Mariko Shiga

Mariko Shiga (志賀 真理子, Shiga Mariko, December 24, 1969 – November 23, 1989) was an idol star and voice actress born in Funabashi, Chiba, Japan. She attended and graduated from Funabashi Municipal High School before enrolling in the University of California, Riverside in 1989. While on a trip to Arizona in November of that same year, Shiga was killed in an accident near Flagstaff when she was thrown from the vehicle due to the car rolling as it swerved to miss an animal. She died thirty-one days before her 20th birthday. Shiga had a starring role as one of the children answering questions in the NHK quiz show Donna Mondai Q TV from 1984 to 1985. She performed the song Yume no Naka no Rondo, which was used as the theme song for the July 1985 OVA Magical Princess Minky Momo: La Ronde in My Dream. In 1986, Shiga played the role of Yumi Hanazono, the main character in Magical Idol Pastel Yumi. Her single, Freesia no Shōnen, was used as a theme song for the same series, and this helped her gain in popularity. After playing the role of Yumi and performing the theme song for the series, she officially made her debut as an idol singer under Warner Pioneer.

The actual debut song as a singer is the song "Dream Rondo -Rondo-" released in 1985 by Victor Music Industry (now JVC Kenwood Victor Entertainment). This song was used as the theme song for the OVA " Magical Princess Kanojo no Minkyomomo Yume no Naka no Rondo " released in July 1985 .

After that, in " Magical Idol Pastel Yumi " ( 1986 ), she voiced the main character Yumi Hanazono and was in charge of the theme song " Freesia no Shounen" . ” became the format. For this reason, "Yume no Naka no Rondo -Rondo-" is now considered a pre-debut song.

Shiga's only song to be listed on the Oricon Top 100 Weekly Rankings is Freesia, which ranked as high as #48 during the week of March 31, 1987.During the promotion of her second single, she appeared as a guest on the radio program " Kenji and Yasuko 's Omoshiro Land" ( Nippon Cultural Broadcasting ). The staff will get mad at me." As she said, she had a calm voice for a female idol at the time.

In April 1988, when she entered university, she faced the problem of balancing her studies and activities in the entertainment industry , and retired from the entertainment industry . In August 1989, she went to study abroad at the University of California , Riverside , in order to learn languages and jazz , which was her favorite music genre . However, at the 10th anniversary event of the founding of Studio Pierrot held in July of the same year , she temporarily returned and acted as a moderator. This is due to the fact that the production studio of "Pastel Yumi", which was the voice actor for the main character, was "Studio Pierrot", and the relationship was deep.

However, on November 23 of the same year (24th Japan time), when she went on a short trip after studying abroad, an animal jumped out in front of the car she was riding in with four friends on a freeway near Flagstaff , Arizona. In order to avoid it, he suddenly turned the steering wheel while driving at high speed, causing a traffic accident in which the car overturned. The four friends who were in the car were seriously injured, but survived, but Shiga died instantly from bruises all over her body when she was thrown out of the car. She was scheduled to return to Japan for the first time after her studies on December 3, one month before her 20th birthday .

The body was cremated locally and the remains were returned to Japan in 1990 .