Oshi-Katsu Chronicle: Kamakura and Muromachi. The Shogun Who Backed Kan'ami and Zeami

At a play you went to with a friend, an actor you’ve never seen before captures your heart. By the time you leave, you already want to see the next show. Meeting an oshi can begin with a single performance.

This is the story of a shogun drawn to a stage, and of the father and son who created it. Let’s trace their meeting as if we were sitting in the audience.

1. Yoshimitsu’s Oshi: Kan’ami, Zeami and the Stage That Won Him Over

In the 14th-century Muromachi period, Kan’ami’s troupe performed at Imakumano in Kyoto. A troupe, or za, is a group of performers who build a stage together. The shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu saw the performance, praised the art of Kan’ami and his son Zeami, and supported them. That backing became a major foothold for their careers. Japan Arts Council, “Kan’ami” (in Japanese)

Father and son, Kan’ami and Zeami, developed Noh, a performing art that tells stories through song, dance and acting. Noh may strike us today as formal, but at the time, arts that led to Noh were also performed at temple and shrine events. Japan Arts Council, “History of Noh” (in Japanese)

Kan’ami also borrowed fresh ideas from other arts. He learned kusemai, a dance art, and worked its rhythm into his own performances. Think of a singer who picks up the rhythm of another genre and gives familiar music a new freshness. Explainer on Kan’ami’s art (in Japanese) The Nohgaku Performers’ Association’s explainer likewise notes that Kan’ami, with Yoshimitsu’s support, took in the melody of kusemai and reformed the music, and that Zeami, then only 12, received the shogun’s patronage. Nohgaku Performers’ Association, “History of Noh” (in Japanese)

1. 01A troupe performsKan'ami's za at Imakumano
2. 02The shogun watchesAshikaga Yoshimitsu
3. 03He praises the artKan'ami and his son Zeami
4. 04He backs themA foothold for their work

A shogun's backing carried political weight; it isn't the same as buying a ticket.

Yoshimitsu’s support shows how the verdict “that stage was wonderful” can push a performer’s career forward. The way support begins will feel familiar to fans today. But a shogun, at the top of the warrior government, had far more influence than an ordinary audience member. It isn’t the same mechanism as joining a fan club or buying a ticket now.

2. “I Didn’t Know They Had This Side!”: Zeami’s “Flower”

Your favorite actor plays a completely different role in the next work. You’d been looking forward to the usual expressions, and the new performance surprises you anyway. Even after years of support, you can find one more reason to love someone.

That experience of finding a familiar face fresh again is a way into Zeami’s idea of the “flower” (hana).

In Kaden, his writing on how to perform and train for Noh, Zeami thought about the art of captivating an audience. “Flower” is a word for the novelty and appeal an audience feels in a performance. It doesn’t refer only to visual glamour. Japan Arts Council, “Kaden” (in Japanese)

Kaden also prizes the ability to play all kinds of roles and satisfy a wide range of spectators. In today’s terms, that’s a performer who can hold the house not only in the usual specialty roles but in different ones too.

The familiar performerThe performer who surprises

1. Same role againIt was good last time
2. A new roleThey had this side too
3. A wide rangeHolds many kinds of audience

The "flower" concerns the novelty and appeal an audience feels, not only visual glamour.

“It was good last time, so the same again is fine” isn’t guaranteed. How do you make viewers feel the appeal all over again? Seen this way, Zeami’s ideas about art come closer to those of us who look forward to the next appearance.

3. Joining In, Like Calling Out at a Live Show: Odori Nenbutsu

At a live show, you wave your hands and raise your voice along with the people around you. Your relationship to the venue changes from when you were only watching, because you’re part of what is happening in front of you.

Going back a little from the Noh stage, where the audience watches the performers, we reach the Kamakura period. There, in a place where the gathered people themselves chanted and danced, was odori nenbutsu.

Odori nenbutsu is a Buddhist devotional practice of dancing while reciting the Buddha’s name. The monk Ippen spread it to many places, and people didn’t just watch the dance in front of them. They chanted the nenbutsu themselves and prayed with their bodies. Japan Arts Council, “Nenbutsu Odori” (in Japanese)

Ippen’s odori nenbutsu is said to have begun in 1279 in what is now Saku City, Nagano Prefecture. Hachijuni Cultural Foundation, “Odori Nenbutsu” (in Japanese) In Saku it lives on today as the “Atobe Odori Nenbutsu” and is designated a nationally important intangible folk cultural property. Saku City, “Atobe Odori Nenbutsu” (in Japanese)

What compares to a live show is the part where the people there match their voices and movements. The purpose of odori nenbutsu lay in prayer to the Buddha. Think of Ippen as an idol and the nenbutsu as a cheering call, and you change what the practice means.

Today

Live show

• Voices and movements match
• [object Object]

Kamakura period

Odori nenbutsu

• Voices and movements match
• [object Object]

What is shared is joining in with your voice and body; the purpose is different.

Still, picturing “the people there joining in themselves” makes odori nenbutsu easier to imagine than a written description alone.

4. “Let’s Have That Event One More Time”: The Gion Festival the Townspeople Won Back

If the local festival you looked forward to every year stopped being held, you’d feel its absence. You’d be glad to hear it was coming back, and if you could help with preparations, you’d want to be part of it. People like these are part of what holds up a treasured event.

Kyoto’s Gion Festival has a history in which townspeople revived the procession of yamahoko, which war had interrupted. A yamahoko is a large, decorated float, and the procession is the parade in which the floats move through the city.

