A thousand years of poetry,
reborn as J-POP.

Garu JP reimagines classical Japanese poetry — the Man'yōshū, the Tale of the Heike, the Iroha song — as contemporary music. Words that have lived a thousand years, reborn in today's sound.

古典詩歌 × J-POP

About Garu JP

千年の詩を、J-POPに。

A thousand years ago, people cried through the same nights we do — longing in love, wounded by partings, anxious about tomorrow, and still rising to meet the morning. The words left in these old poems are the honest, unguarded hearts of people who lived a thousand years ago.

Those feelings were handed down from song to song, from heart to heart, until they became Japanese culture itself — the very sensibility we carry today. Without knowing it, we have all received a baton carrying a thousand years of human feeling.

Garu JP takes up that baton and sets it against the scenery of modern life. For each poem we study the air of the age it was born in, listen for the poet's breath, and recompose it in the genre where it comes most alive — ballad, funk, swing, electronica, metal. Every song comes with the story behind the original: its historical background and the poet's heart.

May the today of someone a thousand years ago overlap, somewhere, with yours.

The Hyakunin Isshu Project

百人一首

The Ogura Hyakunin Isshu is Japan's most beloved poetry anthology: one hundred poems by one hundred poets, spanning some six centuries, compiled around 1235 by the poet Fujiwara no Teika. Emperors and priests, court ladies and wandering monks — each left exactly one poem. Our project is to set all one hundred of them to music, one by one, as J-POP songs.

Hyakunin Isshu

One hundred poems, one hundred poets. Original text, romaji, English translation, and the story behind every song.

43 / 100 poems — 43 released
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Classics

The Man'yōshū, the Tale of the Heike, the Iroha poem, Bashō's haiku — the classics beyond the Hyakunin Isshu.

9 works — 9 released
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Songs

楽曲一覧
No. 1 Aki no Ta “The Autumn Fields” — Emperor TenjiReleased→No. 2 Haru Sugite “Spring Has Passed” — Empress JitōReleased→No. 3 Ashibiki no “The Long Mountain Night” — Kakinomoto no HitomaroReleased→No. 4 Tago no Ura “Tago Bay” — Yamabe no AkahitoReleased→No. 5 Okuyama ni “Deep in the Mountains” — Sarumaru no DayūReleased→No. 7 Ama no Hara “The Wide Plain of Heaven” — Abe no NakamaroReleased→No. 9 Hana no Iro wa “The Color of the Flowers” — Ono no KomachiReleased→No. 10 Kore ya Kono “So This Is the Place” — SemimaruReleased→No. 11 Wata no Hara “Across the Wide Sea” — Sangi Takamura (Ono no Takamura)Released→No. 12 Ama tsu Kaze “Wind of Heaven” — Archbishop HenjōReleased→No. 13 Tsukubane no “From the Peaks of Tsukuba” — Retired Emperor YōzeiReleased→No. 15 Kimi ga Tame “For You” — Emperor KōkōReleased→No. 16 Tachiwakare “Though We Part” — Chunagon Yukihira (Ariwara no Yukihira)Released→No. 17 Chihayaburu “Unheard of, Even in the Age of Gods” — Ariwara no NarihiraReleased→No. 22 Fuku kara ni “The Storm on the Mountain” — Fun'ya no YasuhideReleased→No. 23 Tsuki Mireba “When I Gaze Upon the Moon” — Ōe no ChisatoReleased→No. 24 Kono Tabi wa “An Offering of Autumn Leaves” — Sugawara no MichizaneReleased→No. 33 Hisakata no “The Unhurried Light of Spring” — Ki no TomonoriReleased→No. 35 Hito wa Isa “The Plum Blossom Remembers” — Ki no TsurayukiReleased→No. 36 Natsu no Yo wa “Where the Moon Sleeps on a Summer Night” — Kiyohara no FukayabuReleased→No. 37 Shiratsuyu ni “Scattered Pearls of Dew” — Fun'ya no AsayasuReleased→No. 38 Wasuraruru “Forgotten, I Still Fear for You” — UkonReleased→No. 40 Shinoburedo “Though I Tried to Hide It” — Taira no KanemoriReleased→No. 41 Koi su Chō “They Say I Am in Love” — Mibu no TadamiReleased→No. 43 Aimite no “Since the Night We Met” — Fujiwara no AtsutadaReleased→No. 56 Arazaran “Once More, Before I Go” — Izumi ShikibuReleased→No. 57 Meguriaite “The Midnight Moon” — Murasaki ShikibuReleased→No. 59 Yasurawade “Watching the Moon Till It Leaned West” — Akazome EmonReleased→No. 60 Ōeyama “The Road I Have Never Walked” — Koshikibu no NaishiReleased→No. 62 Yo o Komete “The Gate Will Not Open” — Sei ShōnagonReleased→No. 63 Ima wa Tada “If Only I Could Tell You Myself” — Fujiwara no MichimasaReleased→No. 70 Sabishisa ni “In Loneliness” — Ryōzen HōshiReleased→No. 71 Yū Sareba “When Evening Falls” — Dainagon Tsunenobu (Minamoto no Tsunenobu)Released→No. 73 Takasago no “Cherry Blossoms on the High Hills” — Ōe no MasafusaReleased→No. 77 Se o Hayami “The Stream Will Meet Again” — Retired Emperor SutokuReleased→No. 80 Nagakaran “Tangled as My Morning Hair” — Taikenmon'in no HorikawaReleased→No. 84 Nagaraeba “Someday, Even This Night” — Fujiwara no KiyosukeReleased→No. 86 Nageke tote “The Moon Is Not to Blame” — Priest SaigyōReleased→No. 89 Tama no O yo “O Thread of My Life” — Princess ShikishiReleased→No. 92 Waga Sode wa “The Stone Below the Tide” — Nijōin no SanukiReleased→No. 93 Yo no Naka wa “Let the World Stay as It Is” — Minamoto no SanetomoReleased→No. 97 Konu Hito o “Waiting by the Salt-Fires” — Fujiwara no TeikaReleased→No. 98 Kaze Soyogu “Evening at the Sacred Stream” — Fujiwara no IetakaReleased→

Classics

歌集めぐり
Iroha Uta “The Iroha Song” — Iroha — the pangram poem (attr. Kūkai, Heian period)Released
Mochizuki “The Full Moon” — Fujiwara no Michinaga's 'Full Moon Poem' (Shōyūki diary, 1018)Released
Kagerō “First Light” — Kakinomoto no Hitomaro (Man'yōshū I · 48)Released
Gion Shōja no Kane “The Bell of Gion” — The Tale of the Heike, opening lines (Kamakura period)Released
Harumi “Spring Sea” — Ariwara no Narihira (The Tales of Ise, episode 68)Released
Iyoyo Masumasu “More and More” — Ōtomo no Tabito (Man'yōshū V · 793)Released
Samidaregawa “River of May Rain” — Matsuo Bashō, haiku (The Narrow Road to the Deep North, 1689)Released
Koke no Koromo “The Robe of Moss” — Ono no Komachi & Archbishop Henjō, poem exchange (Gosenshū / Tales of Yamato 168)Released
Iyashike Yogoto “Let Good Things Pile Up” — Ōtomo no Yakamochi (Man'yōshū XX · 4516 — the anthology's final poem)Released

Listen & Follow

配信・SNS

New songs premiere on YouTube, then roll out to streaming services.

YouTube X (Twitter) TikTok Instagram ▶ Full playlist on YouTube