Mika Nakashima

Mika Nakashima (中島 美嘉) is a Japanese singer and actress.

Five of her studio albums, one of her mini-albums and one of her compilation albums have reached number one in Japan's Oricon album chart.

She also embarked on an acting career, most notably as Nana Osaki in the live action film adaptations of Nana.

She has sold over 10 million records in Japan.

Born and raised in Kyushu, Mika was the youngest of three children.

She grew up in the small town of Hioki, Kagoshima, where she has said there was "nothing there, only enka."

She began listening to enka singer Eiko Segawa and studied classical Japanese dance, but as she loved dressing-up and make-up, she hoped to work in fashion magazines since she was Too Short to become a model.

Nakashima decided not to attend high school after completing junior high and began working.

At the age of 15 she moved to the city of Fukuoka where she room-shared with two others.

At the age of 17, she attended an audition not knowing what it was for.

She also won the "New Artist of the Year" award from the 44th Japan Record Awards.

She was chosen from 3,000 girls to be the actress of the fall 2001 Fuji TV drama Kizudarake no Love Song (傷だらけのラブソング), in which she played the heroine Mirai Shimazaki, and also sang the theme song, "Stars."

In November 2001, "Stars" became her debut on Sony Music Associated Records, which would go on to become her best-selling single.

Her second single "Crescent Moon", an 80s themed song, was limited to 100,000 copies.

It sold out the first day of its release.

In March 2002 she released her third single, "One Survive," and her first video collection, "Film Lotus".

Nakashima's first album, True, released in August 2002, was a number 1 hit on the Oricon charts.

The album boasted a mature mixture of jazz and contemporary pop.

In 3 weeks, True sold a million copies, and has sold nearly 1,174,000 copies to date.

Then, as a commemoration of one year since her debut, Nakashima released a Premium EP: Resistance, which hit the charts' number 1 spot for two weeks in a row.

On December 18, a documentary video, Kiseki: The Document of a Star, was released.

In 2002, the singer received the "New Artist of the Year" award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards and "Best New Artist of the Year" at the All Japan Request Awards 2002.

Nakashima's second album, Love, which was released in November 2003, sold nearly 1.45 million copies, surpassing that of her debut.

The Japan Composers Association awarded Love the Best Album Award.

After releasing a second mini-album, Oborozukiyo: Inori, in September 2004, Nakashima topped the Oricon Album Chart again with Music in March 2005, as well as with her first greatest hits album Best in December of that year.

Best is the third album by Nakashima to have sold a million copies or more, but like her second album, Best also outsold True in sales - by nearly 30,000 copies.

In 2005, Nakashima co-starred alongside Aoi Miyazaki in the live-action movie Nana, based on the manga of the same name, which was released September 10, 2005.

She also sang one of the theme songs for the movie, which was released as a single under the name "Nana starring Mika Nakashima".

The single, titled "Glamorous Sky," was written by the manga's author, Ai Yazawa, and composed by L'Arc-en-Ciel vocalist Hyde.

It was Nakashima's only number 1 single on the Oricon Singles Charts.

It sold over 423,000 copies in 2005, making it the best-selling female single of the year.

The single continued selling well into the next year and sold 444,067 copies, which was about 25,000 copies less than her Nana co-star, Yuna Ito's "Endless Story".

The single was featured in Konami's guitar/drum simulation game GuitarFreaks and Drummania V3, as well as Nintendo's Moero! Nekketsu Rhythm Damashii Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan 2.

Nakashima was nominated at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan as "Best Buzz Asia from Japan" for "Amazing Grace '05", and the "Glamorous Sky" video was nominated as "Best Female Video" and won the award for "Best Video from a Film".

Due to the success of Nana, a sequel was released in December 2006.

It included two new songs by Nakashima, again under the name Nana starring Mika Nakashima.

The theme song to Nana 2 movie was "Hitoiro" (One Color), which was also written by Yazawa, with music composed by Glay's leader, Takuro, who also wrote the coupling song, "Eyes for the Moon".

Besides the single, Mika released the album The End, featuring all songs released under the name Nana starring Mika Nakashima.

This was followed in May by her 4th single, "Helpless Rain", and in August, by her 5th single "Will", which went on to rack up sales of over 140,000.

Both were top ten hits and sold around 100,000 copies, proving Nakashima's rising star appeal.