Guide / Reference for Japanese album credits

[Nisto]

Abbreviations
Please note that these are not conclusive lists - one abbreviation could refer to more than what's listed here

General
OP = Opening
ED = Ending
M = Music
CV = Character Voice
OST = Original Soundtrack / Original Sound Track
OSV = Original Sound Version
MV = Music Video

Roles and instruments
Con / Cond = Conductor
G / Gt / Gtr = Guitar
E. Gt / Eg = Electric Guitar
A. Gt / Ag = Acoustic Guitar
Vo = Vocal
Cho = Chorus
Ba / Bs = Bass
EB = Electric Bass
Cb = Contrabass
Wb = Wood bass
Ob = Oboe
Tp = Trumpet
Cla = Clarinet
Fag = Fagotto
Hn / Hr = Horn
Fr Horn = French Horn
Sax = Saxophone
A. Sax = Alto Saxophone
B. Sax = Bariton Saxophone
T. Sax = Tenor Saxophone
Fl / Flu = Flute
Dr = Drums
Per / Perc = Percussion
Cperc / Cla Perc / C.P = Classic Percussion
Lat / Lpc = Latin Percussion
Tb = Trombone
Pf / Pt = Piano(forte)
Apf / A. Piano = Acoustic Piano(forte)
Ep = Electric Piano
Key = Keyboard
Syn = Synthesizer
St = String
Vn / Vl / Vln = Violin
Va / Vla = Viola
Vc / Vlc = Violincello


Japanese credits

General
曲目 = Tracklist
オープニングテーマ / オープニング主題歌 = Opening theme
エンディングテーマ / エンディング主題歌 = Ending theme
挿入歌 = Insert Song (fictional)
劇中歌 = Performed Song (theatrical)
アルバム = Album
オリジナルサウンドトラック = Original Soundtrack
オリジナルサウンドヴァージョン / オリジナルサウンドバージョン = Original Sound Version
オリジナル・カラオケ = Original Karaoke
アニメーション = Animation
ドラマ = Drama

Production
音楽 = Music
曲 = Track / Music / Song
作曲 = Composition
編曲 = Arrangement
作編曲 = Composition and arrangement
作詞 / 詩 = Lyrics
歌 / 唄 = Song (Vocals)
作曲者不明 = Unknown composer
(音響)効果 = Sound effects
合唱団 / 合唱 / コーラス = Chorus
演奏 / 出演 = Performance
訳 = Translation
訳詞 = Lyric translation
英訳 = English translation
アレンジ = Arrange
ボーカル / ヴォーカル = Vocals
ナレーション = Narration
サウンド = Sound
オーケストラ = Orchestra
ゲスト・ミュージシャン = Guest Musicians
ミュージック = Music

Staff
発売元 = Publisher
販売元 = Distributor
販売協力 = Cooperating Distributor
脚本 = Screenplay / Scenario Writer
音響監督 = Sound Director
音響プロデュース = Sound Produce(r)
監修 = Supervision
演出 / 制作 = Production
協力 = Co-operation
原案 = Original Draft
キャスト = Cast
ディレクター / ディレクタ = Director
ミキシング = Mixing
プロデュース = Produce(r)
イラスト = Illust(ration)

Instruments
口琴 = Harmonica
尺八 = Shakuhachi
三味線 = Shamisen
鼓 = Drums
篳篥 = Hichiriki
篠笛 = Shinobue
琴 = Koto
琵琶 = Biwa
津軽三味線 = Tsugaru-jamisen
笙 = Shō
高麗笛 = Komabue
竜笛 = Ryuteki
二胡 = Erhu
鉄琴 = Glockenspiel
鉦鼓 = Shōko
能管 = Nokan
摺鉦 = Surigane
大鼓 = Otsuzumi / Ohkawa
木琴 = Xylophone
ストリングス / 弦 = Strings
キーボード = Keyboard
フルート = Flute
ギター = Guitar
ベース = Bass
コントラバス = Contrabass
ドラム = Drums
パーカッション = Percussion
ブラス = Brass
マンドリン = Mandolin
アコーデイオン = Accordion
ピアノ = Piano
ピアニカ = Pianica (Melodica)
オーボエ = Oboe
クラリネット = Clarinet
ホルン = Horn
サックス / サクソフォーン = Sax / Saxophone
チューバ = Tuba
トランペット = Trumpet
セロ / チェロ = Cello
トロンボーン = Trombone
ヴィオラ = Viola
バイオリン・ソロ = Violin Solo
シンセサイザー = Synthesizer
マンドール = Mandore
バスーン = Bassoon
ファゴット = Fagotto
フィドル = Fiddle
イングリッシュホルン = English Horn
コーラングレ / コール・アングレ = Cor anglais
カヤグム = Kayagum
ホーメイ = Khoomei
イギル = Igil
アナラポス = Analapos
ヘグム = Haegeum
ケンガリ = Kengari
チャッパ = Chappa
チャンゴ = Janggu



