It's for Japan region. Also I find the word "suddenly" kind of weird, as Japanese companies do this (unlock their popular work/artists in streaming without announcement in advance) semi-frequently.
They are all available in Apple Music for me with a US account.
This has been geofenced to very few countries. God, I hope geofencing in the media market. It's so last-century. I understand it's all about price-segmentation and it helps producers, but it's so impractical, annoying, philosophically anti-internet, and it just pushes people into piracy. The anime market is a typical example of this. I understand Ghibli's protection of their status (they are, effectively, the "Apple" of animation: high-quality, somewhat-exclusive, and totally unapologetic about their behaviour, particularly after the bad experience working with Disney), but it doesn't help me showing my kids how wonderful their art is.
I am discovering Studio Ghibli with the release of their movies on Netflix (better late than never) and it is an amazing feeling to watch something making you feel so much while being so different compared to western animation. Kiki's Delivery Service is from 1989 yet the animation, the music, and the topic (a girl becoming a woman via her first job: delivering packages with her cat and flying broom in a city that looks like La Rochelle) could have been made this year.
Really happy that I can now listen to Totoro 's soundtrack on Spotify, the joy of feeling in the Japanese countryside on a hot summer day while being in a rainy European city is priceless.
Yeah, I cannot find any of these albums on Google Play Music in the US. It's frustrating bc I can't find a single article that states if this is a regional thing. Every article just says that it's suddenly available but doesn't say what countries. I'm just going to assume that it's not available in the US yet.