Description

Outstanding vocal harmony by 20 Buddhist monks

Shomyo is the term for the melodic Buddhist chant made by monks as they chant sutras in temples. The earliest mention of it in Japanese records dates from the ceremony held to consecrate the statue of the Great Buddha at Todaiji Temple in 752. The record states that, at this ceremony, there was a shomyo recitation in four parts: bai, sange, bonon, and shakujo. For this concert, we have invited the group Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years to perform this very same four-part work from the ceremony to consecrate the Great Buddha statue, plus two new shomyo pieces composed by the Yasuno Miyauchi especially for Voices of a Thousand Years: "Umigiri Sandan" and "Umigiri Eko." "Umigiri Sandan" was composed in 2012, based on a tanka poem written by Junko Sato, who lost her life in the tsunami that followed the Great East Japan Earthquake. It is a masterpiece that has been repeatedly performed in areas affected by the earthquake and other parts of Japan. Forming a pair with "Umigiri Sandan," "Umigiri Eko" is a new opus that was first performed only this year. Through these shomyo works, the concert will offer a prayer for the repose of the dead and a paean to life, carried by the beautiful harmonics of the monks' voices.

Production credit

Performance: Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years [Shichiseikai (Tendai shomyo), Karyobinga shomyo kenkyukai (Shingon shomyo)]
Music composition: Yasuno Miyauchi
Stage direction and composition: Hiromi Tamura

Lighting: Tai Morishita (Lightship)
Production: Junko Hanamitsu
Management Assistance: NPO Kaibunsha
Special Thanks: Shingon sect Buzan school Anyoin Temple, Kanagawa Prefectural Music Hall

Related Lecture: Introduction to Shomyo

The program includes an introductory lecture about shomyo with the participation of monks who are members of Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years and the composer. This lecture will set forth the history and appeals of shomyo in simple terms, and include samples of shomyo in the Tendai and Shingon styles, so listeners can hear the difference. The lecture will provide basic knowledge before hearing the concert. People may also come just to hear the lecture and not attend the concert.

Schedule: 15:00, Sunday 24 October, 2021 [approx.90 min]
Venue: The Museum of Art, Kochi - Museum Hall
Fare: Free of Charge

Lecturers:
Kojun Arai [Shingon shomyo, Hogyokuin]
Shoei Suehiro [Tendai shomyo, Konreiji]
Kenkai Tobe [Shingon shomyo, Senzoji]
Yasuno Miyauchi [Composer]

*This event will take place in lecture style and may ask participants to join experiencing the shomyo chanting.

Profile

Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years
Shomyo is a treasured Japanese musical tradition going back 1,200 years. With the aim of preserving and developing this tradition, leading figures from Japan’s two main Buddhist sects, Shingon and Tendai, formed the cross-denominational unit Shomyo Yonin no Kai, later changing the name to Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years. From 1998 to 2016, the group gave regular annual performances at Spiral in Tokyo, in concerts introducing classic shomyo pieces as well as many new shomyo works that had been commissioned to distinguished composers. In 2014, the group made a well-received tour to three cities in the United States including New York to perform the contemporary shomyo work “Sonbo no Toki” ("Crisis"), a requiem by Ushio Torikai for the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The group continues to explore the profundities of the shomyo tradition and its contemporary possibilities. CD releases include A Un no Koe and Sonbo no Toki, both composed by Ushio Torikai and released on the Japan Traditional Cultures Foundation’s label. The group has also released a new DVD that is titled Tsuki no Kogon (Mantra of Moonlight) and presents their performance of a piece composed by Yu Kawabara, under the joint label by NPO Kaibunsha and Shomyo no Kai - Voices of a Thousand Years.

Hiromi Tamura [Director]
Born in Tokyo in 1955, Hiromi Tamura graduated from the Department of Sociology in the Keio University Faculty of Letters. He has served as Director of the Production Department in the National Theatre of Japan, Director of the New National Theatre and National THeatre Okinawa Department, and Director of the Research and Training Department in the National Theatre of Japan. He plans and produces shows of traditional Japanese performing arts, mainly in the genres of folk entertainment, court music, and shomyo (Buddhist music). He also prepares and directs new works of performing arts grounded in research on folk ceremonies and oral tradition. Besides taking action for the preservation and transmission of classical performing arts, he collaborates with musical composers and other parties in the creation of many ambitious works that view traditional materials from the perspective of the present. He has constantly served as the director of the series of shomyo concerts at Spiral (Voices of a Thousand Years, vol. 1 - 24, 1998 - 2016).

Yasuno Miyauchi [Composer]
Yasuno Miyauchi graduated from Tokyo Gakugei University with a bachelor's degree in musical composition (G), and was awarded a master's degree from the Department of Media Creation in the Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences. She takes a unique approach to musical composition that interweaves sounds from the human voice and body as its fundamental elements. While her activities are centered in TSUMUGINE, the musical performance group she heads, Miyauchi is also putting effort into the composition of new works in genres such as shomyo, traditional Japanese music, gamelan, and others that are based on traditional Asian approaches to music. In addition, she has often held the WA-Tsumugi project, a vocal workshop open to participation by any and all comers, in various places, both inside and outside Japan. In other countries, for example, she held this workshop in New York during her stay there after her selection for a grant from the Asian Cultural Council in 2016, and in four countries in Southeast Asia where she did research under a fellowship program funded by the Japan Foundation Asia Center in 2018. She is doing research on the inherent role of music as a communication tool, and the social use of music not only for entertainment but also on the sites of education, welfare, etc. She received honorary mention for her entry in the digital music category at Prix Ars Electronica 2008, and took the first prize in the Tokyo Wonder Site - Experimental Sound, Art & Performance Festival 2008.

This is the third round of activity by Miyauchi at the Museum of Art, Kochi. Previously, in 2019 she did research on indigenous performing arts and culture in the prefecture under the museum's artist-in-residence program, and in 2020 composed new gamelan music for Kochi children under a program for "Creating Music for Gamelan Practice" in the museum's special school outreach program with Asian instruments.