To my mind, the sound of the koto is clean and elegant with something ethereal about it. I had the pleasure of listening to some koto music this past weekend at a recital held by my university's koto club.
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| kusutama.jp |
The koto is a very dynamic instrument. A standard 13-string koto is usually laid on the floor, and the player will use their right hand to pluck the strings and their left hand to pluck or hold down a string in order to alter its intonation. A player will often reach across the instrument to shift the position of a bridge or hold down a string. The strings can be plucked with or without a pick, slapped, or even scratched to create a diverse array of sound colors. It makes simply watching someone play quite interesting.
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| JETAANY.org |
As the recital was on the formal side, most of the young women on stage dressed in kimono. It's one of life's simple pleasures to see a a line of girls dressed in brightly colored robes. Though koto was the star, the girls were accompanied by other students playing shakuhachi or shamisen.
My favorite performance was perhaps the three-movement piece that outlined the life cycle of a sakura blossom - blooming bud, full bloom, falling petals. Lush arpeggiated harmonies were balanced by stark singular plucks, all while the primary melody was seamlessly passed from one koto to another.
The pieces at this recital matched my understanding of "Japanese music" in that there was a chamber music ideal. The small groups played without a conductor and kept in time by communicating with each other. Though the pieces were all performed by small groups or duets, each voice was distinct, each line of a song being easily identified. There were some uniquely Asian harmonies that my Western ears still aren't used to. The end of each piece always seemed to arrive quite suddenly and was pulled together by a last flourish of the strings. My ears couldn't pick up on the Eastern concluding chord progressions.
But altogether it was a lovely experience, and it makes my heart warm to see how traditional music and instruments can still strike a chord with young people. It makes me think that real art and beauty never truly disappear and are always passed down in one form or another.
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| commons.wikimedia.org |
Check out this video for a beginner's guide to koto:
Japanology Plus Koto Lesson （琴学習）
And check out this one to see what a master can do with this instrument:
Kaori Kimoto plays "Tegoto" by Michio Miyagi
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