Looking up Japanese characters

First of all, you need to know what it is you're looking at. The main character sets you need to focus on are kanji, hiragana and katakana. I'm no expert at describing the differences and so on, but in my eyes, I'd definitely say hiragana is curvy, and both kanji and katakana have pretty linear strokes in comparison. Katakana does look kanji-like in some cases, but doesn't really have any character with more than 2 or 3 strokes (= doesn't have too many details). And as you may figure, the kanji table consists mostly of 3+ stroke characters, so ultimately you can think like this:

Hiragana and Katakana: Consider the differences between hiragana あうもよつ vs katakana アウモヨツ. As you might see, the hiragana characters clearly have more curvy edges and is seldom as linear as katakana (definitely so, when viewed with sans-serif fonts at least). And also: none of these examples have more strokes than 3.

Kanji: Does it have more than 3 strokes (あ, も, ウ, モ, ヨ, ツ are all examples of hiragana/katakana-only characters with 3 strokes (tip: try to count the strokes))? Then you're most likely looking for a kanji. One thing that may also help, is to memorize kanji with 1-3 strokes, so that you don't go looking for hiragana / katakana in a kanji table, or the other way around.

One last thing to note: some kanji looks scarily alike katakana (e.g. katakana タ vs kanji 夕). If you don't know the language at all, you ofcourse can't know which one's right in the context, so you should definitely try to actually translate the sentence with an automated translator to make sure that nothing is left untranslated, like "abcタdef" or something (in which case, you most likely copied the wrong character).

The hiragana and katakana scripts, as stated above, has few characters (in comparison to kanji at least), so they can be found allover the net, presented in different ways. I personally prefer to just look up the tables on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana

But if you know kana well, you can generate the characters directly from romaji to hiragana and katakana here (http://www.mauvecloud.net/charsets/kanagenerator.html).



For kanji, it is obviously a bit more complicated, especially depending on the number of strokes it has. You should also be aware that sites / programs could very well be missing a character you're looking for.

The way I've gotten used to looking up kanji, is to count the strokes. I recommend looking at stroke animations of a few simpler kanji, and when you think you've got the hang of how most details are drawn (e.g. square boxes have 3 strokes, etc.), you shouldn't have too much trouble counting strokes. When it's simply too hard to see all the strokes, you probably want to resort to other methods, and I couldn't recommend using radicals enough (in which case counting strokes also becomes very useful).

I often use these sites when going by the number of strokes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_kanji_by_stroke_count
http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-bin/wwwjdic.cgi?1B

It is also possible to look characters up by combining radicals to narrow down the search. When I started this thread, I personally wasn't aware how it was done, but luckily a tutorial was generously made by dancey (http://vgmdb.net/forums/showpost.php?p=28393#post28393)
Sites and programs that can be used to do this:
WWWJDIC (http://edrdg.org/cgi-bin/wwwjdic/wwwjdic?1R) (web)
Jisho (http://jisho.org/kanji/radicals/) (web)
JquickTrans (http://postmeta.com/) (software)
WaKan (http://wakan.manga.cz/) (software)
Tagaini Jisho (http://tagaini.net/manual) (software)

However, there are definitely more ways than that. You can also try to have an OCR service identify the character(s) by uploading a picture: http://appsv.ocrgrid.org/nhocr/. Unfortunately, it is not always successful in recognizing it, and often fails, depending on the quality of the picture, and the font style. You should also try using different recognition methods when it fails to recognize something, even though they might not be meant to be used for the type of picture you upload. Doing this has helped me a few times when it otherwise fails.

