Mujitsu and Tairaku's Shakuhachi BBQ

Jon wrote:

For clarification sake for anyone joining this thread - we've determined that honkyoku pieces that are new individual "versions" of older koten honkyoku pieces and which retain the essence of the originals are considered koten honkyoku while pieces which are not versions of older pieces and are composed in modern times do not generally get the designation of koten honkyoku even if the pieces contain koten honkyoku elements and are inspired by them.

Ah...where exactly did this determination happen? I think that mostly, 'we' have ventured deep into the woods of angels dancing on the head of a pin, and that turning 180 degrees and easing back out into the light of day, where such matters are of little concern, would be a useful thing to do.

Why should we care 'what honkyoku is'? You play what your teacher (whoever, or whatever that is) plays, as best you can. If you get another teacher, you play whatever he or she plays, as best you can. When you're done with teachers, you play whatever you play, as best you can, trying to maintain what you perceive as 'essence'; to honor the tradition, knowing that you will never really get it 'right'. Honkyoku has grown from so many different roots, and been fed by so many tributaries, that it's silly to try to nail it down.

Don't worry. Be happy.

STUPID HIPPY wrote:

edosan wrote:

Jon wrote:

Thank you Michael. That clears up a lot for me and I get it now. So only the honkyoku that Watazumi Doso created need to be recategorized.

Apparently, you still don't get it...

It is a bummer but at the same time it is meaningful.

Welcome to the forum, STUPID HIPPY!

"Honkyoku has grown from so many different roots, and been fed by so many tributaries, that it's silly to try to nail it down."

That being said, its still kinda fun to try : )
Here's my attempt:

I think honkyoku are solo (although on some occasions duets) shakuhachi pieces that come from the suizen tradition (usually) and have no known creator.  Thus they are called koten or koden honkyoku, which means classical or traditional original songs.

Modern honkyoku would be solo or duet, or even some Tozan honkyoku have up to 5 players : O
Modern honkyoku have a known creator and try to follow the feeling and ideas of the koten honkyoku.

All koten and koden honkyoku of course have changed over time and we can see this clearly when comparing different lineages which hold the same honkyoku.  Although almost the same, they have sometimes different phrasing and fancy stuff, but are easily recognizable as the same piece. 

Although if you've read the story about Yamato Choshi you can see what easily happens with songs even in a short period of time..

"This piece was composed by Tani Kyochiku (1882-1950), a student of the Kyushu (Kumamoto prefecture) shakuhachi master Miyagawa Nyozan (1868-1946). Kyochiku was a professional shakuhachi-playing monk who toured not just Japan but also China and other countries. In 1930 he took his long 2.5-shaku (approx 75 cm.) instrument on tour to Hong Kong, Singapore, Sumatra, Burma, and India. At that time his passport identified his occupation merely as a "religious musician."

Kyochiku learned this piece as "Darani" from the Nara shakuhachi performer Murata Sen'o, but when ten years later he performed it for Murata, the latter exclaimed "That is a nice piece, what is it?" This comment, indicating that after ten years the piece had been completely altered, greatly disheartened Kyochiku. He then named what he played "Yamato-joshi" (literally, "melody from Yamato"). Yamato, another name for Nara, was the area in which he had once learned the original composition."

Good story..   : )
Anyway, that's my 2 yen on the subject..

Chris

Bogert wrote:

"Thus they are called koten or koden honkyoku, which means classical or traditional original songs. Modern honkyoku have a known creator and try to follow the feeling and ideas of the koten honkyoku."

This is the point to be objective about and what this thread is chiefly concerned with however I am enjoying the other topics of interest.

As it is now if someone goes to Komuso.com to see the honkyoku composed in modern times they will not find Watazumi original composed Dokyoku under "modern honkyoku". The source pieces for other Dokyoku pieces are also not easily found or provided on Komuso.com.

I am sure there is a more effective way of organizing things. I am not a Librarian but what if honkyoku were organized by date with the known "authors" as well as known or possible source pieces included rather than by "honkyoku", "modern honkyoku", "koten" etc.?

Last edited by Jon (2009-04-05 15:25:07)

Jon wrote:

As it is now if someone goes to Komuso.com to see the honkyoku composed in modern times they will not find Watazumi original composed Dokyoku under "modern honkyoku". The source pieces for other Dokyoku pieces are also not easily found or provided on Komuso.com.

I am sure there is a more effective way of organizing things. I am not a Librarian but what if honkyoku were organized by date with the known "authors" as well as known or possible source pieces included rather than by "honkyoku", "modern honkyoku", "koten" etc.?

Why doesn't "someone" (i.e. you! ) do the research and find out which songs Watazumi "composed" and/or are his improvs and then send that list to Ron over at www.komuso.com and ask him to reassign them to the "Modern Honkyoku" category? He is usually quite open to improvements in his website.

Hi Jon,

Jin Nyodo is not an issue because the liner notes to his albums (also collected in Hogaku Journal and published on www.komuso.com) are very detailed about the origin of the pieces, and the rare original compositions.

As far as Watazumi repertoire goes www.komuso.com has a listing of all the songs he recorded (at least, we don't know what else he may have played) and it should be possible to go through them systematically and identify the ones which are "normal" honkyoku. In some cases (c.f. "Yamagoe" which is originally known as "Kyushu Reibo") he changed the names.

That leaves the unidentified pieces which the liner notes might hint at as Watazumi's original or an improv. If you get stuck, come to the forum and ask for help. There are many "Dokyoku" players here. They might be able to help.

A task like this only needs systematic work to get narrowed down to the problematic pieces and then some research.

We await your results and if anybody else wants to help maybe you can divide the titles up alphabetically or something and figure out what each piece is.

Ciao,

BR

Chris Moran wrote:

Jon wrote:

...  what if honkyoku were organized by date with the known "authors" as well as known or possible source pieces included rather than by "honkyoku", "modern honkyoku", "koten" etc.?

Edosan, you can create databases on the fly right?

I think Edosan uses a Mac so I don't know what they have there, but with Microsoft Access (part of MS Office) and the database facilty in OpenOffice (which is free) it's very easy to create a database... if you use one of the many templates they already set up for use. Most personal and business applications you can think of have a template, maybe one of them will have the fields you need. If you can't find a template that's suitable, you can still go about creating a database without writing even one line of code, meaning you don't have to know programming, but expect to struggle some. Either way use google starting with the search terms "Microsoft Access Tutorial" or "OpenOffice Database Tutorial". You'll probably rely heavily on google to "write" your database, but  there's plenty of information out there on the web for it.

Jon wrote:

It's been done apparently komuso.com/pieces/Kaze.html

!

Ron Nelson is like God. He watches silently then acts in the best interests of the people. Let's hope he never gets the idea to do something like a flood or tsunami.