, also known as "lute priests", were travelling performers in the era of Japanese history preceding the Meiji period. They earned their income by reciting vocal literature to the accompaniment of music. were mostly blind, and adopted the shaved heads and robes common to Buddhist monks. The occupation likely had its origin in China and India, where blind Buddhist lay-priest performers were once common.
The musical style of the is referred to as , which literally means " music". Although these performers existed well before the events of the Genpei War, they eventually became famous for narrating tales about this war. Before sang , they were entertainers and ritual performers. They took on a broad range of roles, including poetry and song, plague prevention, and spiritual purification; it was probably because of their ritualistic duties that they became the caretakers of .
The are considered the first performers of the Tale of the Heike, which is one of Japan's most famous epics. It details battles between two powerful clans, the Minamoto and the Taira around the 12th century. The Taira (or Heike) were eventually annihilated by the Minamoto (sometimes called the Genji), who systematically killed every male descendant of the Taira. Religion in Japan at the time incorporated many native animistic (Shinto) beliefs into its Buddhist theological framework, leading many court nobles and religious leaders to worry about angry Taira spirits disrupting the peace. The great earthquake around 1185 CE contributed to this sentiment. Since their rituals included placating spirits and preventing plagues, music became a vehicle for placating lingering, resentful Heike spirits.Tokita 61 and became immensely popular for the next several hundred years.
Etymology literally means "lute priest". is derived from , which translates as a teacher who explains Buddhist precepts. The two characters and mean "Buddhist doctrine" and "teacher" respectively. referred to blind priests who played the to accompany their songs about legends, wars, histories, and mythologies. Eventually, referred to non-blind and blind performers and was also used as a suffix to a series of other types of people, such as , , , and .Ishi 293
are referred to in Japanese iconography that dates back to the late Heian period (794–1185 CE). They are also referred to in the , written by Fujiwara no Akihira (989–1066).Tokita 60
History
Origins and proliferation Shōbutsu, a Buddhist monk of the Tendai school, was, according to tradition, the first to sing the , around the year 1220.Japan Encyclopedia: 78. Subsequently, two different factions of were formed. These were the Ichikata school, founded by Akashi Kyoichi, and the Yasaka School, founded by Yasaka Kigen.The Asiatic Society of Japan: 4. Ranks were assigned to on the basis of skill, the highest being , followed by , and .Groemer: 4.
The proliferation of the Yasaka and Ichikata factions heightened with the contributions of Akashi Kakuichi (1300–1371). A noted , Kakuichi's narration is currently accepted as the definitive version of the .Ashgate: 78. A documented reason for this is that Kakuichi was largely responsible for forming the Ichikata guild. This preceded the formation of the , a self-governing guild of . The Tōdō received income in two ways: patronage from the Kyoto aristocracy and military, and its monopoly over the teaching and transmission of . To be accepted as a disciple, an aspiring student would have to pay a fee, after which the study of each new piece of music required payment.
By the 13th and 14th centuries, performed for the military elite and the aristocracy, including the regional feudal lords. Public performances were also given during Buddhist temple services. The general population had the further option of attending Kanjin performances, which they were required to pay a fee to see.
Sengoku to Edo period The Ōnin War (1467–1477) proved a trying occurrence for the proliferation of the . The war instigated the Sengoku period (15th–17th centuries), an era of civil war and political–military conflict that lasted for nearly two centuries. In this time, many musicians turned their attention to the or the three-stringed lute. Therefore, not only did the conflict cause a loss of performers, but also a decline in the number of listeners of the .The Biwa in History: 143.
However, the complete demise of the was prevented by the Tokugawa Ieyasu, who favored the art of performance. Ieyasu ultimately reunified the country by establishing the Tokugawa shogunate, and became a fervent patron of the .
During the Edo period (1600–1868), the Tokugawa shogunate provided the Tōdō with special privileges and substantial financing, which the Tōdō then distributed to members according to rank. The Edo period also marks the era in which the shogunate designated as one of its official ceremonial forms of music. Accordingly, new schools of appeared, many of which were influenced by the newly introduced and its accompanying styles of music. The two predominant schools that came about during the Edo period were the Maeda-ryū founded by Maeda Kyūichi, and the Hatano-ryū founded by Hatano Kōichi. Both figures were members of the Shidō-ha, which was the most active branch of the older Ichikata school.The Biwa in History: 142.
Collaborations were formed between amateur aficionados of the who, over the course of the Edo period, made small revisions to the musical notation of the score. The ceremonial form of the performed for the shogunate became increasingly solemn and refined to meet the standards of the intellectual class. Moreover, to ensure the development of the score, improvisation notably declined.