But it isn't over yet: you can also draw the character.
http://nciku.com has a pretty good tool which has actually worked good for me plenty of times! Be aware, though: they list some Chinese characters, too, and you wouldn't want to mix a Chinese character with a kanji!
http://kanji.sljfaq.org is another alternative, but it has not worked as good as nciku's tool for me.
http://chasen.org/~taku/software/ajax/hwr/ I got this suggestion from dancey, and I haven't tried it





If there's something important I forgot, or if there is something to correct, please let me know!

[Secret Squirrel]

I've seen "Pf" for piano (aka Pianoforte).

[Nisto]

I've seen "Pf" for piano (aka Pianoforte).

Added :) What's the simple shortened version of just Piano though? I'm certain I've seen one somewhere.

Also, I vaguely remember "Perc" (percussion) being used somewhere, but can someone verify the abbreviation?

[Blitz Lunar]

most likely it'd be Pno.
also Perc is frequently used for Percussion, yeah.

[Nisto]

Hasn't "Pi." been used for piano?

[Dag]

Good idea.

Other JP stuff that may be useful:
演奏: performance
作編曲: composition and arrangement
音楽: music
効果: (sound) effects
サウンド: sound (generic)
アレンジ: arrange (generic)
ヴォーカル/ボーカル: vocals
唄: song (uncommon) (this and 歌 refer to vocals)

This page (http://www.restructures.net/instruments.htm) contains a bunch of abbreviations, but probably not all correspond to what is used in Japanese booklets.

[AcidBeast]

Sometimes the instruments/music staff are in katakana, here are some:

キーボード (keyboard)
フルート (flute)
ギター (Guitar)
ベース (Bass)
ドラム (Drums)
パーカッション (percussion)
コーラス (chorus)
オーケストラ (orchestra)
ブラス (brass)
マンドリン (mandolin)
アコーデイオン (accordion)
ピアノ (Piano)
ストリングス (Strings)
オーボエ (oboe)
クラリネット (clarinet)
ホルン (horn)
トランペット (trumpet)
トロンボーン (trombone)
バイオリン・ソロ (Violin Solo)
ボーカル / ヴォーカル (vocal)
ナレーション (narration)
ミキシング (mixing)
プロデュース (producer)
シンセサイザー (Synthesizer)
ゲスト・ミュージシャン (Guest Musicians)

[Nisto]

Here's another site with some abbreviations:
http://www.edition-peters.com/music/guide.php

[Xenofan 29A]

Here, on pp. 7-8, (http://vgmdb.net/album/19776) Lat. is used to refer to latin percussion.

[Cedille]

鼓 = Drums
It should be judged on a case by case basis, but I think this is basically supposed to represent more traditional Japanese percussions, and like Taiko, I think it's the best to keep it in Romaji (Tsuzumi).

One of the most oddest I ever came across is "Prog" (see this scan (http://vgmdb.net/db/covers.php?do=view&cover=97656)). Progressive Rock Arrangement, maybe?

[Gigablah]

I was under the impression that "prog" was short for "programming" (e.g. synthesizer programming).

[Nisto]

AcidBeast suggested the Kanji for me. She said it was specifically "hand drums". But the hand part was apparently not so important, so I decided to leave it out. She also said she had only seen it used in a booklet once, so maybe we should leave it out for now?

[Carl]

A good reference, nice idea Nisto.
And ditto what Blah said (prog = programming)

[Cedille]

I was under the impression that "prog" was short for "programming" (e.g. synthesizer programming).

How couldn't I think of that *facepalm*

She also said she had only seen it used in a booklet once, so maybe we should leave it out for now?
If your list is intended for reference, it's okay. I suggested keeping it Romaji (like Taiko) if you translate the performance credits from Japanese to English. Some instruments such as 二胡 is fine to replace by the English name like Erhu, though.

[Nisto]

I just saw 初回封入特典, on a sticker (http://vgmdb.net/db/covers.php?do=view&cover=14723). Does this indeed simply mean first print?

[Xenofan 29A]

It means first print (初回) pack-in (封入) bonus item (特典).

[Nisto]

I added a little tutorial on looking up Japanese characters. Any expert; feel free to revise it, heh.

[Cedille]

アナラボス = Anarabosu

It has to be アナラポス / Analapos, I think. A very rare instrument created by a Japanese.
http://www.akiosuzuki.com/web/profile01.html
http://www.geocities.jp/city_memo/kaneda/ana.htm

[Nisto]

It has to be アナラポス / Analapos, I think. A very rare instrument created by a Japanese.
http://www.akiosuzuki.com/web/profile01.html
http://www.geocities.jp/city_memo/kaneda/ana.htm

Good catch. I've gone ahead and changed it.

