Thank you for your lesson about BABYMETAL songs in the 1st album. Otsukaresama. Papa Daisuki! I enjoyed to learn English from your explanation. I took all your lessons in the 1st album and expect lessons in the 2nd album.
Highly informative lesson thank you so much. I have gotten through the Hiragana and am now tackling the Katakana along with the first 512 Kanji. It is a hard language to learn but I am not going to give up. Your videos have been extremely helpful and I hope to see many more. Thanks again.
+Duane Metal I have learned a lot and hope to see more in the future. Have fun at Wembly, I will be in Seattle, Washington watching BAND-MAID have their first international concert at Sakura-Con on 26 March.
Thank you for another great session. I was just starting to learn Hiragana and saw a huge mountain in front of me (Katakana, Kanji), but your perspective of looking at the challenge as fun options will keep me going.
+Singulitarian Thank you, and yes, please look at it that way. Kanas are simple, but Kanjis are intriguing to learn for each character has it's history of how it was made.
What an enlightening lesson! Thank you very much, Duane先生 ! I really appreciate your series and I'm enjoying since the very first video! Just met BM in november 2020 and I'm thrilled ^_^ Singing knowing theses little nuances of pronunciation and writing (and of course the proper meaning of the poetics/lyrics of the songs) makes me more excited and encouraged to seek further more on this "mysterious" and "subarashii" culture. Hugs from Brazil!
Bon dia! Thank you for coming, viewing, and nice comment. I'm glad you liked the series. I hope you continue to keep interested in the Japanese language and culture. Obligado!
thanks for making or videos. I'm going to see baby metal in Detroit in about a month. Your channel has helped me more than everything I've found on the internet combined. The way u break done the words and pronounce them slowly makes the words stick in my head. I have already memorized 2 of their songs and I'm working on learning more. Now I will be able to sing along and accually know what they are saying not just understanding the jest of song like I did before finding or channel. I also wanted to know if u might be doing videos and their new song Karate any time soon. Anyway thank u and your channel rules and so do u.
might you be doing more when the new Babymetal cd comes out? I cannot tell you how much this series has meant to me and to my understanding of both Babymetal and the Japanese language!
+Duane Metal If you continue with the series, are you going to touch on the version differences? i.e. the Japanese version has Syncopation while the international version got From Dusk Till Dawn
Amazing lesson, mr. Duane! I've just started to read about alphabets in Japanese and this lesson is very helpful. My closest goal is hiragana. And i'm curious if you get recognized in Japan and other countries? Thank you!
After watching all of you videos I just started to learn Japanese properly. (At least I will try very hard ;) So this was very helpful! Thank You! :) --See you-- in London :D
For me, the sound of フ/ふ is the most difficult to pronounce. That sound is almost always romanized as "fu", but it's often pronounced as "hu". An example: in the romanized lyrics of アカツキ the word あふれて is showed "afurete", but Su always sings "ahurete". I wonder why?
+Gildean Costa One reason is because of the two different systems of Romanization. The other reason is Japanese F sound is not really an F sound of English or other languages. It is bilabial fricative -- the sound you make when you blow out a candle light. So if you keep your mouth a little bit wider, it turns into Hu sound.
AFAIK, there are a few more examples of „syllables“ with special pronounciation. For example, ひ seems to be somewhere in the middle between „hi“ and „shi“, with a hint of a hissing sound, right?
haha I often argue with my son about how to pronounce tofu :-) I am making tofu & vegetable kebabs with peanut sauce tonight. Now I can annoy my son by telling him there are different ways to spell it too :-) Thanks Duane
Duane First I want to say that I really enjoyed your videos thus far and I love it that you take your time to read our comments. That being said, I have a request for you. With the end of the Japanese school year in sight could you please do a video on explaining the Japanese school system, as a future teacher myself I'd find it very interesting. I have searched on the internet myself but I find it pretty confusing. The main thing I don't understand is the following: Yui, Moa and Suzuka were all part of "Sakura Gakuin". What is Sakura Gakuin? Is it a school or only an Idol group but why do they graduate and have tests then? Is it something extra-curricular everyone can choose to do in Japan? Is it a substitute for 'middle school? Please Duane-Sensei, help me understand this and the Japanese education system. Kitsune Up!
