【予選1st 第16ブロックB】OTONOVA2023 - Participation Report (the power of the personalities)

I am very happy that Mudia exists and supports artists of all kinds. I am glad that events such as Otonova2023 are organised, which I am participating in for the first time.

As someone for whom life would be empty without music, I am even more excited about the Otonova2023 event and looking forward to all the performers taking part.

The course of the first qualification of this block 16B was very interesting and exciting, as we were able to witness the confrontation of participants representing different musical genres and artistic achievements. It was also noticeable that the criteria for choosing to support a particular performer varied widely: admiration for their work, familiarity with a particular performer, following the majority of people.

Congratulations to all the performers taking part in Otonova2023 for their excellent participation! It was a really exciting duel, which in this group resulted in the following outcome:

1. 瀧本りおな (Riona Takimoto)

Congratulations to the 瀧本りおな (Riona Takimoto) for winning first place 🥇 with 14899 points in this first qualifying group and advancing to the next stage. Please continue to give your best  in the future💪 .

Riona Takimoto (nicknamed Rioton) was born 22 August 2000. She has twenty-two years old and she from Hyogo. She is active as a singer mainly in the Kansai region (no office affiliation). She started dancing in the first grade of primary school. When she was in her second year of high school she passed an audition for the musical BELIEVE. She then started her career as a DANCE & VOCAL. After her experience in the second musical 'COSMOS' (also released image song 'Go for it'), her activities were spurred on and she is currently performing 10 live shows a month and appearing regularly on a radio show every Friday.

On 22 August 2019, in commemoration of her 19th birthday, she held a CD (album 'JUST ALIVE' is released) release celebration solo live at amHALL (Umeda, Osaka) to a packed house and a great success.

The birthday one-man live tour scheduled for 22 August 2020 was cancelled due to the new coronavirus, and was held at Soap opera classics-Umeda on a reduced scale, with a smaller audience and distribution. The fans call her 'Rioton'.

Riona is very active on social media and in the media distributing music. For a better understanding of her artistic work, I recommend visiting her account on Tik-Tok (@musicriona), which is followed by more than fifty thousand people. On it, one can observe Riona's other talents, such as dancing, in addition to her good singing. It is also worth visiting her Youtube channel (@user-ld5tm9jv7f/about), where we can see MVs to her original songs or recordings of live performances at concert houses.

2. THE SOUND STAR

In second place with 2355 points was the band THE SOUND STAR 🥈. Congratulations on advancing to the next stage! Please continue to give it your all in the future 💪 .

Formed in 2016 THE SOUND STAR are a junior and senior high school band of three members including two sisters and one brother from Hirakata City, Osaka (An-chan Vocal 2007/08/17 3rd year junior high school girl, Sene Vocal / Keyboard 2005/07/13 2nd year high school girl Osaka School of Music, Akun Drumer 2009/10/8 1st year primary schools boy). The band was selected for the second round of the theme song audition for the popular manga magazine Nakayoshi's popular comic "Dosei, Koi ni shite shimashiru da" (I'm going to fall in love anyway). They were selected as one of the 14 bands that passed the second round of the theme song audition for the popular manga magazine Nakayoshi's "Balloons have flown", and received praise for their music from music producer Yasuhiko Warita, who has provided songs to SMAP, Ken Hirai and others, and has given them special individual guidance. Performed "Centre Lane" with the band on BS Fuji TV. FM Hirakata radio broadcast Strawberry Tart and Centre Lane. Live performance on the street THE SOUND STAR 400 CDs with 5 songs achieved ・Akkun(Drums) Advanced to the third round of the most famous drum magazine in Japan for two consecutive years ・Eggs Daily Running No.1 "THE SOUND STAR/Maji-Kimoi". Their Youtube channel (@TheSoundStar) is well worth a visit, featuring recordings of their live street performances, live broadcast recordings, covers, MVs to original songs.

3. strobolight (Toshiki Kinoshita)

Third place along with 5 points went to strobolight🥉,  , who is the singer and guitarist of a grunge rock band called Radio Wave Boy, based in Tokyo. Toshiki Kinoshita combines singing with simultaneous guitar playing very well. It is worth visiting his Youtube channel (@kinoshit100) to get a better idea of his work. Please continue to give it your all in the future 💪 .

4. 長島 真太郎 (Shintaro Nagashima)

By the decision of the audience, fourth place with no points score went to the 長島 真太郎 (Shintaro Nagashima). Please continue to give it your all in the future 💪 . 

Shintaro Nagashima (real name) live in Iwanai-gun, Hokkaido. He is singer and songwriter and he applied for this audition in search of an objective evaluation of his own singing. He are 7th year working for an electric power company, he is 4th year of marriage  and he is also father of one child.He is champion of his throat pride in Iwanai broadcast on 7/31/2022. 

Everyone in this group proved to be very strong and intriguing, from which it was difficult to choose two performers who . I'm rooting for the winners the 瀧本りおな (Riona Takimoto)and the band THE SOUND STAR and I can't wait to see how they will fare in the Otonova2023 competition.