[dancey]

It might also be worth noting the katakana for "Drama" (dorama). There is also this site that I've used but I think it's weighted more on the stroke count and less on the OCR of the kanji:

http://chasen.org/~taku/software/ajax/hwr/

I am at work write now but I wouldn't mind screenshotting a simple guide on how to use jQuickTrans to rebuild kanji. I do this all the time

[dancey]

Another common katakana I see in booklets is "Irasuto" which is short for Illustration.

[Nisto]

I've added Illustration and Drama. I'll add the link, too.

If you could do a tutorial on compiling via radicals, that'd be great! I'd like to get more experienced in that, too.

[dancey]

Sure, I'll work on that tonight when I get home!

[Dag]

For drama cds:
キャスト: cast (voice actors)
出演: 'cast', 'appearance/performance' more or less, I've seen it used to credit the voice actors in talk tracks. Not sure if it also applies to drama tracks.

Also maybe this could help:
曲: music, song. This is the generic term for a musical piece.

[Xenofan 29A]

If you're adding Japanese traditional instruments (they show up very, very rarely, of course), I've got these, which I'm sure have all shown up in video game/anime scores.

篳篥: Hichiriki
篠笛: Shinobue
琴: Koto

Edit: I'm not so sure that I've seen them used (other than samples in Okami and such) but:

琵琶: Biwa
津軽三味線: Tsugaru-jamisen (Something like a shamisen made of snake skin rather than cat skin)

[Nisto]

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. All added.
Xenofan 29A: I was actually suggested to add more rarely used instruments, so it doesn't matter what kind they are.

[Xenofan 29A]

Well, then I've got a few more. Again, I've only heard these sampled in VGM, to my knowledge, but they are used in Okami and Okamiden, for sure.

笙 : Shō
高麗笛 : Komabue
竜笛 : Ryuteki
鉦鼓 : Shōko

[Cedille]

ピアノ = Piano
オーボエ = Oboe
クラリネット = Clarinet
ホルン = Horn
トランペット = Trumpet
トロンボーン = Trombone

If you're covering those major ones, here are missing;

フィドル = Fiddle
ヴィオラ = Viola
セロ/チェロ = Cello
コントラバス = Contrabass
チューバ = Tuba
バスーン = Bassoon
サックス/サクソフォーン = Sax / Saxophone
ファゴット = Fagotto
イングリッシュホルン = English Horn
コーラングレ/コール・アングレ = Cor anglais

二胡 = Erhu
鉄琴 = Glockenspiel
木琴 = Xylophone

[Xenofan 29A]

Of course, an English Horn is a Cor anglais, just as a Fagotto is a Bassoon, so they should be grouped together.

Also, 木琴 can mean an orchestral Xylophone, but it can also mean a traditional Japanese variety, and in those cases would be translated Mokkin.

[Cedille]

I listed them separately since I thought we should go with Fiddle not Violin if it's フィドル which is printed on the booklet, but there might be some discretionary selecting between bassoon and fagotto (my musical knowledge is rather limited and I'm not the best person to talk about this =p).

it can also mean a traditional Japanese variety
There are some plucked percussions included in Japanese traditional music, but I feel they are generally called Koto. I do think 木琴 can include some variations such as Marimba or Kalimba, but can't think of an instrument that can't be called anything but Mokkin. Then again, I'm not the best person to talk such and you'd know more.

[Xenofan 29A]

I listed them separately since I thought we should go with Fiddle not Violin if it's フィドル which is printed on the booklet, but there might be some discretionary selecting between bassoon and fagotto (my musical knowledge is rather limited and I'm not the best person to talk about this =p).

There are some plucked percussions included in Japanese traditional music, but I feel they are generally called Koto. I do think 木琴 can include some variations such as Marimba or Kalimba, but can't think of an instrument that can't be called anything but Mokkin. Then again, I'm not the best person to talk such and you'd know more.

Here. (http://books.google.com/books?id=WNEp7_mGltQC&pg=PA64&dq=Japanese+Traditional+Music+Mokkin&hl=en&ei=fQZ4TYGMEcOclgeN1KX4Bw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CEkQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=Japanese%20Traditional%20Music%20Mokkin&f=false) Whew, that was a lot tougher than I thought it'd be.