+spaagerken Hi Spaagerken san. Thank you for your comments. Yes, it is the time for the end and the start of school years. It is also the time for Sakura blossoms. Well, it's hard for me to explain everything about the Japanese school systems in a ten-minute video. Let me comment only on Sakura gakuin. Sakura gakuin is not a real school. It is a fictitious school made up only on TV. Those "students" -- only girls -- are "supposed" to belong to this school but they are only pretending. (they are not studying any subjects ---- well, they do, but only for TV program purposes.) Sakura gakuin is also the name of a singing group -- they perform on stage. And when any member of a singing group grow older and considered too old to stay in the group, she is naturally pressured to leave the group. We call this "retirement" Sotsugyoo, which means graduation. It doesn't refer to Sakura gakuin only; when any girl singer of any singing group leave the group, we call it Sotsugyoo. Thus, members of BABYMETAL "graduated" from Sakura gakuin because they have outgrown the group, and became the stable members of BM. Not anybody can enter Sakura gakuin. It's a group of talented girls with looks and singing and dancing ability. I assume there is a very strict audition to be selected as a member. A production company called AMUSE produces this group.
+Duane Metal thank you for the reply. I understand now. Have fun in England and at Wembley and I look forward to you analysing Metal Resistance. Kitsune Up
+willough_k Thanks for the extra comment. I've only heard Sakura Gakuin two weeks ago so I was a little confused on what it actually was. Thanks to watching almost every video and your explenations I think I get it now.
I have heard that when learning Japanese it's better to leave kanji alone until you reach intermediate stage. I would appreciate hearing your opinion on this, and thanks for all the videos!
+Braud7777 Yes, I agree. I don't want nobody to get discouraged by Kanji learning at the early stage. But if one is interested in learning Kanjis, there is no reason to stop it.
I am trying hard to pick up certain words/phrases in Japanese and apply them. I am wondering if it is inappropriate or incorrect to use the sentence(?) "Megitsune, cho yabai" when kind of flirting with an attractive woman? (I have a lady friend that I think is very awesomely foxy...lol). I just want to know whether or not if I am doing this correctly.
I'd say it's inappropriate for you to say this into the lady's face. Calling somebody Megitsune can be an insult. Think of an English word "bitch". It literally means "female dog", but it is taken as a word of insult. Usually, nobody wants to be called by a (female) animal. And, "choo yabai" = super cool and sexy, should be used among the boys when the target lady is not in the vicinity. As a word of compliment, you should say, "kirei desu ne" =you're beautiful, "sekusii desu ne" = you're sexy, "iroppoi desu ne" =you're so (sexually) attractive, seductive.
Hi, Duane先生. Thank you for your great lesson as always. I’m heartily thankful to you. But I beg to complain this time!! When you were talking about lengthen marker in Japanese (長音符/“―”), surely you could have referred to the name of “Su-metal”!! What a shame! Lol In fact the topic of her name was what I have been thinking about since before. Because I’m nearly convinced that the majority of non-Japanese-speakers regard the “-” in Su-metal as a mere hyphen. But actually that’s not a hyphen which connects two words, but a Japanese mark which extends its previous sound as you mentioned. That’s why Moametal and Yuimetal don’t have “-” between each their first name and “metal” in their names. Moreover “Su-metal” looks unusual and unique in the point of using Roma-ji, Japanese marker, and English in one name, doesn’t it? Well……and the most important issue…… YOU ARE GOING TO THE UK? God, Jealous!! (omg, is this the origin of one of BM songs called "GJ" in their brand new album?) The show is gonna be nuts! I really hope you will have a supreme time. I will lovingly cheer for you and BM from live-viewing venue in early morning rather than midnight in Japan(^o^)/ And report about the show maybe in the next video pleeeease. P.S. Forgive me of my terrible English every time, but I think I’m supposed to try to use English for foreign people watching your channel (when I talk about Japanese language/culture especially).
+sho-ta Blue Yes, yes, I was thinking about it, but if I started to talk about Su-metal, the video might have gotten too long, and if I touch it, I have to explain why it's not Sumetal, but Su-metal, and that's another story. Sorry.... : r
I have been wondering quite some time why Su-Metal is the only one being spelled with a hyphen, until some day it suddenly struck me and I mentally facepalmed myself.
