Strawberry Flower

Strawberry Flower logo as seen on the cover art to Ai no Uta.

Strawberry Flower was a Japanese music duo, mostly known for their work with Nintendo in creating songs for TV commercials for the Pikmin franchise. Formed in late 2001 specifically to create a song for TV advertisements for Pikmin, Strawberry Flower made the song "Ai no Uta". It became a sleeper hit, getting to #2 in the Japanese charts and becoming one of the best-selling singles in Japan in 2002. They later followed with more Pikmin-related single releases until 2004, totalling 1 million singles sold in their home country.

Although they kept largely inactive ever since, they briefly reunited in 2015 for the song "arukuhayasade", released independently and with no ties to Pikmin. Most of their songs were released exclusively in Japan, but they got worldwide exposure in 2008, with the inclusion of two of their songs in the game Super Smash Bros. Brawl’s soundtrack, gathering a cult following.

Members

• Yellow Pikmin – female vocalist
• Blue Pikmin – male guitarist
• Red Pikmin – male bassist
• Purple Pikmin – female guitarist
• White Pikmin – female bassist
• Rock Pikmin – male guitarist
• Winged Pikmin – female bassist

Singles

• Ai no Uta (includes Namida Ga Afureta)
• Pikmin Dance
• Tane no Uta (includes Shabondama)
• Song of Hey! Pikmin

Sheet music

In light of the popularity of the Strawberry Flower album, two different sheet music books were released containing music for Ai no Uta. They were released in Japan by the publishing companies KMP on January 15^th, 2002 and Doremi in January 30^th, 2002. The retail price for each was ¥500.

KMP

The cover of the Ai no Uta book published by KMP.

This book was published by KMP on January 15^th, 2002 and contains three different arrangements of the song: a solo piano arrangement, a guitar arrangement, and a 2-part chorus arrangement with piano accompaniment. All of the arrangements are in the song's original key (D major). Also included at the end of the book is a lyric sheet with the chords. All of the arrangements within are arranged by K. K. SMALLWOOD. The book consists of 11 pages, and its ISBN number is "ISBN 4-7732-1915-7".

The text on the cover translates to:

• CM song for the Nintendo GameCube software "Pikmin"
• Song of Love
• Strawberry Flower
• Piano Solo
• Guitar Arrangement
• 2-part Chorus with Piano Accompaniment
• Pikmin
• PIKMIN

Doremi

The cover of the Ai no Uta book published by Doremi.

This book was published by Doremi on January 30^th, 2002 and contains three different arrangements of the song: a solo piano arrangement (three staves, voice with piano accompaniment in the original key of D), another solo piano arrangement (simplified to the key C, this time with only two staves), and a solo guitar arrangement. Also included at the end of the book is a lyric sheet with the chords, similar to the other book. The piano arrangements are written by Shiori Aoyama and the guitar arrangement is written by Michio Tashima. The book consists of 11 pages, and its ISBN number is "ISBN 4-8108-1594-3".

The text on the cover translates to:

• Piano & Guitar Piece
• Piano playing • Easy piano solo • Guitar playing
• Pikmin
• PIKMIN
• Song of Love
• "Pikmin CM Song"
• Song / Lyrics & Composition: STRAWBERRY FLOWER

See also

• Wikipedia's article on Strawberry Flower