[dancey]

This guide is intended for those with little to moderate understanding of the Japanese language. It is by no means comprehensive and may very well be inaccurate in areas. Please feel free to correct or improve portions of it.

An Illustrative Guide to Radical Lookup

Preface

Software Used in this Guide: jQuickTrans (http://www.postmeta.com/)

Kanji, literally translated, means chinese characters and are an integral part of the Japanese writing system. You can read all about the history, variations and the differences between Chinese and Japanese kanji here. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanji)

Radicals are the components of kanji characters. Each individual kanji can be made up of one or more radicals. There are 7 basic radicals which vary based on the position in which the radical is located.


hen (left side)
tsukuri (right side)
kanmuri (top)
ashi (bottom)
tare (left+top)
nyo (left+bottom)
kamae (box)


There are 200+ different radicals, each with it's own definition. The definition of a radical can often times hint towards the definition of the kanji it builds. For more information on radicals, click here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_(Chinese_character)). For an index of radicals, click here (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Chinese_radical_index).

You can rebuild any kanji using radical lookup and, in the context of this site and this guide, you can use it to lookup single characters, words, recreate entire sentences or pages or anything you're interested in understanding. That being said, for someone with a basic understanding of the Japanese language and unfamiliarity with different radicals, this can be a very time consuming process. It is most useful for looking up (or verifying) proper names for album credits when you cannot find a Japanese webpage with credit information either due to the age or popularity of the album.

Looking up Radicals with jQuickTrans

In jQuickTrans there are 3 main sections of the program. The topmost section is the input area, the bottom left section is the kanji info section and the bottom right section is the dictionary section.

http://dancey.pairsite.com/img/radicalLookup/jQuickTrans01.png

For the purpose of this guide you'll want to focus on the lower left side of jQuickTrans. By default, the radical lookup pane is hidden, so you will need to enable it by clicking the "Radical Lookup" button next to the Print icon on the kanji info section or by clicking Options --> Kanji Info --> Radical Lookup.

The radical lookup section mirrors the radical index numbers noted in the wiki link above, which is ordered by stroke count. The numbers within the kanji info pane indicate the number of strokes required to draw that radical.

All you need to do to lookup kanji is click on a radical (or a combination of radicals) in the radical pane and the kanji info section will populate with kanji that have that radical or combination of radicals.

So let's start with an example. I'll use "Sakimoto Hitoshi" ("崎元 仁") as a simple example. You may want to increase the default 200 kanji results to something higher in order to pull more results. This is particularly useful if your kanji only has one or two radicals because your kanji info pane could be populated with a large number of kanji. It is also useful to sort by the column labeled "Frequency", the lower the number the more frequent that kanji appears in writing and common dialogue.

Starting with the left-most kanji you can immediately recognize 3 radicals: the "山" left-most radical, the "大" right-top kanji, and the "口" on the bottom right. I find it easiest to start with radicals that I recognize first (often the simplest) and work my way towards harder/more complex radicals as the list becomes more and more filtered. So the most simple radical I see in that is "口", so find the "口" in the radical list and click it. You now have a populated list of kanji in your info pane that contain the "口" radical.

Now let's move on to another radical that is easily recognizable, the "山" shaped radical. So find the "山" radical in the radical pane and click it. You can see the size of the list has been noticeably reduced by the size of the scroll bar. You can also see that at the top of the list, since you sort by frequency, you see the kanji that you're looking for ("崎")! You don't even need to enter the other radical(s).

Once you find the radical you're looking for, you can click and drag the kanji from the kanji info section to the input section to save it for later use or to build more of the word(s) you're trying to build.

So the same process applies to the second kanji. Press the "x" button to clear the radical lookup results and start by trying to identify some radicals in the kanji. In this case, you have a very simple kanji and these kanji are often the ones that are most difficult to find. You see there is a "一" radical and a "几" radical. If you click the "一" radical, you'll see that there are literally thousands of possibilities for this radical. So now you need to look for the "几" radical. If you click that, your list is filtered to one result, wait what? That's not the kanji you're looking for! That means you've picked the wrong radicals, so let's go back to our radical index and see if you can find a better match. Often times this means either taking what you thought was a complex radical and breaking it down into multiple simple radicals or taking multiple simple radicals and combining them into a more complex radical.