Hi, duane先生. How are you doing? I’m certain that you had a fantastic night at Wembley arena. I myself went to the live-viewing venue witnessing that marvelous show with excitement and deep emotion as well. One of the most impressing stuffs for me was the words of greeting at the end of the show told by Su-metal. Quoting from lyrics of “THE ONE”, she said “Remember. We are always on your side”, right? To me, her words sounded like a little sentimental and with all her hearted. I was sooo touched by that. What was the atmosphere like at Wembley arena? Anyway, please take a rest enough, and if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, please allow me to wait for your new video (leisurely), in which you maybe mention the groundbreaking show or lyrics of songs in brand new album. Thank you always.
+sho-ta Blue Hi Shota-Blue. I'm back from London, but to tell you the truth, I missed the show! My work circumstances didn't allow me to stay in London until the beginning of April (I was there on business anyway.) Lucky are you to be able to witness the grandeur of the Wembley show live. Yes, I'll do what I can to meet the expectations of BM fans.
+Duane Metal Did you?? That’s too bad, sorry. I understand “the circumstances of work” when l look back at myself (T_T) I’m always wondering how some of the people can go to all of the concerts or music festivals in Japan and abroad which BM appears in (^_^;) Let’s aim the next chance!
Thank you for your lesson about BABYMETAL songs in the 1st album.
Otsukaresama. Papa Daisuki! I enjoyed to learn English from your explanation. I took all your lessons in the 1st album and expect
lessons in the 2nd album.
Thank you for being a fan of my video lessons. Please keep watching and I'll try my best to satisfy the audience including many Japanese.
Highly informative lesson thank you so much. I have gotten through the Hiragana and am now tackling the Katakana along with the first 512 Kanji. It is a hard language to learn but I am not going to give up. Your videos have been extremely helpful and I hope to see many more. Thanks again.
+Flastew Thank you for being patient. I admire your ambition. See it my way, and it becomes fun. :-)
Yes, I have learned more through your videos than any books I have. Thanks for making this a fun experience.
Good Luck on your Wembley trip. Hope you and the girls both have a great gig.
+Duane Metal I have learned a lot and hope to see more in the future. Have fun at Wembly, I will be in Seattle, Washington watching BAND-MAID have their first international concert at Sakura-Con on 26 March.
+John Winner Good, have fun!
Can't wait for your videos for the new album Duane. :)
See you at Wembley Duane! I'll be sure to find you and thank you for these great lessons!
Thank you for another great session. I was just starting to learn Hiragana and saw a huge mountain in front of me (Katakana, Kanji), but your perspective of looking at the challenge as fun options will keep me going.
+Singulitarian Thank you, and yes, please look at it that way. Kanas are simple, but Kanjis are intriguing to learn for each character has it's history of how it was made.
What an enlightening lesson! Thank you very much, Duane先生 ! I really appreciate your series and I'm enjoying since the very first video! Just met BM in november 2020 and I'm thrilled ^_^
Singing knowing theses little nuances of pronunciation and writing (and of course the proper meaning of the poetics/lyrics of the songs) makes me more excited and encouraged to seek further more on this "mysterious" and "subarashii" culture.
Hugs from Brazil!
Bon dia! Thank you for coming, viewing, and nice comment. I'm glad you liked the series. I hope you continue to keep interested in the Japanese language and culture. Obligado!
I'll certainly be looking for you at Wembley.
I would be honoured if I could meet you. ^_^
+S kildert I'm already in London.
I know ひらがな and カタカナ, and I'm a third of the way through learning 漢字. I'm not giving up! The complexity is a strength once you understand it!
+alphaknave Yeah!!!! Way to go!
thanks for making or videos. I'm going to see baby metal in Detroit in about a month. Your channel has helped me more than everything I've found on the internet combined. The way u break done the words and pronounce them slowly makes the words stick in my head. I have already memorized 2 of their songs and I'm working on learning more. Now I will be able to sing along and accually know what they are saying not just understanding the jest of song like I did before finding or channel. I also wanted to know if u might be doing videos and their new song Karate any time soon. Anyway thank u and your channel rules and so do u.
+bucky459er Thank you. I'll try to meet you expectations as much as I can.
Hope you will have a good trip and enjoy the concert! :3
might you be doing more when the new Babymetal cd comes out? I cannot tell you how much this series has meant to me and to my understanding of both Babymetal and the Japanese language!
+scott steele Voices like yours are hard for me to ignore.......
