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Ei. Wa. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Mar. 9th, 2007 06:44 pmCopied and edited for non-Japanese consumption from a post to the Tousando board.
Photos are up.
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/wodeford/album/576460762392937555
It was worth it. It's been such a sucky week I almost didn't go and then I said, "Screw it," and hopped a BART to Civic Center and the Asian Art Museum.
I killed an hour before the concert in the Japanese gallery. The Asian is a downtown museum - they rotate pieces on exhibit to maximize use of space and their collection. The two byobu (folding screens) in current rotation are an early Edo (mid 17th century) depiction of horse racing and a later Edo one of episodes from The Tale of the Heike. If the date estimate is correct on the first one, I have evidence of features on some men's clothing that will interest my fashion conscious SCA Nihonjin brothers: kataginu with "Joan Crawford shoulders" and hakama with koshi-ita (stiffened backs) from c. 1650.
The detail on screens of this type is, as always, incredible. I stood, I slavered over depictions of fashionable racegoers and riders in courtly threads. I studied the battling samurai on the Heike screen and found myself laughing at one in brown-laced armor with his back to the viewer - seems eerily like my Outlander friend. Back shots of him in battle photos are traditional....
I struggled to hold still enough to get some shots with a digital camera that does not like flashless shooting in low light.
Specially for my stitch-jock embroidering friends (you know who you are!), I shot some detail photos of a 19th century kimono and some 19th century Chinese court robes. Textiles, like scrolls and other paintings, tend to rotate at the Asian so if you're interested in seeing these up close, make a visit this spring. In fact, Thursday 4/19, there's a presentation called "Cherish the Old, Know the New: A Kimono Renaissance" at 7:00 at the Asian. Nobuaki Tomita who does costuming for NHK period dramas as well as designing modern fashions is the speaker. I am SO there.
When is it appropriate for a mature, married woman to wear the girlish, swinging sleeved furisode? When she plays the koto. The longer sleeves will not get caught in the strings, they just slide out of the way.
Kaoru Nakamura and her students are the Kyara Sound Team. Nakamura-sensei opened the concert with a simmering solo on the 17th century classical masterwork "Midare". It was just plain fascinating to watch the techniques used to produce bent notes, vibrato and other effects. The koto's 13 strings are arranged over movable bridges. The strings may be plucked with the right hand while the left may press, rub or raise the string from the other side of the bridge. It's complicated, it's madness - and yet it works.
Kazuhiro Kamiya, the shakuhachi soloist, studied his art through a komuso school. His solo, titled "Over the Mountain" did much to soothe the disharmonies of the week. Much of the rest of the program involved more modern ensemble pieces. To my ear there is a distinctly Western-ear-friendly influence to some of these, particularly in comparison to something as spare as "Midare". The finale was listed in the program as "California, My Dream." An arrangement of the Mamas and the Papas for koto ensemble and shakuhachi is pretty much something one has to hear to believe, and yet it worked.
The Kyara Sound Team ensemble does not currently have any CDs available. If you are interested in koto, I have been enjoying the work of Nanae Yoshimura on The Art of the Koto Vol. 1 and Vol. 2
Photos are up.
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/wodeford/album/576460762392937555
It was worth it. It's been such a sucky week I almost didn't go and then I said, "Screw it," and hopped a BART to Civic Center and the Asian Art Museum.
I killed an hour before the concert in the Japanese gallery. The Asian is a downtown museum - they rotate pieces on exhibit to maximize use of space and their collection. The two byobu (folding screens) in current rotation are an early Edo (mid 17th century) depiction of horse racing and a later Edo one of episodes from The Tale of the Heike. If the date estimate is correct on the first one, I have evidence of features on some men's clothing that will interest my fashion conscious SCA Nihonjin brothers: kataginu with "Joan Crawford shoulders" and hakama with koshi-ita (stiffened backs) from c. 1650.
The detail on screens of this type is, as always, incredible. I stood, I slavered over depictions of fashionable racegoers and riders in courtly threads. I studied the battling samurai on the Heike screen and found myself laughing at one in brown-laced armor with his back to the viewer - seems eerily like my Outlander friend. Back shots of him in battle photos are traditional....
I struggled to hold still enough to get some shots with a digital camera that does not like flashless shooting in low light.
Specially for my stitch-jock embroidering friends (you know who you are!), I shot some detail photos of a 19th century kimono and some 19th century Chinese court robes. Textiles, like scrolls and other paintings, tend to rotate at the Asian so if you're interested in seeing these up close, make a visit this spring. In fact, Thursday 4/19, there's a presentation called "Cherish the Old, Know the New: A Kimono Renaissance" at 7:00 at the Asian. Nobuaki Tomita who does costuming for NHK period dramas as well as designing modern fashions is the speaker. I am SO there.
When is it appropriate for a mature, married woman to wear the girlish, swinging sleeved furisode? When she plays the koto. The longer sleeves will not get caught in the strings, they just slide out of the way.
Kaoru Nakamura and her students are the Kyara Sound Team. Nakamura-sensei opened the concert with a simmering solo on the 17th century classical masterwork "Midare". It was just plain fascinating to watch the techniques used to produce bent notes, vibrato and other effects. The koto's 13 strings are arranged over movable bridges. The strings may be plucked with the right hand while the left may press, rub or raise the string from the other side of the bridge. It's complicated, it's madness - and yet it works.
Kazuhiro Kamiya, the shakuhachi soloist, studied his art through a komuso school. His solo, titled "Over the Mountain" did much to soothe the disharmonies of the week. Much of the rest of the program involved more modern ensemble pieces. To my ear there is a distinctly Western-ear-friendly influence to some of these, particularly in comparison to something as spare as "Midare". The finale was listed in the program as "California, My Dream." An arrangement of the Mamas and the Papas for koto ensemble and shakuhachi is pretty much something one has to hear to believe, and yet it worked.
The Kyara Sound Team ensemble does not currently have any CDs available. If you are interested in koto, I have been enjoying the work of Nanae Yoshimura on The Art of the Koto Vol. 1 and Vol. 2