The Gion Festival is a festival with prayers for calming epidemics. In the Muromachi period, the procession of yamahoko, supported by townspeople, developed, but the Onin War, a war that engulfed Kyoto, interrupted it. Then in 1500, the townspeople revived the procession. Kyoto City, “Gion Festival: The Festival” (in Japanese) The Museum of Kyoto’s explainer likewise records that the Onin War interrupted the yamahoko procession and that it was revived in 1500, 33 years after the war began. In the Muromachi period, successive Ashikaga shoguns also watched the procession from viewing stands. Museum of Kyoto, “The Gion Festival: The Yamahoko Procession as Seen by the Ashikaga Shoguns” (in Japanese)

1. Muromachi periodProcession developsSupported by townspeople
2. Onin WarProcession interruptedWar engulfs Kyoto
3. 1500Procession revivedBy the townspeople

The revival came 33 years after the war began, as the Museum of Kyoto notes.

The closest scene today is local people cooperating to restart a festival or treasured event that had been interrupted. Waiting and saying “I want to see it again” isn’t all there is to it. Someone on the supporting side makes the return possible.

At the Gion Festival today, too, the townspeople who field yamahoko floats and the parishioner organizations (ujiko) support the event, and traditional crafts such as weaving, carving and metalwork come together in the decorations that adorn the floats. Behind the splendid procession, you can see the townspeople’s involvement (Kyoto City, “The Towns and Lives That Support the Gion Festival”, in Japanese).

None of this means the division of roles today was exactly the same in 1500. But looking at festivals now, we can see that keeping an event going takes the work of people other than those in front.

Timeline of Oshi-Katsu in the Kamakura and Muromachi Periods

Odori nenbutsu in the Kamakura period, the development of Noh in the Muromachi period, the revival of the Gion Festival after war. Lined up by date, the events in this article show how the places where people gather changed over time.

1. 1279Ippen begins the dancing nembutsu in ShinanoPerforming arts
2. 1282Crowds surge to the dancing nembutsu on Katase beachPerforming arts
3. 1299The "Ippen Hijiri-e" is made (12 volumes, 48 scenes, National Treasure)Media
4. 1324Close retainers of Emperor Go-Daigo stage a tea-tasting contestBusiness
5. 1349The viewing stands collapse at a fund-raising dengaku at Shijo KawaraPerforming arts
6. 1354The dengaku master Ichitada diesPerforming arts
7. 1356The "Tsukuba-shu" is completed (2,190 verses by 450 poets)Media
8. 1366Sasaki Doyo holds a 100-cup tea-tasting contest at OharanoBusiness
9. 1374Imakumano sarugaku. Kan'ami and Zeami win Ashikaga Yoshimitsu's patronagePerforming arts
10. 1378At the Gion festival, Zeami attends Yoshimitsu's viewing standPerforming arts
11. c. 1400Zeami continues writing "Fushi Kaden"Media
12. 1433A fund-raising sarugaku is held at Tadasu KawaraBusiness
13. 1434Zeami is exiled to SadoPerforming arts
14. 1464The Tadasu Kawara fund-raising sarugaku presents 23 noh and 20 kyogen plays over three daysBusiness
15. 1467The Onin War. Sarugaku troupes lose the backing of the shogunate and temples and shrinesPerforming arts
16. 1500The Gion festival's yamaboko float procession, once suspended, is revivedPerforming arts

Performing Arts and Trend Words of the Kamakura and Muromachi Periods

“Flower” (hana), for captivating an audience, and basara, for flashy dress and behavior. These words offer clues to the stage and to people’s lives.

Sajiki (viewing stands)

Seating built for fund-raising performances and similar events. Positions were assigned according to rank

Kanjin (fund-raising)

Collecting donations to build or repair temples and shrines. Tied to performance, it gave rise to kanjin sarugaku

Basara

Behavior not bound by existing authority or custom. A word that symbolizes the revels of figures like Sasaki Doyo

Hana (the flower)

The central concept of Zeami's "Fushi Kaden," the power of a performance to move the audience

“Flower” in the diagram is Zeami’s idea of art from section 2. Basara describes a trend of favoring flashy clothes and behavior and refusing to be bound by the old order.

Being drawn to a stage you saw once. Having your heart taken again by a new performance. Joining in a gathering yourself. Lending your strength to keep a treasured event going. In the performing arts and festivals of the Kamakura and Muromachi periods, too, there were people who watched and people who supported.

In the next installment, Oshi-Katsu Chronicle: Azuchi-Momoyama and Early Edo, we turn to kabuki-odori and kabuki: the pleasures of reading a performer’s reputation and going to see the actor you like.

References

• Japan Arts Council, “Kan’ami” (in Japanese)
• Japan Arts Council, “History of Noh” (in Japanese)
• Japan Arts Council, “Kaden” (in Japanese)
• Japan Arts Council, “Nenbutsu Odori” (in Japanese)
• Hachijuni Cultural Foundation, “Odori Nenbutsu” (in Japanese)
• Kyoto City, “Cultural History 28: Gion Festival, The Festival” (in Japanese)
• Kyoto City, The Towns and Lives That Support the Gion Festival (in Japanese)
• Nohgaku Performers’ Association, “History of Noh” (in Japanese)
• Saku City, “Atobe Odori Nenbutsu” (in Japanese)
• Museum of Kyoto, “The Gion Festival: The Yamahoko Procession as Seen by the Ashikaga Shoguns” (in Japanese)