+Duane Metal If you continue with the series, are you going to touch on the version differences? i.e. the Japanese version has Syncopation while the international version got From Dusk Till Dawn
Right. I didn't realize that until recently. Hmmm.. I must listen to them both.
From Dusk Till Dawn is one of my favourites but I wish I also had Syncopation, I don't think I've ever heard it in full.
Amazing lesson, mr. Duane! I've just started to read about alphabets in Japanese and this lesson is very helpful. My closest goal is hiragana.
And i'm curious if you get recognized in Japan and other countries?
Thank you!
Good. がんばってください．Me? Recognized? No, nobody knows me except the subscribers of this channel.
Great you will go to London :)
After watching all of you videos I just started to learn Japanese properly. (At least I will try very hard ;) So this was very helpful! Thank You! :) --See you-- in London :D
+Stefan Hary That's very good to hear. Hang in there!
+Duane Metal Yes I will! :)
Challange accepted, I will find u!
Kitsune up
For me, the sound of フ/ふ is the most difficult to pronounce. That sound is almost always romanized as "fu", but it's often pronounced as "hu". An example: in the romanized lyrics of アカツキ the word あふれて is showed "afurete", but Su always sings "ahurete". I wonder why?
+Gildean Costa One reason is because of the two different systems of Romanization. The other reason is Japanese F sound is not really an F sound of English or other languages. It is bilabial fricative -- the sound you make when you blow out a candle light. So if you keep your mouth a little bit wider, it turns into Hu sound.
+Duane Metal Oh! I got it!! Great explanation. Thank you.
AFAIK, there are a few more examples of „syllables“ with special pronounciation. For example, ひ seems to be somewhere in the middle between „hi“ and „shi“, with a hint of a hissing sound, right?
Interesting lesson. Thank you. I've been enjoying the new single Karate! How about you Duane?
+Copper Whiskers No, I haven't. I'm waiting for the album to be delivered to me in ten days.
+Duane Metal Everything I can find says April 1 release date worldwide. Do the members of the fan club get it early?
No, everybody gets one at the same time.
haha I often argue with my son about how to pronounce tofu :-) I am making tofu & vegetable kebabs with peanut sauce tonight. Now I can annoy my son by telling him there are different ways to spell it too :-) Thanks Duane
+Rainbow Skye Actually, the sour of "f" is not like the English f, it is the sound when you blow out a candle. Is't that interesting? Practice some.
Duane
First I want to say that I really enjoyed your videos thus far and I love it that you take your time to read our comments. That being said, I have a request for you.
With the end of the Japanese school year in sight could you please do a video on explaining the Japanese school system, as a future teacher myself I'd find it very interesting.
I have searched on the internet myself but I find it pretty confusing. The main thing I don't understand is the following: Yui, Moa and Suzuka were all part of "Sakura Gakuin". What is Sakura Gakuin? Is it a school or only an Idol group but why do they graduate and have tests then? Is it something extra-curricular everyone can choose to do in Japan? Is it a substitute for 'middle school?
Please Duane-Sensei, help me understand this and the Japanese education system.
Kitsune Up!
+spaagerken Hi Spaagerken san. Thank you for your comments. Yes, it is the time for the end and the start of school years. It is also the time for Sakura blossoms. Well, it's hard for me to explain everything about the Japanese school systems in a ten-minute video. Let me comment only on Sakura gakuin.
Sakura gakuin is not a real school. It is a fictitious school made up only on TV. Those "students" -- only girls -- are "supposed" to belong to this school but they are only pretending. (they are not studying any subjects ---- well, they do, but only for TV program purposes.) Sakura gakuin is also the name of a singing group -- they perform on stage. And when any member of a singing group grow older and considered too old to stay in the group, she is naturally pressured to leave the group. We call this "retirement" Sotsugyoo, which means graduation. It doesn't refer to Sakura gakuin only; when any girl singer of any singing group leave the group, we call it Sotsugyoo. Thus, members of BABYMETAL "graduated" from Sakura gakuin because they have outgrown the group, and became the stable members of BM.
Not anybody can enter Sakura gakuin. It's a group of talented girls with looks and singing and dancing ability. I assume there is a very strict audition to be selected as a member. A production company called AMUSE produces this group.
+Duane Metal thank you for the reply. I understand now. Have fun in England and at Wembley and I look forward to you analysing Metal Resistance.
