Saori Yuki (由紀さおり Yuki Saori, born November 13, 1948) is a Japanese singer … Read Full Bio ↴Saori Yuki (由紀さおり Yuki Saori, born November 13, 1948) is a Japanese singer and actress. She was born as Akiko Yasuda (Yasuda Akiko (安田章子?)) in Kiryū, Gunma, Japan and raised in Yokohama. She started her singing career with her older sister Sachiko as a child singer. Although in 1965 she debuted with her first single "Hitchhike Musume (Hitchhiking girl)" from King Records (Japan) as Akiko Yasuda, the result was not successful and had not been for a few years.

She made a national smash hit with "Yoake no Scat (Scat at dawn)" in 1969, with 1.5 million sales, which led her to sing at the NHK's Kōhaku Uta Gassen, the annual year-end music show (since then she had continued her appearance until 1978). She received the Best Vocalist Award in 15th Japan Record Awards with her hit "Koibumi (Love Letter)".

She had quickly become a popular TV personality on numbers of variety shows and other programs, as well as actress in several movies. She received the Award of Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in Japan Academy Prize in 1983 with her role of Chikako Numata, a mother of two difficult sons in The Family Game.

She started to refocus on her career as a vocalist with her sister Sachiko in 1985. They toured around the country with their specialty of Japanese Children's songs and received Best Planning Award in 28th Japan Record Awards with their hit album Ano-toki, Kono-uta (あの時・この歌 (those times, these songs)). Their repertoire has not been limited to Children's songs but original songs, pops, classic, and anime songs.

In 2009 she released her first original album since 1984, commemorating the 40th anniversary of her singing career as Saori Yuki. A collaboration album with Pink Martini titled 1969 was released in November 2011 in more than 20 countries, and quickly gained popularity in various places including the United States, Canada, Singapore and Greece.