Noh Theatre - G^2
- Hard to give an exact start of noh theatre
- 14th century Sangaku was imported to japan from china (pantomime, acrobatics, magic, music, dance)
- Over 600 years, arts shaped and developed
- Nambokucho perios noh was officially created
- Zeami - most well known practitioner of non, kan'ami's son, entrusted with leadership of his father's Za, Wrote new plays
Characteristics - Combines elements of dance, drama, music and poetry
- Written in 15th or 16th century
- Recreated famous scenes from well known works of japanese literature Not a dramatic reenactment of an event but its retelling
- Scenes are actual spots in japan - in spirit or ghostly form to the site of a significant event
- A lot of the stories have these spirit and supernatural aspects to them
- Attain salvation by going back to these traumatic places and "facing" your experiences
- Zen buddhism and Noh - Japan very much influences by religion, prominent during Zeami's time, Hana (flower) feeling of perfect balance, mystic suspension in time, state of awareness
- Staging is very centred around spiritualism everything is there for a reason
- Tree in the back of the stage is very important, japanese pine tree, buddhist ideas of simplicity
- Movement - Kata (movement patterns), once the kata is named then it becomes known and becomes a fibre of Noh.
- Hakobi - same centre of gravity as kamae (basic posture of Noh)
- Shiori - to express sadness or greif
- Sashi uses the fan.
- The voice is very important to Noh - Utai = vocal - performed by Shit (master) and students, keeps the story moving, Ji-utai (chorus) sing to movement/shit's thoughts
- Sung in 1st person
- No set pitch
- Sings as one voice, no harmonies
- Based on a 7-5 or 12 syllable count sung over an 8 beat measure
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