Recently the winners of the 4th Seiyu Awards was announced, and the Best Lead Actress Award went to Miyuki Sawashiro, a seiyu that I have been admiring for quite some time. Amidst all this hype around the more ‘exposed’ seiyu like Horie Yui and Nana Mizuki *groan*, I always thought Sawashiro had a special quality in her voice.

Her assertive loli voice is quite awesome.

I started to notice her voice after hearing two similar sounding characters, Aruru (Utawarerumono) and Maria Taro (Zetsubou Sensei). Both characters had a strong childish persistence in their speech. It was then I started paying attention to her voice and the characters she voiced.

She continued to voice a lot of major side characters, but rarely ever got the leading role. It came as a shock to me when I discovered that she put on a male voice for Shinkurou, the titular character of Kurenai. There’s a certain inflection and fluster in her voice that I felt made the character felt… real. Like, that’s how a normal person would speak in real life.

The chemistry she had with Maaya Sakamoto was simply fantastic.

After that, whenever I hear Sawashiro’s voice in any new anime, I get extremely excited. I absolutely enjoyed her work as Sasada (Natsume Yuujinchou), Tsugumi (Kannagi), Warden aka God (Maria Holic) and then finally a leading role as Canaan (Canaan). All this while, it seemed to me that not enough people were giving her the attention she deserves, especially when there are seiyu like Aya Hirano and Kugimiya Rie who seem to monopoly the spotlight all the time.

So this award she received, I think, is totally appropriate. So, Miyuki-chan, congratulations and I hope you’ll continue to get more major roles in future series. If you’re not sure how she sounds like, her more recent roles include Kanbaru (Bakemonogatari), Ayane (Kimi ni Todoke) and the very sexy Celty Sturluson (Durarara!!) – her voice made me go moe over a headless character!

I love me some cool-dere. Nekomimi and latex, yeah.

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