Music in Japanese animation is often closely tied to the Japanese music industry, but is also a significant industry, and genre in its own right, with genre often referred to as "anison", a portmanteau of "animation" and "song", or "anime song". It is common for television and original video animation series to be accompanied by soundtrack albums, which may include the opening ("OP"), ending ("ED") and insert songs ("IN"), incidental music, original songs ("image songs") and drama tracks (short plays featuring the show's voice actors). Established Japanese musical acts often perform songs featured in animation series or movies. Likewise, it is not uncommon for voice actors from anime shows to have a music career in their own right; Megumi Hayashibara, Yui Horie, Nana Mizuki, Maaya Sakamoto and Minori Chihara are among numerous voice actors who have also recorded music independent from anime.
There are also vocalists who have dedicated most of their careers to the performance of theme songs, including Ichiro Mizuki, Akira Kushida, Mitsuko Horie, Isao Sasaki, Hironobu Kageyama and many others.
Famous quotes containing the word music:
“If music in general is an imitation of history, opera in particular is an imitation of human willfulness; it is rooted in the fact that we not only have feelings but insist upon having them at whatever cost to ourselves.... The quality common to all the great operatic roles, e.g., Don Giovanni, Norma, Lucia, Tristan, Isolde, Brünnhilde, is that each of them is a passionate and willful state of being. In real life they would all be bores, even Don Giovanni.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)