So you had two relatively simple radicals, clear the list and let's start from scratch! Let's try to break it down into even more simple radicals. You can't break the single line radical down any further so maybe you can break down the "几" radical. If you look in the radical index there is a "mans legs" radical (儿), which could work. Click that and let's see what happens. Looks like right off the bat you got a better hit than you did using the "几" The 5th most frequent radical (先) is really close to what we're looking. Let's try clicking the "一" radical again. This time your list is much shorter but again, you don't see anything in the list that resembles what you're looking for. Let's try removing the "一" radical and going back to the kanji to identify additional radicals. All we have left are the line at the top and the line above the "儿" radical, so maybe we can combine these two radicals into a "二" radical. If you click the "二" radical and look in the list, the 3rd most frequent kanji is exactly what we're looking for ("元"). Now you've rebuilt the last name and can use that for searching ("崎元").

The third kanji follows the same principle. You see 3 radicals in this one, two "一" (or maybe one "二") and "彳" We already know from the previous kanji that maybe it's a good idea to try and start with "二" radical, so filter on that first. There's still a lot of kanji in the info panel, though. If you scroll down the list a bit you will find the kanji we're looking for. You can also filter further by using "彳" and you see "仁" in the 4th most frequent position.

Now that we've rebuilt the radical you now have something you can type into search engines and hopefully find out how to pronounce it. Do not rely on the jQuickTrans dictionary for name translation. You can actually change the dictionary from "edict" to "Proper Names" and get names for the kanji in the input section but for many Japanese names there can be a LOT of variation in pronunciation. It's best to try and find websites that clarify the kanji with hiragana to get a correct romanization.

Remarks

The more you lookup kanji using radical lookup the more familiar you will become with the individual radicals themselves and it will reduce the time you spent trial-and-erroring and scrolling through the kanji info list.

Some things to note as I've been doing this for a few years now:

- The "一" radical pretty unreliable. Sometimes I see it included in kanji that it shouldn't be included in at all (?) and it's just so simple it's often misleading as to the true representation of the radical.
- Some radicals have a vastly different individual radical representation than how they are represented in kanji. The "彳" radical is always used on the right but the straight radical representation is misleading (at least in the application) if you are doing this by character recognition alone.
- There are a handful of complex common radicals in the 6-9 stroke range that are misleading if you're not familiar with radicals. A good example is "自" and "首". You can spend a lot of time piecing together radicals and never finding a kanji if you're not using the right ones, so if all lookups keep coming up empty, try looking at more complex radical combinations.
- There are a handful of simple kanji you should familiarize yourself with so you don't have to do radical lookups for single radical kanji. Good examples are "一", "八", "十", "几", "中", and "口". These can be a pain to lookup because you end up having to scroll through hundreds of kanji looking for something simple.
- Often times if I'm having a hard time identifying radicals I will put in one simple radical in the kanji and scroll through the list and see if I can find anything that resembles the kanji I'm looking for and look at the radicals that it's composed of. This might clue you in to a radical you're not identifying properly.
- The jQuickTrans program it looks like isn't really being supported or maintained anymore (hence freeware... I think I paid 30$ for it 7-8 years ago). I've noticed some rather unfortunate bugs in the software using Windows 7 likely related to comparability and such. There is a clipboard link option which is helpful because it will automatically pull your clipboard into the input area, but sometimes it just stops working. There's also some error messages every once and a while. Just reload the app and you should be fine.

As an aside, you can use these instructions to rebuild kanji in any application and I believe this is the same way you lookup kanji in a dictionary, though I've never personally used or have seen one.

Hope this helps some users who are as unfamiliar with Japanese as I am.

[TerraEpon]

A faggoto is the Italian word for bassoon, there is no difference.

A fiddle is merly a violin played in a certain style, but sometimes there's also slight body differences.

[Nisto]

Wow, finding Kanji via radicals is much easier than I had ever imagined! Thank you so much for the tutorial, dancey.

Also, thanks for all suggestions everybody, I will work on editing the first post today.

[nextday]

I saw "Asax" and "Tsax" today. Alto Saxaphone and Tenor Saxaphone.

Noticed they weren't listed here.

Edit: You could also add these.

E Gt. = Electric Guitar
A Gt. = Acoustic Guitar
ピアニカ = Pianica (more commonly known as melodica)
マンドール = Mandore

[LiquidAcid]

Small question:
Can 劇中歌 be used alternatively for 挿入歌 (insert song)? Or does it mean something different?

