and the heroine, Kamio Misuzu. While Key’s debut work “Kanon” is described as a “story of a small miracle,” this work is a large-scale worldview that depicts the heroine Misuzu’s tragic fate. It is a more profound work from the genre of “tearjerker games” established by “Kanon,” and has a common thread with the “view of life” depicted in later Key works such as “CLANNAD.” “AIR” was a huge hit following “Kanon” and was ported to the home game Dreamcast in 2001. It gained even more fans, and a TV anime animated by Kyoto Animation (hereafter, KyoAni) began airing in January 2005. This TV anime is called the “KyoAni version.” A movie version of the anime was released on February 5, 2005.
This “movie version” was directed by Osamu Dezaki, a master of the anime world, and the director’s artistic style is strongly expressed in the work. Looking back on it, it seems that “AIR” and “The Song of the Bird” started as PC games and steadily gained popularity and recognition through media mix. But in reality, the story is not that simple. The circumstances surrounding the creation of the song “The Song of the Bird” are complicated.
