Flute and Shakuhachi

Jo Kondo, J. Benitez

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781134353736
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Mezzi di comunicazione e arti performative
• Subtopic: Musica

First Published in 1994. In their quest for new sound materials, avant-garde musicians often produce sounds which accidentally bear a strong resemblance to traditional instruments. While conventional Western instruments have taken on a functional role, instruments such as the shakuhachi are still closely associated with their cultural, religious, and historical roots. The colorful and unique shakuhachi has become the most widely known and used Japanese instrument. This collection provides a comprehensive historical overview of the shakuhachi, its technical aspects and its relationship to the flute.

Aspects of the Flute in the Twentieth Century

Pierre-Yves Artaud
Translated by Catherine Dale

Introduction

An instrument of culture which more than likely originates in the very first stammerings of musical expression, the flute has always attracted respect, even devotion.

Its origins are divine: Krishna, Pan and Tityrus are the earliest known virtuosi. Plutarch observes that “the flute calms the spirits and penetrates the ears with a sound so gracious that it brings peace and tranquility to every movement, even down to the very soul”.

Captain Cook reports that at the time of his voyage to Tahiti on 22 April 1769, he was extremely surprised to find an unknown type of flute: “22 April 1769, Tootahah provided us with a sample of his country’s music; four people played a type of flute which had only two holes and which, as a result, could play only two notes a semitone apart; they played these instruments rather as one would play the transverse flute, with the single exception that the musician, instead of using his mouth, blew into one of the holes with his nostril, while stopping the other with his thumb…”.

Nose flutes of this type are found equally among the pygmy tribes of Africa and in the Phillipines.

The explanation which was provided later relies on a high degree of spirituality; primitive peoples believed that there were two kinds of air: the first, exhaled through the mouth, was considered impure since it originated in the viscera. The second was exhaled through the nose and arose in the head, the repository of the soul. This second kind constituted a pure breath which was capable of being heard by the gods and the dead only when it was amplified by the flute, the sole wind instrument in which the air is not soiled by the instrument since it does not pass through its tube.

The shakuhachi, for its part, was introduced into Japan from China and became an instrument of Zen spiritual meditation; indeed, examples of this type may be multiplied almost ad infinitum.

It is interesting but fundamentally quite natural to meet the flute again and again throughout the history of humanity and to observe that its role in creation in the twentieth century is a decisive one.

In this respect, there has been an undeniable infatuation for the shakuhachi flute in the West for several decades. Performances on the shakuhachi have fascinated composers both in terms of the instrument’s virtuosity and in particular of its fluidity of sound, and have facilitated a reconsideration of the manner of writing for the Boehm flute at a time when the historical need to liberate the Boehm instrument from certain aesthetic criteria was becoming urgent.

For my own part, ever since my encounter with Yoshihisa Taïra shortly after his arrival in Paris (1966), I began to become increasingly aware of and enthusiastic towards traditional types of music, particularly that of the Japanese tradition and the shakuhachi. At the Autumn Festival (in 1970, if my memory serves me correctly) I attended the recital given by Yokoyama and Tsuruta, who had been invited to Paris by Maurice Fleuret. This was a revelation, one of the most important musical experiences of my life, which enabled me among other things to penetrate more fully the universe of my friend Taïra and to reconsider in large part my own technique and sensibilities.

In 1986 I met Yoshikazu Iwamoto at the Almeida Festival in London. I attended the rehearsal for his forthcoming recital and was dazzled not only by the presence but also by the instrumental and physical control of this great master. I cannot remember exactly how the idea of playing together arose, but naturally it could only delight and fascinate me, as well as cause me some anxiety. The fascination of anyone who regards this instrument and his art with such passion and veneration may easily be understood; the anxiety to which it gave rise stemmed, I believe, from the challenges it posed:

1. How would one construct a convincing programme from traditional and contemporary music for the two solo instruments?
2. How would one integrate the two sonorities in a duet?
3. How would one avoid falling into the simplistic notion of superimposing two different worlds or, worse, of caricaturing a culture either through naivety or through the adoption of a sort of cultural colonialism (in the manner of Ravel: “Laideronnette, Empress of the Pagodas”!)?

