In honor of Earth Day, Japanese folk artist Ichiko Aoba takes over our Mixtape for Mother Earth playlist with a selection of songs to pay tribute to our beautiful planet. Below, she explains her vision. “The rain dance reaches into the sky, and the gathered clouds release their raindrops. Green life pokes its face up from the ground anew, as water flows across the cosmos like a mother cradling her child. I chose these songs imagining a cyclical blue star, which passes through each of us indiscriminately, as if we were just vessels for water.” —Ichiko Aoba