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Japan Performing Arts
A remarkable number of the traditional forms of music,
dance,
and theater have survived in the contemporary world,
enjoying some
popularity through reidentification with Japanese cultural
values. Traditional music and dance, which trace their
origins to
ancient religious use--Buddhist, Shinto, and folk--have
been
preserved in the dramatic performances of No, Kabuki, and
bunraku theater. Ancient court music and dance
forms
deriving from continental sources were preserved through
imperial
household musicians and temple and shrine troupes. Some of
the
oldest musical instruments in the world have been in
continuous use
in Japan from the Jomon period, as shown by finds of stone
and clay
flutes and zithers having between two and four strings, to
which
Yayoi-period metal bells and gongs were added to create
early
musical ensembles. By the early historical period (sixth
to seventh
centuries A.D.), there were a variety of large and small
drums,
gongs, chimes, flutes, and stringed instruments, such as
the
imported mandolin-like biwa and the flat
six-stringed
zither, which evolved into the thirteen-stringed
koto. These
instruments formed the orchestras for the seventh-century
continentally derived ceremonial court music, which,
together with
the accompanying bugaku (a type of court dance),
are the
most ancient of such forms still performed at the imperial
court,
ancient temples, and shrines. Buddhism introduced the
rhythmic
chants, still used, that were joined with native ideas and
underlay
the development of vocal music, such as in No.
Data as of January 1994
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