History of appearance
Since its appearance in the 14th century, it was immediately aimed at the upper strata of Japan. The Noh theater was adored at the court of the Tokugawa shogunate; it was especially popular among the samurai and the highest aristocracy. It was inaccessible to ordinary mortals in those days.
Even now, if you visit the But theater without feeling some kind of power in your hands, you will not get real pleasure from watching the actors play. And also don’t forget, all the action on stage is carefully encrypted and if you don’t know the code, then everything you see will be simple strange gestures and movements.
All these small nuances were acquired over time, and not created all at once. With each century, the theater developed, absorbed the experience of centuries, filled with a list of plays, movements and traditions were honed.
Japanese Joruri Theater
The first to show puppet shows were the kutsugushi, hunters who had nothing to do in their free time. So they made dolls, and at the same time staged simple performances for their own amusement... Later, Buddhists became interested in such art. They began to tell the stories of their abodes and parables, walking around the cities with a small stage right on their chest, attached to their neck! Then they added music, sekke, and Buddhist parables in musical arrangements, and all this art began to be called kugutsu. By the way, courtesans often entertained their masters with the help of puppet shows at that time.
This art has been complemented over the centuries by various elements such as the koto (a bowed instrument similar to a violin) or the shamisen (a traditional stringed instrument in Japan). Topics for stories changed, and then one day, a descendant and student of great masters of puppetry combined a popular musical play with a puppet show. Joruri is the name of the girlfriend of the main character, the popular character of Minamoto Yoshitsune in those years. The puppet theater was named after her, and over the years it only became more popular in Japan...
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Traditions
On the stage of the Noh theater, as is typical for the Japanese, complete minimalism reigned. There was practically no scenery, props or other props here, the main thing was the actor, his mask and his movements.
The traditions of Noh theater are so deep that most kimonos and masks were passed down from one actor to another. As a result, some masks are now several hundred years old. They were all on stage, the audience was watching them all.
The light in the theater is focused so that every spectator is able to see the mask and its emotion. All the action takes place to the singing of a choir, the beating of drums and other musical cacophony (this is exactly what it will seem like to most foreigners).
The site or main narrator begins to narrate the life story of the Gods, spirits, demons, who sometimes even descend to Earth and remember mortals (this is so sweet of them). Among the “ordinary people” there may be monks, generals and warriors, and naturally the shogun.
Depending on the story, the story itself changes. If they are gods, then it is quite possible that some ancient Japanese myth from their life will unfold before us, and if they are a mortal commander, then most likely we will have a story about a bloody battle. Most often, all these stories are very archaic and therefore are now understood by few people.
Japanese Bunraku Theater
Bunraku is the most famous and largest puppet theater in Japan. It grew, of course, from Joruri puppet shows, but at one time it received the status of a state theater. It is Bunraku that is represented by Japanese puppet theater today. According to a tradition that developed back in the mid-17th century, a doll, half or a third of a man’s height, is led by three people. The most experienced one is responsible for the head, the other two are responsible for the arms and legs. The puppeteer actors themselves are usually draped with black cloth over their heads. It really works: after a few minutes of the performance, the viewer stops noticing the puppeteers altogether! However, especially famous actors could still show their faces during performances.
The dolls are voiced by one person - Guidayu. He narrates from the perspective of all the dolls, changing his voice from low to falsetto, accompanied by traditional musical instruments. The first building of the Bunraku National Circus was built in 1872 in Osaka. And in 1956 a new one was built, using more modern technologies and with maximum consideration for the needs of artists. The Japanese Bunraku Theater has been touring around the world since 1962.
You will find the National Bunraku Theater in Osaka:
Masks
There is an opinion that masks in Noh theater are created for specific roles, but this is absolutely not true. All masks participate in different performances. At the same time, do not forget that the facial expression on them is always the same.
Unlike the ancient Greek theater, when the actor could change masks on stage to express his feelings, here it is almost impossible. As a result, the actor still shows the real game, with his deeply symbolic gestures and movements. Only a person on stage is able to convey all the feelings of a mask in the theater. But without him it is just an impersonal piece of wood and nothing more.
But you shouldn’t think that the actor alone creates the necessary atmosphere. Here you have Hayashi - the musical accompaniment to which the actors perform on stage, and Utai - the recitative of the choir, which sets the right mood. And this is without touching on the topic of light and shadow, which the Japanese pay special attention to regardless of the type of art.
Now there are about 200 types of masks, each of them expresses its own emotion. But most of them, at first glance, do not convey any emotions at all.
The main material for creating masks is Japanese cypress. It is also curious that there is no one specific school of theater, but they are all different. They also use their experience in different ways and the same masks with the same facial expression are often used for different roles. Despite all the acting, the mask itself expresses pure emotion, and it is already difficult to move away from it. Therefore, Noh theater is loved by those theatergoers who stand for pure emotion.
Japanese theater: from time immemorial
Theater in the Land of the Rising Sun is an art that comes from a truly ancient past. The first to begin giving theatrical performances for religious purposes were the Shintoists, adherents of the religion that existed before Buddhism in Japan. The most interesting thing is that these “shamanic dances with a tambourine” called Kagura, quite simple, have survived to this day as a theatrical art! But the Japanese theater received its main impetus when Buddhism began to penetrate into Japan from China, Korea and India almost 1,500 years ago. Some historians believe that the pro-Greek states of Asia, India and Korea were also vehicles for ancient drama, one of the main “ancestors” of theater in the world...