[Nisto]

Edit: On second thought, I think it'd be a drama song. It was simpler than I thought... 劇(drama)中(during)歌(song)

[LiquidAcid]

Edit: On second thought, I think it'd be a drama song. It was simpler than I thought... 劇(drama)中(during)歌(song)
Uhm, what's a drama song?

Anyway, more specifically I'm referring to e.g. this album:
http://vgmdb.net/album/29456

See the back scan, information for track 2 for example. That should be a song from episode 11 of the animation. Having seen the entire animation, this is one of the many songs that plays somewhere inbetween the episode, making it an insert song for me.

Thoughts?

[Nisto]

A track where performers play a dramatic role with song(s) in the background, I suppose you could say.

On that cover, far down on the 765PRO ALLSTARS list, it says clearly (in katakana) "drama"+performance(kanji), so there should be at least some type of drama track on the album.

I guess it could be a song that was used in the way an insert song does, but it was used as BGM for a drama track here - with voices, so to speak.

[Secret Squirrel]

WWJdict says that 劇中 means during a play, so I'd interpret it as a BGM vocal that plays in the body of the episode sometime.

[LiquidAcid]

Hmm, ok, I get what you mean. Makes sense, since the songs don't appear as insert songs itself (part of the episodes soundtracks), but are themself part of the events in the episode.

@SSquirrel: So, how should we translate them?

[Secret Squirrel]

I don't know. Background Vocal perhaps?

[Nisto]

I just heard the track, and it seems it's not a drama track, so I guess it really is an alternative for "insert song".

[LiquidAcid]

The distinction here is that a (regular) insert song plays during the show as part of the soundtrack. The characters inside the show are not aware that any music is playing at that point. Here however the song is part of the plot itself. I think that's what 劇中 is emphasizing.

It's similar to the parts of the Disney movies, where the scene turns into some sort of musical for a a short amount of time (Hakuna Matata e.g.).

[Nisto]

I think I understand what you mean. Maybe a good translation for it could be "song during play", or even something as crazy as "act(ing) song".

[LiquidAcid]

I decided to call them Insert Drama/Vocal Song for now (in the Idolmaster album notes). Added a note explaning the difference.

[Phonograph]

挿入歌 inserted (fictional) song -> you don't see a singer
劇中歌 performed (theatrical) song -> you see a singer

[Nisto]

劇中歌 performed (theatrical) song -> you see a singer

That's weird, because there's no singer (as far as I can tell) in the part where track 2 appears: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mf3QPkb0Cv0

[LiquidAcid]

IMO the fact that the singer is visible or invisible is totally irrelevant here. The important thing is that the performance is actually part of the plot. Take e.g. a performance that takes place in the next room, which the characters can perceive audible, but not visually. Still qualifies as 劇中歌, since it is part of the plot.

[Phonograph]

because the performed song is a part of the "plot" unlike an insert song which could be absent (it's only used for musicality)
another example could be those macross frontier songs sung by sheryl in concerts or ranka
but iirc, some songs are used as inserted too

[Fearin]

http://vgmdb.net/album/468

Notes for the final track mention
Wb (Contrabass/Double bass?)
Vn (Violin?)

[LiquidAcid]

Vn = Violin, would make sense. Fumi Uchiyama is also performing violin on RDCD-0008 and KDSD-00024~5.
Same goes for Wb, see notes in KICA-1375~6, SVWC-9191~2 and SQEX-10175~6 (Kazuki Chiba).

[Nisto]

I think Wb is Wood Block. See last page here: http://www.aosa.org/documents/Guidelines/Orchestration.pdf. Sure, it's all in capital here, but what would the "W" in "Wb" be, otherwise?
EDIT: I see him playing contrabass in the booklet, so I guess Contrabass was right after all. It's weird, because I can't find any reference that says "Wb" is an abbreviation of it. If you can find a reference, please link to it here!

I agree with Vn being Violin.

[LiquidAcid]

I'm a bit sceptical. I just did some Googling and apparantly there exists a "Gibson Sg Standard Bass Faded Wb". Seems to be an e-bass. No explanation about the Wb suffix though.

The only thing else is the term walking bass, but that's not an instrument but a specific way to play it.

