Machiko Watanabe (渡辺真知子), born 23 October 1956 in Yokosuka, Japan, is a Japanese
singer-songwriter whose career began while she was still a schoolgirl. After
winning an audition for Takeshi Terauchi in Yokohama, she was advised to finish
secondary school before pursuing music; she later earned a special prize at the
Yamaha Popular Song Contest while a freshman at Senzoku Gakuen Junior College, a
contest she entered four times. Machiko Watanabe's debut single, "Mayoimichi"
(1977), sold 800,000 copies and catapulted her to instant fame. She followed the
hit with "Kamome ga Tonda Hi...