Photo from kabar.kg website
Around the 7th century, Japan borrowed the art of Gigaku pantomime and Bugaku dances from the culture of its neighbors. Gigaku lived for a little over 300 years, since much more interesting and complex genres grew on its basis, but the art of dance was so popular with the imperial court that it existed until the Meiji restoration in 1868, when the shogunate regime was overthrown. It would seem that the old regime had fallen, but the art of dance, as a component of the traditional art of Japan, even experienced a second heyday during that period, and still represents the ancient theatrical traditions of Japan!
In the 14th century, two directions came to Japanese theater at once: the dramatic theater of masks Noh and the Kyogen theater. The first was intended for the nobility, the second was for the entertainment of the lower classes. At the beginning of the 17th century, the most famous Japanese theater in the world today, Kabuki, was born. In addition, from the traditional theatrical entertainment of old times, such trends as Jozuri and Yose have survived to this day. We will try to briefly tell you about each of these styles below...
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Acting
The acting is unusual for Western audiences, as is the essence of the plays. People in Europe and America are accustomed to the fact that theater is a very realistic thing, trying to connect the narrative on stage with what is happening to the viewer. This is actually why the current theater is experiencing a serious crisis of relevance.
But here deep symbolism rules the roost. The musical accompaniment, the singing of the choir and the movements of the actors should show that they can be separated by an abyss, while nothing happens on stage. In traditional clothing and a mask, it is difficult to notice movements, especially facial expressions of a person. Nevertheless, the gesture is at the forefront here. Many gestures already mean something, have their own language, and there are also those that exist only for the sake of beauty.
At moments when it is necessary to emphasize the particularly dramatic nature of the situation, the music and singing of the choir stops. Silence ensues, but if you are experienced in such theatrical productions, then you will understand what they want to tell you. And for the rest it will be like silence and an absurd pause.
Mostly actors play in special theaters. If you are lucky enough to attend a performance, be patient; on average, one performance lasts about 4-5 hours. However, the narrative itself does not proceed linearly; it is interrupted by miniatures from the life of ordinary people, sometimes even with dancing.
Such subtleties block the way for all newcomers to quickly fit in and understand what they are being told from the stage. But for others, Noh theater is a specific stage genre of art in which they talk not about feelings, but about shades of feelings.
<Yose Theater Palace of Convention of Japanese Gods>
Where to watch Noh in Japan?
Some of the easiest places to watch noh today are modern indoor theaters with a built-in noh stage. In Tokyo, these venues include the National No Theater near Sendagaya Station, the Kanze No Theater in Ginza, and the Azure Tower Theater in Shibuya. Osaka has the Otsuki no theater, Nagoya has the Nagoya no theater, next to Nagoya Castle.
These days, a typical noh program lasts a couple of hours and consists of two or three acts of noh with short kyogen pieces in between. Tickets range from 3,000 to 12,500 yen and can be purchased at the box office or online. Some venues offer discounted tickets to see one act of Noh, which may be ideal for those looking for a short introduction to the Japanese art form. Please note that purchasing tickets often requires knowledge of the Japanese language.
Otabisho. Otabisho
As mentioned earlier, shrines, temples, and nobles were some of the earliest patrons of Noh theater. Accordingly, some famous sanctuaries and temples have beautiful outdoor scenes but still exist today. They sometimes put on shows, but tickets can be hard to come by. Miyajima Itsukushima Shrine (where the stage stands on pillars in the sea), Hiraizumi Tusonji Shrine, Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto, and Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo are some places where such outdoor scenes can be found.
Ukiyo-e. Japanese art movement
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Kabuki stage makeup
An actor's makeup depends on the role he plays. When playing a young charmer or a young man, the face is painted white. To reflect a more mature age, brown shades are added to the makeup. If the script requires the actor to look strong and masculine, various stripes are applied to his face. To enhance the emotional coloring of the character, special Kumadori canons are used. Canon colors: blue black and different shades of red. Scarlet signifies courage, honesty, and loyalty, while black symbolizes spirituality and supernatural powers. Blue in this tradition is interpreted as evil and dark otherworldly forces.
Often, in Kabuki, the roles of women are still played by men. And they make up so skillfully that from the stage it is impossible to distinguish such actors from real women. The basis of this makeup is light shades and a large amount of cosmetics on the face.
Japanese Yose Theater
Of course, humor could not bypass the theater of Japan, which is why the Yose Theater was created. This is an intimate theater with comedy performances, mainly represented by the rakugo genre - stories with a funny ending, collected from jokes around the country. The topics were not limited by anything, so in these anecdotes you can hear funny situations from politics, history, everyday life, however, from old times. That is why modern rakugoka, performers of the rakugo genre, often write their own satirical stories...
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In addition to rakugo, there were other popular genres of Yose, such as manzai, dialogues with humor, originating from performances on the occasion of the new year. This type of humor was the most popular in the Yose theater after performers began to dress in the European style in the 1930s. And with the development of television, it became firmly established in various shows, incorporating many different elements from other areas of humor. In addition, the Yose Theater traditionally hosts performances by artists in the genres of kodan (art reading) and naniwabushi (a special way of telling ballads). Between main performances there is always a show of magic tricks or the art of cutting out paper silhouettes.
You can watch performances of the Yose Theater (and other areas of Japanese theater) in Tokyo, at the National Japanese Theater:
