In the fast-paced, fickle world of J-pop, Yumi Matsutoya is a constant reliable presence. You could almost set your watch by her. Just about every fall she releases a new album, and most years she Does a concert tour of Japan. While her albums don't vary much year to year, featuring pleasant, middle-of-the-road J-pop featuring Matsutoya's easy-on-the-ears but unremarkable voice, her tours are something else. They're more like Las Vegas-style spectaculars than normal J-pop concerts - not too many...

In the fast-paced, fickle world of J-pop, Yumi Matsutoya is a constant reliable presence. You could almost set your watch by her. Just about every fall she releases a new album, and most years she Does a concert tour of Japan. While her albums don't vary much year to year, featuring pleasant, middle-of-the-road J-pop featuring Matsutoya's easy-on-the-ears but unremarkable voice, her tours are something else. They're more like Las Vegas-style spectaculars than normal J-pop concerts - not too many Japanese artists artists, for example, include a circus, complete with trapeze artists and elephants, in their shows, as Matsutoya did a few years back. Matsutoya, who was born in the Tokyo suburb of Hachioji in 1954, belongs to the generation of singer-songwriters who came to prominence in the early 1970s. She released her first album, Hikoki Gumo (Airplane Contrail) in 1973 under her maiden name of Yumi Arai. Since then "Yuming," as Matsutoya is affectionately referred to by her loyal fans, has released no fewer than 40 albums, including greatest-hits compilations. Yuming is highly respected as a songwriter, and several other J-pop artists have scored hits with Matsutoya compositions. In 2003 she released an album (Faces) comprising her versions of songs she'd written for other artists but never recorded herself. On one song, "Ocean Blue", Matsutoya performs a duet with herself by adding a contemporary vocal track to the original Yumi Arai version of the song. One explanation for Matsutoya's long career is that she has carefully avoided overexposure: she seldom Does commercial endorsements and doesn't go in for TV appearances.