Kitsune Up
+willough_k Thanks for the extra comment. I've only heard Sakura Gakuin two weeks ago so I was a little confused on what it actually was. Thanks to watching almost every video and your explenations I think I get it now.
See you at Wembley Duane ;)
I have heard that when learning Japanese it's better to leave kanji alone until you reach intermediate stage. I would appreciate hearing your opinion on this, and thanks for all the videos!
+Braud7777 Yes, I agree. I don't want nobody to get discouraged by Kanji learning at the early stage. But if one is interested in learning Kanjis, there is no reason to stop it.
I am trying hard to pick up certain words/phrases in Japanese and apply them. I am wondering if it is inappropriate or incorrect to use the sentence(?) "Megitsune, cho yabai" when kind of flirting with an attractive woman? (I have a lady friend that I think is very awesomely foxy...lol). I just want to know whether or not if I am doing this correctly.
I'd say it's inappropriate for you to say this into the lady's face. Calling somebody Megitsune can be an insult. Think of an English word "bitch". It literally means "female dog", but it is taken as a word of insult. Usually, nobody wants to be called by a (female) animal. And, "choo yabai" = super cool and sexy, should be used among the boys when the target lady is not in the vicinity. As a word of compliment, you should say, "kirei desu ne" =you're beautiful, "sekusii desu ne" = you're sexy, "iroppoi desu ne" =you're so (sexually) attractive, seductive.
Duane Metal Thank you again! Clearly, I have an enormous amount more to learn. I appreciate your taking the time to set me straight. :-)
Hi, Duane先生. Thank you for your great lesson as always. I’m heartily thankful to you. But I beg to complain this time!! When you were talking about lengthen marker in Japanese (長音符/“―”), surely you could have referred to the name of “Su-metal”!! What a shame! Lol
In fact the topic of her name was what I have been thinking about since before. Because I’m nearly convinced that the majority of non-Japanese-speakers regard the “-” in Su-metal as a mere hyphen. But actually that’s not a hyphen which connects two words, but a Japanese mark which extends its previous sound as you mentioned.
That’s why Moametal and Yuimetal don’t have “-” between each their first name and “metal” in their names.
Moreover “Su-metal” looks unusual and unique in the point of using Roma-ji, Japanese marker, and English in one name, doesn’t it?
Well……and the most important issue…… YOU ARE GOING TO THE UK? God, Jealous!! (omg, is this the origin of one of BM songs called "GJ" in their brand new album?) The show is gonna be nuts! I really hope you will have a supreme time. I will lovingly cheer for you and BM from live-viewing venue in early morning rather than midnight in Japan(^o^)/ And report about the show maybe in the next video pleeeease.
P.S. Forgive me of my terrible English every time, but I think I’m supposed to try to use English for foreign people watching your channel (when I talk about Japanese language/culture especially).
+sho-ta Blue Yes, yes, I was thinking about it, but if I started to talk about Su-metal, the video might have gotten too long, and if I touch it, I have to explain why it's not Sumetal, but Su-metal, and that's another story. Sorry.... : r
I have been wondering quite some time why Su-Metal is the only one being spelled with a hyphen, until some day it suddenly struck me and I mentally facepalmed myself.
Hi, duane先生. How are you doing? I’m certain that you had a fantastic night at Wembley arena.
I myself went to the live-viewing venue witnessing that marvelous show with excitement and deep emotion as well. One of the most impressing stuffs for me was the words of greeting at the end of the show told by Su-metal. Quoting from lyrics of “THE ONE”, she said “Remember. We are always on your side”, right? To me, her words sounded like a little sentimental and with all her hearted. I was sooo touched by that. What was the atmosphere like at Wembley arena? Anyway, please take a rest enough, and if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, please allow me to wait for your new video (leisurely), in which you maybe mention the groundbreaking show or lyrics of songs in brand new album. Thank you always.
+sho-ta Blue Hi Shota-Blue. I'm back from London, but to tell you the truth, I missed the show! My work circumstances didn't allow me to stay in London until the beginning of April (I was there on business anyway.) Lucky are you to be able to witness the grandeur of the Wembley show live. Yes, I'll do what I can to meet the expectations of BM fans.
+Duane Metal
Did you?? That’s too bad, sorry.
I understand “the circumstances of work” when l look back at myself (T_T)
I’m always wondering how some of the people can go to all of the concerts or music festivals in Japan and abroad which BM appears in (^_^;)
Let’s aim the next chance!