Meiji period to present In 1868, the Meiji Restoration heralded the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate. This ultimately contributed to the abolition of the Tōdō, which undermined social privileges for the musicians and reduced the availability of avenues for performance. The Hatano-ryū, in particular, underwent a debilitating decline in popularity, so much so that it struggled to survive in Kyoto until the middle of the 20th century.Musical Narrative: 81. In addition, the rise in popularity of the , which accompanied contemporary songs and narratives, made the ancient tales of the Heike appear antiquated. By the end of the Edo period, the had replaced the as the most common instrument used among blind musicians.
The tradition persisted, however, through the Tsugaru lineage (transmitted by sighted performers) and the Nagoya lineage (transmitted by professional blind musicians of the Tōdō tradition), both of which belonged to the Maeda-ryū.Ashgate: 82. The Tsugaru lineage consisted of Kusumi Taisō (1815–1882), who learned the of the Edo Maeda-ryū, as well as his sons Tateyama Zennoshin and Tateyama Kōgo, both of whom lamented the decline of in the late years of Meiji and sought to foster a number of pupils. In Nagoya, a city which had been a thriving centre for performance, a small faction of blind male players continued to transmit alongside other mediums of music of growing popularity, such as the and . Differences exist between these lineages due to geographical separation and changes that have occurred uniquely in time. For example, the Nagoya lineage relied almost entirely on oral transmission. Nevertheless, the Nagoya and Tsugaru were both nominated by the Japanese government as "Intangible Cultural Properties" in 1955 and 1959 respectively, with Nagoya performers Inokawa Kōji, Doizaki Masatomi and Mishina Masayasu nominated as national treasures.
The libretto notation on which remaining performance is based today in Nagoya is called Heike Shosetsu. It was composed by Ogino Tomoichi (1732–1801), initially a disciple in the Hatano-ryū faction, before acquiring the post of in the Kyoto branch of the Maeda-ryū school;The Biwa in History: 144. Tomoichi had great knowledge of both major schools as a Hatano-ryū disciple master. As such, he played a fundamental role in the revival of the .
Toru Takemitsu also contributed to the continuation of the by collaborating with Western composers. Recognising that traditional Japanese music, and interest in it, was quickly falling out of fashion, Takemitsu, as well as a number of composers before him, noted that studies in music theory and music composition almost entirely consisted of Western theory and instruction. Though some Western composers had begun to incorporate Japanese music and Japanese instruments into their compositions, these composers often focused on those Japanese instruments most similar to Western ones; for example, Michio Miyagi's utilization of the . Takemitsu, on the other hand, collaborated with Western composers and compositions to include the distinctly Asian-sounding . His well-received compositions revitalized interest in the in the modern day.
According to Hugh de Ferranti, modern, live performances of narrative singing are rare, with almost all performers being "practitioners of Chikuzen-biwa and Satsuma-biwa".De Ferranti: 13 The "emerged from interaction between moso and the samurai class" in Satsuma Province, starting a period of popularity for "modern " until the 1930s, while the had its origin in the 1890s in the Chikuzen region of Kyushu, drawing upon aspects of music, , and the technique. These traditions enjoyed widespread appreciation during the early 20th century due to the "nationalist, militarist sentiments of late-Meiji imperialist ideology". In the post-war era, these traditions were considered "refined classical pursuits", resulting in their popularity beyond .De Ferranti: 14. The itself is also depicted with the image of goddess Benzaiten at her shrines, and in images of the "in homes, shops, and offices".
However, modern associations with are mainly connected to the , themselves linked to the Tale of Heike and Hōichi the Earless, well-known works taught in schools and readapted for television series, manga, popular literature and other media. As such, "most Japanese come to think of the biwa as a battered old string instrument played by a decrepit blind man who looks like a Buddhist priest and wanders about chanting old tales about war and ghosts". According to Ferranti, "outside of the realms of scholarship and the few who are involved in learning and performing", few Japanese civilians are familiar with the aural qualities of the and cannot recognize its tones with references to ancient war-tales. The instrument is viewed as antiquated, a relic of the past that "cannot be a thing of contemporary Japanese life and experience, but is tied forever to the world of the Tale of the Heike; a gloomy world of martial valour and samurai ghosts".
and in society
Blindness For most of Japan's recorded history, music and narrative performance were common activities for the blind, whose importance in most other major genres is also unavoidable, save for court and theatre music, from the 13th century until the 19th.De Ferranti: 20. Folk and literature attest "invariably about blind and ", and only in modern times do sighted musicians master such instruments like the .De Ferranti 20-1.