thumb|right|300px|upright|A in a 1501 illustration
, 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. 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 .
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).
History
thumb|A with his audience from an [[emaki painted in the 14th century]]
Origins and proliferation
Shōbutsu, a Buddhist monk of the Tendai school, was, according to tradition, the first to sing the , around the year 1220. Subsequently, two different factions of were formed. These were the Ichikata school, founded by Akashi Kyoichi, and the Yasaka School, founded by Yasaka Kigen. Ranks were assigned to on the basis of skill, the highest being , followed by , and .
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 . 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 .
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.
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. 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. 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, 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". 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. The itself is also depicted with the image of goddess Benzaiten at her shrines, and in images of the "in homes, shops, and offices". Folk and literature attest "invariably about blind and ", and only in modern times do sighted musicians master such instruments like the .
According to De Ferranti, the act of playing lutes for alms by blind musicians finds its roots in Indian Buddhist culture during the 1st millennium CE. As early as the 4th century, blind itinerants in South Asia, described by texts such as the as holy men, played lutes for alms. In the Shanbei region near Inner Mongolia, "blind beggars who recited tales and travelled with pipa accompanists were common", prior to the 1949 revolution.
Prior to the spread of Buddhism during the 6th to 9th centuries, it was "generally acknowledged that in Japanese ritual life blind men and women [were] respected as shamanic celebrants who bore numinous power because of their separation from the world experienced by others". Historically, the blind performed healing rituals for curing illness and exorcising spirits. For music, plucking or striking string instruments also have ritual meanings, and were tasks probably given to blind individuals to perform in belief of their shamanistic abilities.
The intimate ties between the and the blind in the Tōdō and various regional groups for further cement this inseparable relationship. Blindness was a necessary condition for membership in these organizations, which looked after blind performers and professionals and blind ritualists respectively. In the Tōdō, performers came to control the guild, and thus the lives of many Japanese blind people. According to the legends of these institutions, "the lineage of blind players ultimately is traced to ... a blind disciple of the historical Buddha Shakyamuni, called Gankutsu Sonja".
However, according to Hugh de Ferranti, not all blind players of antiquity "were completely lacking the sense of vision and knowledge of music".
Japanese iconography indicates two female lute-playing deities: the aforementioned Benzaiten and Myōonten; their identities are often fused together, but both have their roots in the continental Asian tradition, and can be traced from Sarasvati through various forms. Benzaiten represents eloquence while Myōonten epitomizes music itself. Especially in Kyushu, there are hills, valleys, ponds, and bridges throughout Japan, where performers supposedly buried or offered instruments to the local waters. Along with blindness, maleness was a necessary condition for admission to the and Tōdō. There are also a few rare references to both sighted and blind female entertainers who may have played , though in the Edo period, some female enthusiasts learned from professionals as a recreational activity.
Itinerant women performers did still exist in medieval Japan, though they are most frequently shown playing the drum. In the Edo period, singers called often accompanied themselves on the or , the latter of which was played by "affluent blind women who taught it to the wives of samurai and merchants". In general, the blind were treated according to the restrictions of their societal rank. In other words, commoner townsmen () and warrior–rank blind people "were allowed to engage in the professions available to all of similar rank, within the constraints of their visual impairment", while those in agrarian households were expected to contribute to the payment of land taxes via any means of labor possible.
According to Hugh de Ferranti, iconographic and literary sources generally portray as solitary and pitiable figures, though wealthy and powerful individuals also exist in such representations. However, plays called feature deliberate tricking of a blind so that he becomes lost and disoriented, or suffers losses and misunderstanding. Such action is provoked by sighted individuals for pure amusement, as in the stories of Saru and Tsukimi . In these images, people "look out from their houses at the players and appear to be laughing or jeering at them", while children run away from and dogs bark at them. According to the or Essays in Idleness, in the reign of the cloistered emperor Go-Toba, Yukinaga – the man in charge of the household of the chief advisor to the emperor, Fujiwara Kanezane – often exchanged poems with the imperial court. Embarrassed, he gave up on learning poetry and took the tonsure, and became a monk under the abbot Jien of the Tendai sect.
- Chinese popular sermons designed to appeal to the masses, known as
- Epic ballad narration entitled , later revised into a new or Buddhist chant called the in reference to the six worlds of Buddhism, which became the chief model for the singing
- style of Buddhist preaching with melody, a style favored by Jien
- influence from the Kyoto- school from which idea of accompanying narration with derives
- The story itself chronicling the Taira/Genji Heian period, oft interpreted as one phase of Buddhism's six worlds. The story is treated as a , or sermon with the purpose of enlightenment.
musically is influenced by Buddhist chant, and the and traditions of the from the 11th and 12th centuries. Indeed, it is a combination of the style practiced by and , and narrative. Akashi Kakuichi was Jōichi's disciple and a favorite of Ashikaga Takauji, possibly due to blood relations. The new idiom of song made the old styles of antiquated, especially with the as a new instrument.