Ayumi Hamasaki

Ayumi Hamasaki (浜崎 あゆみ, Hamasaki Ayumi, born October 2, 1978) is a Japanese recording artist, lyricist, model, and actress. Hamasaki has achieved popularity in Japan and Asia by enforcing her position as an artist and not trying to be forced as a "product", which was a common factor within the Japanese music culture and Avex Trax. Through her entire career, she has written all her lyrical content, produced her own music and has sometimes co-composed her music, which is evident in her albums I Am..., Rainbow and My Story.

Born and raised in Fukuoka, she moved to Tokyo at fourteen to pursue a career in entertainment. In 1998, under the tutelage of Avex CEO Max Matsuura, Hamasaki released her debut single "Poker Face" and released her million-selling record A Song for XX. The album debuted at the top of the Oricon charts and remained there for four weeks, establishing her popularity in Japan. Her next five albums accomplished over one million shipments in Japan, with her third effort Duty selling near three million units, becoming her best selling studio album. A Best, her first compilation album, is her best selling album, with more than four million copies sold in Japan. In 2008, after her album Next Level was released, album and single sales declined due to ongoing competition with new upcoming artists. Throughout her career, Hamasaki has had all her albums within the top five position in Japan and has five million-selling singles, including "Boys & Girls", "A", "Seasons", "M" and "H".

Ayu

The ayu (アユ, 鮎, 年魚, 香魚) or sweetfish, Plecoglossus altivelis, is an amphidromous fish, the only species in the genus Plecoglossus and family Plecoglossidae. It is a relative of the smelts, and is placed in the order Osmeriformes. Native to the Palearctic ecozone, it occurs in rivers, lakes, and coastal waters of western Hokkaidō in Japan southward to the Korean Peninsula, China, and Hong Kong. The species has been extinct in Taiwan since 1967, although there are populations of re-introduced Japanese stocks in some of the northern streams.

The name "sweetfish" is due to the sweetness of its flesh. In reference to its typical one-year lifespan, it is also written as 年魚 ("year-fish"). The ayu is the prefectural fish of Gunma Prefecture and Gifu Prefecture.

Subspecies

Three subspecies are currently recognized, but their status is questioned and species may be monotypic:

Ayu (disambiguation)

The ayu is a species of fish.

Ayu may also refer to:

AYU refers to:

See also

African manatee

The African manatee (Trichechus senegalensis), also known as the West African manatee or seacow, is a species of manatee; it is mostly herbivorous (eats plants). African manatees can be found in much of the western region of Africa, from Senegal to Angola. Scientists do not know a lot about this species, but they hypothesize the African manatee is very similar to the West Indian manatee (Trichechus manatus).

Taxonomy

The African manatee was officially declared a species under the Trichechus senegalensis taxon in 1795 by the naturalist, Johann Heinrich Friedrich Link. No subspecies of this taxon are known, but unreliable claims have been made that there are morphological disparities between coastal manatee populations and isolated inland populations. After more research, no genetic evidence supports these claims and form any subspecies. The African manatee falls under the Trichechus genus with only two other species, the Amazonian manatee and the West Indian manatee, which are also sirenians.

Singing

Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of tonality, rhythm, the use of sustained tones and a variety of vocal techniques. A person who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung without accompaniment or with accompaniment by musical instruments. Singing is often done in a group of other musicians, such as in a choir of singers with different voice ranges, or in an ensemble with instrumentalists, such as a rock group or baroque ensemble. Singers may also perform as soloist with accompaniment from a piano (as in art song and in some jazz styles) or with a symphony orchestra or big band. There are a range of different singing styles, including art music styles such as opera and Chinese opera, religious music styles such as Gospel, traditional music styles, world music, jazz, blues and popular music styles such as pop and rock.

Singing can be formal or informal, arranged or improvised. It may be done for religious devotion, as a hobby, as a source of pleasure, comfort, or ritual, as part of music education, or as a profession. Excellence in singing requires time, dedication, instruction, and regular practice. If practice is done on a regular basis then the sounds can become more clear and strong. Professional singers usually build their careers around one specific musical genre, such as classical or rock, although there are singers with crossover success (singing in more than one genre). They typically take voice training provided by voice teachers or vocal coaches throughout their careers.

Singer Motors

Singer Motors Limited was a British motor vehicle manufacturing business, originally a bicycle manufacturer founded as Singer & Co by George Singer, in 1874 in Coventry, England. Singer & Co's bicycle manufacture continued. From 1901 George Singer's Singer Motor Co made cars and commercial vehicles.

Singer Motor Co was the first motor manufacturer to make a small economy car that was a replica of a large car, showing a small car was a practical proposition. It was much more sturdily built than otherwise similar cyclecars. With its four-cylinder ten horsepower engine the Singer Ten was launched at the 1912 Cycle and Motor Cycle Show at Olympia. William Rootes, Singer apprentice at the time of its development and consummate car-salesman, contracted to buy 50, the entire first year's supply. It became a best-seller. Ultimately Singer's business was acquired by his Rootes Group in 1956, which continued the brand until 1970, a few years following Rootes' acquisition by the American Chrysler corporation.

Singer (naval mine)

The Singer was a naval mine made and deployed by the Confederacy during the American Civil War. It was a manually laid moored contact mine.

Development

During the American Civil War, Matthew Fontaine Maury, a Confederate government official established the Torpedo Bureau and the Torpedo Corps in Richmond, Virginia to oversee the development and deployment of new types of naval mines. Maury was convinced that the only way to defend the coastlines against Union assaults was through the widespread use of naval mines. Mines were inexpensive and easily produced on a large scale. The low cost and large volume of mines produced would supplement the small naval forces of the Confederacy and make it possible to defend against the superior fleet of the Union navy. The efforts of the Torpedo Bureau and the Torpedo Corps proved to be worth the investment of the Confederacy. For the relative low cost of the mines they did a tremendous amount of damage to the Union forces, sinking a total of 27 Union naval vessels.