refers to a Japanese idol group franchise that began with

Nogizaka46 is a Japanese female idol group produced by Yasushi Akimoto, created as the of the group AKB48. They are the first group from the Sakamichi Series, which also includes sister groups Sakurazaka46 (formerly Keyakizaka46), Yoshimotozaka46, ...

, an "official" rival group of

AKB48 AKB48 (pronounced ''A.K.B. Forty-Eight'') is a Japanese idol girl group named after the Akihabara (''Akiba'' for short) area in Tokyo, where the group's theater is located. AKB48's producer, Yasushi Akimoto, wanted to form a girl group with it ...

. It currently consists of four groups: Nogizaka46, Sakurazaka46,

Hinatazaka46 is a Japanese idol group produced by Yasushi Akimoto. The group was established as a subgroup of Keyakizaka46 named Hiragana Keyakizaka46 on November 30, 2015, and was renamed and spun off into its own group on February 11, 2019. The group's ...

, and

Yoshimotozaka46 is a Japanese idol group produced by Yasushi Akimoto. It was created on February 21, 2018. It is Nogizaka46's second sister group, after Keyakizaka46 (now split between Sakurazaka46 and Hinatazaka46). This was named after the Osaka-based enter ...

. Despite the name, the groups are not required to have exactly 46 members. Except for Yoshimotozaka46, all the groups were named after real streets in

Minato, Tokyo is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. It is also called Minato City in English. It was formed in 1947 as a merger of Akasaka, Azabu and Shiba wards following Tokyo City's transformation into Tokyo Metropolis. The modern Minato ward exhibits ...

and have all-female memberships.

History

The first group, Nogizaka46, was formed on August 22, 2011 with 36 members and released their debut single " Guruguru Curtain" on February 22, 2012. The second group, and Nogizaka46's first sister group,

Keyakizaka46 , formerly , is a Japanese idol girl group produced by Yasushi Akimoto. The group was created on August 21, 2015, becoming Nogizaka46's first sister group under the Sakamichi Series. Following the resignation of group's center Yurina Hirate and ...

, was created on August 21, 2015 with 22 members. It was initially named Toriizaka46 before it was changed for unspecified reasons. They released their first single " Silent Majority" on April 6, 2016. A subgroup named Hiragana Keyakizaka46 was created shortly after with 12 members. On February 21, 2018,

was announced as the third group in the franchise and 46 members passed the final audition on August 20. Unlike the other groups, it has both male and female members of various ages and most members are comedians affiliated with the

Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of ...

-based talent agency

Yoshimoto Kogyo is a major Japanese entertainment conglomerate. It was founded in 1912, Osaka, as a traditional theatre, and has since grown to be one of the most influential companies in Japan, employing most of Japan's popular owarai (comedy) talent, produci ...

, which also manages the idol group

NMB48 NMB48 (read "N.M.B. Forty-eight") is a Japanese idol group that debuted in 2011 as the second sister group to AKB48, produced by Yasushi Akimoto. NMB48 is named after the Namba district in Osaka city of Osaka Prefecture, where the group is base ...

and the Produce 101 Japan group JO1. They released their first single, " Nakasete Kure yo", on December 26, 2018. On February 11, 2019, Hiragana Keyakizaka46 became independent and changed its name to

, thus becoming the fourth group in the franchise. They released their debut single, "

Kyun Kyun may refer to: * KYUN, FM radio station in Twin Falls, Idaho * "Kyun" (song), a 2019 single by Japanese group Hinatazaka46 * Kyun-Tas, a mountain range in Yakutia, Russia See also * Kyung {{disambiguation ...

", on March 27, 2019. On July 16, 2020, it was announced that Keyakizaka46 would also be rebranded into Sakurazaka46, which came into effect on October 14. In the summer of 2018, a joint Sakamichi Audition was held for the all-female groups and 36 of those who auditioned were accepted. Of the 36, 21 were immediately accepted into either Nogizaka46 (11), Keyakizaka46 (9), and Hiragana Keyakizaka46 (1), while the remaining fifteen were grouped as the trainee group in 2019. One trainee dropped out and the fourteen remaining ones were assigned to the three groups on February 16, 2020, with five going to Nogizaka46, six going to Sakurazaka46, and three going to Hinatazaka46. In 2021, members of Nogizaka46, Sakurazaka46, and Hinatazaka46 co-starred in the mystery television drama ''Borderless'', based on by Tetsuya Honda, their first collaboration in a television drama. ''Cinemas Plus'' positively commented on its production values and the members' performances, and highly recommended the drama even for non-fans of the Sakamichi Series.

Current groups

Parodies

* WACK debuted a one-off shuffle unit named consisting of every idol under the company at the time, they released the single, , on June 16, 2021.

References

{{reflist Musical collectives