[Nisto]

I think there's a chance they just got it from the pronunciation of w, since it's pronounced double-u: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/w#Japanese

And I also found this, so it's much possible: In Japan, when you see "W" on a food item it means DOUBLE (http://napajapan.com/Product.asp?product=936&name=Cheetos+-+W+Double+Cheese+Mix)

[LiquidAcid]

Cool stuff, we should open a new thread "weird use of english in the japanese language" :D

[Xenofan 29A]

That would be quite long. Incidentally, I mentioned this exact usage here. (http://vgmdb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=3845)

[CHz]

The disambiguation page for "WB" on the Japanese Wikipedia (http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/WB) says that it can be short for "wood bass" (ウッドベース), which the double bass is sometimes called in jazz and other settings.

[Nisto]

Uh-huh, nice find. Glad someone kept looking even though I was almost convinced. I've made the change in the first post.

[nextday]

I saw this one today:
能管 = Nokan

Also I had these in my other post but they were missed:
ピアニカ = Pianica
マンドール = Mandore

And I saw these on another entry:
摺鉦 = Surigane
大鼓 = Otsuzumi/Ohkawa
ケンガリ = Kengari
チャッパ = Chappa
チャンゴ = Janggu

[Nisto]

...
Also I had these in my other post but they were missed:
...

I missed that post entirely. Sorry about that. I've added them all to the first post.

[Nisto]

Slightly unrelated, I suppose, but I've just made a small discovery: many catalog number stems ends with "CA" (http://vgmdb.net/search?q=CA-). Does anyone know what it may stand for?

[nextday]

Does anyone know what "Lpc" is? It's on a jazz soundtrack, if that helps.

[Nisto]

Is it capitalized as you wrote it? And is it listed as an instrument?

It's otherwise possible it's a guitar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibson_Les_Paul_Custom)

[nextday]

It's not capitalized. I thought it might be the guitar, but the capitalization is throwing me off.

http://i.imgur.com/ZWX31.jpg

[Nisto]

It must be "Latin Percussion". On this page (http://www.h3.dion.ne.jp/~groove/artist/m/morooka_kenji.html) there's another guy credited for playing "Lpc". When searching for this name, most results include "percussion". And the only thing I can think "L" standing for is Latin.

[nextday]

That's probably right, especially since it's listed right below the C.P (Classic Percussion).

Thanks.

[Nisto]

By the way, I don't think "Con" is supposed to be Contrabass, as it's pretty much the same as Wood bass, which is also listed for that album (http://vgmdb.net/album/32324).

It's more likely to be conductor, as the same kanji appeared on this album (http://www2.big.or.jp/~n-fujii/jazzDB/disc_HTML/24386.htm), but there, conductor (most definitely) is abbreviated as "cond".

Edit: A search for the actual reading (which is very likely to be "Kouji Haijima") brings up even more conductor results:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/ps3/demons-souls-black-phantom-edition/credits
http://www.mobygames.com/game/ps3/demons-souls/credits
http://vgmdb.net/search?do=results&id=132293

[nextday]

By the way, I don't think "Con" is supposed to be Contrabass, as it's pretty much the same as Wood bass, which is also listed for that album (http://vgmdb.net/album/32324).

It's more likely to be conductor, as the same kanji appeared on this album (http://www2.big.or.jp/~n-fujii/jazzDB/disc_HTML/24386.htm), but there, abbreviated as "cond".

Edit: A search for the actual reading (which is very likely to be "Kouji Haijima") brings up even more conductor results:
http://www.mobygames.com/game/ps3/demons-souls-black-phantom-edition/credits
http://www.mobygames.com/game/ps3/demons-souls/credits
http://vgmdb.net/search?do=results&id=132293
I edited it. Thanks once again. Went with that reading too because it doesn't seem like it could be anyone else.

Figured it was contrabass since it's a jazz soundtrack.

[nextday]

Slightly unrelated, I suppose, but I've just made a small discovery: many catalog number stems ends with "CA" (http://vgmdb.net/search?q=CA-). Does anyone know what it may stand for?
I couldn't find what it stands for but I found that "CA" is only used for albums. The "A" probably stands for "Album".

[Hellacia]

While looking at Sister Contrast today, I found a credit for 詩, which basically seems to mean "poetry", lol. I assume this is just a poetic way to credit lyrics (okay, that was bad). But 木之本みけ is the credit, and that's Mike Kinomoto, which matches up with what we have for lyrics. Anyway, just sharing a kanji XD

Also, I can't believe I haven't expressed how awesome this thread is yet. Seriously, I'm in here all the time. I suck at Japanese and this helps compensate for that :tpg: