Traditional music
Written over the course of the country's history, Japanese musical tradition tells the story of the archipelago's construction and movements. As well as the - oh so important - influences of its neighbors. We have to go back to the Asuka period (592-710), marked by the introduction of Buddhism into the country, to see the appearance of masked ritual dances. As a vehicle for the transmission of wisdom, music became king, and Emperor Monmu (697-707) even established a Ministry of Music: gagaku-ryō. During the artistically brilliant Nara period (710-793), not only did Chinese music (from the Tang dynasty) penetrate the country en masse, but also music from India, Persia and Central Asia.
It wasat this time that gagaku ("elegant music")became official in the country. Official court music, also played in temples, gagaku was based on musical theories and instruments imported from the kingdoms of China and Korea at the time. Until the end of the 10th century, gagaku was favored by the noble classes. As its repertoire grew, it was divided into two categories: old music - composed before the T'ang dynasty - and new music, composed during or after. Listed as an intangible heritage of humanity by Unesco, gagaku is no longer (solely) court music, but continues to be performed by large ensembles, often belonging to the Imperial Household of Japan, such as the Kunaichō Gakubu and Reigakusha (we recommend listening to their recordings). While the former can be seen at public ceremonies or private rituals, the latter is often commissioned to perform contemporary gagaku works. The great British musician Brian Eno was fortunate enough to collaborate with them. Like Eno, many great Western composers have at one time or another included gagaku in their works. These include Henry Cowell(Ongaku, 1957), La Monte Young(Trio for Strings, 1958), Olivier Messiaen(Sept haïkaï, 1962), Benjamin Britten(Curlew River, 1964) and, more recently, Tim Hecker(Konoyo, 2018). The dance that accompanies gagaku is called bugaku, and is distinguished by the grace and majesty of its movements and the elaborateness of its costumes.
At the same time, during the Nara era, shōmyō, originally from India,appeared. A Buddhist psalmody, the style quickly gained favor with aristocrats and civil servants. It is in shōmyō, chant and liturgy, that a fundamental unity is formed: the melodic cell. During the Kamakura era (1185 - 1333), a period of religious renewal, the art of the biwa (four-stringed lute) developed alongside Buddhist chanting, reinforced by the development of the Shingon and Tendai sects. During the High Middle Ages (11th-16th centuries), "rustic" forms of music flourished, such as dengaku, which mainly combined music and dance, and sarugaku (or sangaku), the playful equivalent of the modern circus, with acrobatics, juggling, jokes, imitations, puppetry and sometimes dance. The latter, dengaku and sarugaku, are often considered the ancestors of nō theater.
Japanese music really took off during the Edo period with the arrival of the emblematic shamisen, a long-necked, three-stringed lute. At the same time, a unity of instruments developed with the koto, the horizontal harp, the biwa lute and the shakuhachi bamboo flute, of Chinese origin. While koto music known as sōkyoku developed in Kyūshū, songs accompanied by the shamisen - the ji-uta- flourished in Kansai. When the latter became an accompaniment for kabuki, it changed its name to nagauta and jōruri when it accompanied bonraku, the traditional puppet theater. From this era, all modern Japanese musical genres have retained elastic tempi.
To listen to traditional Japanese music, turning to albums by the Yoshida brothers (Yoshida Kyōdai), an excellent shamisen duo, is a good idea. Very popular in the country, their albums mix traditional tunes with their own compositions (inspired by Japanese folklore). A little more confidential but fabulous, Kimio Eto (1924-2012) was one of the great koto artists, and each of his recordings is a little gem.
Otherwise, in Tokyo, many theaters in the Ginza district regularly offer traditional music. That said, a real opportunity to sample all the flavors of Japanese musical tradition in one go is to attend a matsuri. Rich in music and local folklore, these popular festivals, often organized around Shintō shrines or Buddhist temples, are celebrated all over the country throughout the year. In February, Okayama hosts the Hadaka Matsuri, a " festival of the naked man ", while in Sapporo, the Yuki Matsuri celebrates the snow - an essential Japanese winter event that attracts over two million visitors every year. In March, the country celebrates Hina Matsuri, the Doll Festival, and in April Hana Matsuri, the Flower Festival - commemorating the birth of Buddha. In Kyoto, Aoi Matsuri, on May 15, is a rose festival, while Gion Matsuri, throughout July, is inspired by a 9th-century rite to combat the plague. Also in July, Osaka hosts one of Japan's oldest summer festivals, the TenJin Matsuri, a famous riverside festival with boats and rowers to the beat of drums, and Fukuoka's Yamagasa Matsuri, one of Japan's most impressive festivals. For a concentrate of Japanese musical traditions, Kyoto's Gion Corner may be a good idea. Although very touristy, this theater has the merit of offering ikebana demonstrations as well as bunraku (puppet theater) and gagaku.
Classical music
One hundred and fifty years after its introduction into the country, classical music - in the Western sense - is still in perfect love with the Japanese. The genre arrived at the beginning of the Meiji era (1868-1912) - a period of modernization and opening up of the country - and owes a great deal to Shuji Isawa (1851-1917), an observer sent to the United States to study the teaching, practice and diffusion of music. Upon his return, and under his impetus, the Meiji government made the radical decision to make the instruction of Western music compulsory in primary and secondary schools. Another event that contributed to the spread of classical music in the country was the American occupation after the Second World War (1945-1952) which greatly popularized the genre in the country.
Today, children are taught music in elementary school, a subject as important as mathematics or history. Most schools have their own orchestra. But what explains the fantastic development of classical music in Japan is undoubtedly the economic miracle that the country experienced in the 1960s. Since then, the country has been a popular destination for the biggest international names, attracted by the quality of the venues and the generosity of the audience. That said, if Japan is still one of the most dynamic markets in the world in the age of streaming, Japanese orchestras - although excellent - are struggling to establish an international reputation and to export themselves.
Besides Toru Takemitsu (1930 - 1996) - a junction between Cage, Debussy and the Japanese tradition - often rightly referred to as the leader of Japanese classical music, the list of composers excelling in the field is long. These include Teizō Matsumura (1929 - 2007) whose work was influenced by Ravel and Stravinsky, Toshio Hosokawa who thought of his compositions as "sound calligraphy", and Yasushi Akutagawa (1925 - 1989) who was close to Dmitri Shostakovich and Aram Khachaturian and was the only Japanese composer whose works were officially published in the Soviet Union. The country also has a giant of conducting, Seiji Ozawa, leader of the Japanese school and one of the greatest specialists of 20th century French music. Following in his footsteps are Kazushi Ōno, known in France for conducting the Opéra national de Lyon orchestra in 2008/09, and above all Kazuki Yamada, a rising figure appointed to lead the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra from 2023.
As for the performers, it is impossible not to mention Yōko Watanabe (1953 - 2004), a Japanese soprano whose career has been devoted to the title role of Madame Butterfly throughout Europe, Mitsuko Uchida, a virtuoso pianist renowned for her interpretations of Schubert, Chopin and Debussy, Nobuyuki Tsuji, a star pianist in Japan and a rising star on the international scene, and of course Ryuichi Sakamoto. A major figure in contemporary music creation, Sakamoto was both a pioneer of electronic music - he was once a member of the Yellow Magical Orchestra, the Japanese Kraftwerk - and a sort of Erik Satie of contemporary classical music. He also composed the beautiful soundtracks of films such as The Last Emperor, Furyo, The Revenant or High Heels.
When you like it, you don't count. And the country loves classical music so much that in its capital alone, there are sixteen professional orchestras (thirty-three in the country) and five large halls with more than 2,000 seats. And if the quality is there everywhere, each hall offers perfect acoustics, some institutions stand out. This is notably the case of the NHK Symphony Orchestra, the best in the country (in the opinion of all) whose prestige continues to be fueled by the direction of the excellent Estonian conductor Paavo Järvi. The ensemble performs at the NHK Hall, the Suntory Hall and the Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall. Lesser known but also very good, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the British Jonathan Nott, plays in the huge building dedicated to the performing arts, the New Tokyo National Theater. The latter is not to be confused with the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, the oldest Japanese philharmonic ensemble whose Music Director is none other than the great Korean Chung Myung-whun. Let us also mention the Yomiuri Symphony Orchestra, one of the most prestigious in the country, which has the specificity of belonging to a press company, the daily newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun.
Current music
In the Land of the Rising Sun, all modern Western styles seem to have found their translation. Rap, rock, pop, variety... Japanese music has assimilated many genres into the country's codes. A ubiquitous soundtrack in Tokyo, Japanese music is often confused with J-pop, a musical genre that became dominant in the late 1990s and refers to the large number of girls and boy bands performing in Japan. It follows on from the city pop of the 1980s, a blend of typically Japanese disco-funk (rediscovered on the Pacific Breeze compilations) and the shibuya-kei of the 1990s, a kitschy fusion of Western sixties pop (Beach Boys, Phil Spector and Serge Gainsbourg) and local variety. Today, the genre is invariably a gold mine, driven by groups like AKB48, a 130-member (!) collective that has sold over sixty million albums in Japan, or Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, a local Lady Gaga intimately linked to the kawaii aesthetic and Harajuku. Tokyo's youth district par excellence, Harajuku is the cradle and meeting point of this J-pop culture. Once a counter-culture niche, it's still very lively, but today more eccentric than anti-conformist.
Ambient music in Japan is particularly prized and respected. Often referred to as kankyō ongaku, for "environmental music", it is not, however, comparable to what Satie called " furniture music". It is not part of the décor or the furniture, but is designed to inhabit the interior space. Satoshi Ashikawa is a pioneer of the genre in Japan, the spiritual son of Brian Eno. Another cult figure is Jun Fukamachi, whose work for the Nicole brand in the 1980s is featured on the album of the same name. Another cult figure recently rediscovered in the West thanks to the work of the American label Light In The Attic, Hiroshi Yoshimura is a fabulous sound painter, author of compositions where peace and harmony triumph.
Japaneseambient is never far from minimalist music or the avant-garde, as the music of the fabulous Midori Takada, epic and beautiful, wonderfully demonstrates, or that of Yoshi Wada and Yumiko Morioka - great figures of the 1980s, whose music, although environmental, is also conceptual. We couldn't recommend listening to Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980-1990, a veritable treasure trove in compilation form.
Ever since The Ventures in the 1960s, an American rock & roll band that enjoyed a cult following in Japan, the country has been in love with rock. That said, it's mainly at the extremes of the genre that Japan produces its most beloved bands, such as Merzbow and Boris, masters of noise and drone respectively. In addition to these two almost cult entities, there's the excellent all-female krautrock band Nisennenmondai and the experimental rock band OOIOO.
A final local nugget: jazz. Although the American genre was banned in the country during the Second World War, listeners secretly embraced it. Over the following decades, jazz became an obsession for Japanese musicians, with the country producing some fabulous ones. These included pianist and bandleader Toshiko Akiyoshi, Bud Powell's spiritual daughter, who had a rich career in the USA; internationally renowned trumpeters Terumasa Hino, Shunzo Ohno and Tiger Okoshi; the most Brazilian of Japanese saxophonists, Sadao Watanabe; free-spirited pianists Yosuke Yamashita and Masabumi Kikuchi; and pianist Satoko Fujii, renowned for her creativity. More niches, but adored by music lovers here, let's not forget to mention Tohru Aizawa Quartet, Kosuke Mine or Hiromasa Suzuki, Japanese jazz gems that any fan of the genre worthy of the name must listen to (or own in their record library).
The case of hip-hop in Japan is somewhat special. The grammatical construction of the Japanese language made the idea of Japanese rap impossible from the outset. And while the first MCs turned to English to express themselves, local rappers soon found ways of adapting Japanese to the genre. And like everywhere else on the planet, hip-hop took local culture by storm. From the 1990s onwards, entities such as Rhymester, a group with conscious, positive lyrics, and King Giddra, the pioneers of Japanese hip-hop, made a major contribution to making Japanese rap what it is today. And let's not forget to mention Dabo or Hime, who have played a huge role in local hip-hop culture. Language barrier aside, outside Japanese borders, it's hip-hop producers who have been most famous here. DJ Nujabes comes to mind, the father of what is now known as "lo-fi hip-hop", atmospheric instrumental productions infused with jazz and soul. The other big name in the discipline is DJ Krush. Also full of jazz and soul, his music has long flirted with trip-hop, making him a key figure in electronic music from 1990-2000.
Dance and theater
Music, dance and theater are often one and the same in Japanese tradition, with each art playing an important role in the other. On the whole, Japanese theater refers back to the great Shintō myths and age-old legends. This is particularly evident in kagura, the oldest form of theatrical dance in Japan. Translatable as " sacred ritualization of a place " and associated with Shintō worship, kagura is often performed on the occasion of matsuri or seasonal rites. They feature myths or historical events, and every shrine, local or national, has its own variant. There are imperial kaguras, or mi-kaguras, dating from the 9th century; watered-down dances performed by temple maids, known as miko-kagura or miko-mai; and rustic dances called sato-kagura or ta-mai, imitating farm chores. Overall, kagura are propitiatory and purifying dance rituals. They are performed to ward off epidemics and fire and ensure good harvests.
Kagura can be seen at the Reitaisai festival, held in September at Kamakura's Tsurugaoka Hachimangu shrine, which features a variety of ceremonies. Alternatively, kagura can be seen every fortnight in the village of Chu-Sha (near Nagano), or at the village of Kagura Monzen Tojimura, where weekly kagura performances take place on stage.
Gigaku may have been introduced to Japan in the 7th century, during the Asuka period. Originally accompanying Buddhist rites, it consists of a parade of dancers wearing huge masks, during ritual dances performed at the temple, and sometimes accompanied by mimes to amuse the audience.
Although nō has retained distant links with the Buddhist religion and Shintō rites, it is first and foremost a secular dance. While some claim that its roots lie in Tibet or China, it would appear to be descended from kagura.
A costumed and masked lyrical drama dating from the 14thand 15th centuries, the nō is characterized by its refined, codified and symbolic acting, which does not tell a plot but expresses an emotion or atmosphere. A highly singular form of dramatic art, nō was one of the first to be inscribed (in 2008) on Unesco's list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The repertoire currently numbers some 250 pieces. As interludes that rouse the spectator from the motionless trance into which the nō has plunged him, kyōgen (buffoonery or farce) are often denigrated and relegated to the register of minor arts. And yet... Performed with great talent, these sorts of little sketches used to highlight the burlesque situations of everyday life have a dramaturgical value in their own right. Seeing a performance of nō is a must when visiting Japan.
Meaning " exuberant and marginal ", kabuki probably originally referred to avant-garde theater - while it is now the most popular form of traditional theater. Dating back to the Edo period in the early 17th century, this epic drama depicts historical events or moral conflicts. Actors speak in monotone voices, accompanied by traditional instruments such as the shamisen. The actors enjoy great renown, often appearing in films or on television.
Of course, the best place to see kabuki is at the Kabuki-za theater in Tokyo, the (inter)national reference in the field. Elsewhere in Kotohira, you'll find Kanamaru-Za, Japan's oldest kabuki theater (1835). It is still in operation, with performances from April to May.
The latest and most popular form of Japanese theater, bunraku is performed with large puppets, manipulated by sight, while a single narrator plays all the roles.