As far as the first point is concerned, it was fascinating for me to observe the ease with which one may pass without any transition whatsoever from the Japanese Middle Ages to the present day. The progression from this period to Takemitsu or Berio is unquestionably more apparent than the progression from Bach to Berio.

I attribute this fact to a common concern for the treatment of the sound which overrides that for structure, for although the latter concern exists in both periods it is not essential to an immediate perception of the music. I would simply like to state that even in the case of a hyper-structural work such as Unity Capsule by Femeyhough, the concern to elaborate a very strict form recedes into the background when the piece is heard, for the listener is confronted with the concept of a sound fantasy. In reality, of course, this structure is not effaced; it is absorbed by our unconscious perception, and is clearly indispensable to our long-term memorization of the piece. A closed structure is as indispensable to musical architecture as it is to monumental architecture. Once the building itself is out of sight we are left with an impression of its spaciousness, the strength of its lines and its general aspect. In the same way, after hearing a musical work, its structures, intensities (orchestral colours, dynamics) and general form associated with its duration remain in our memory.

A musical work should therefore associate both aspects, and it may be observed that these two repertoires do indeed unite them.

With regard to the second point, I confess that my little knowledge of the shakuhachi together with my years of working with Taira have taught me a thing or two.

It is true that the difference in the nature of the two sounds could make their combination in a duet a delicate procedure. However, the considerable degree of freedom exercised by the flutes enables them to approach one another in a satisfactory way. But duet playing also allows the differences between the two instruments to be emphasized and therefore for one part to distance itself as far as possible from the other. The first three duets that were composed for us illustrate, completely by chance, three typical cases:

1. High Song by Jo Kondo provides an example of strict, “abstract” writing in which the shakuhachi must renounce all cultural identity in favour of a sound which is stable in both pitch and tone; this quest for stability constitutes ultimately the original reason for the existence of the Boehm flute.
2. Synchrony by Yoshihisa Taïra seems as though it is written for two shakuhachis. Moreover, the composer has retained deep cultural associations throughout and his highly gestural music imposes on the Western flute a phrasing and sound which remain very Japanese. It was for this reason that I asked Taïra for permission to perform this work which was originally written for two flutes in a version for flute and shakuhachi.
3. Nada by Mike Vaughan offers a very interesting synthesis of these two cases in that the two flutes are required to alternate constantly between Eastern and Western attitudes; moreover, the work, which is composed according to very elaborate structures in terms of its notes and metrical scheme, is none the less very gestural, and such an effusive sound fantasy permits a highly successful osmosis between the two flutes. The selection of the bass flute in partnership with the shakuhachi constitutes an important aspect of this osmosis.

The final point concerns the perilous situation which must be avoided at all costs. Clearly, the choice of repertoire is crucial and, from this perspective, one must know exactly which composers one wishes to address.

The second condition depends first of all on the performer having thoroughly assimilated the culture of his partner. Iwamoto has a very solid “Western” technique and, at the time of our first concert (August 1987 in Dartington), I for my own part had behind me twenty years of knowledge of the Japanese tradition which proved sufficient for me to have absorbed “physiologically” certain technical and cultural principles. Without this kind of approach such a duet combination would prove as musically sterile as the performances of those Baroque music ensembles which play original instruments and believe that by merely purchasing a Baroque flute or a viola da gamba they will achieve the desired result. It ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Foreword
• One Sound
• The Potential of the Shakuhachi in Contemporary Music
• The Shakuhachi and the Contemporary Music Instrumentarium: A Personal View
• An Interview with YOKOYAMA Katsuya
• On Writing for Shakuhachi: A Western Perspective
• Shakuhachi and the American Composer
• Ways of the Shakuhachi: Exploitation or Creation?
• The Shakuhachi: The Instrument and its Music, Change and Diversification
• Aspects of the Flute in the Twentieth Century
• The Contemporary Transverse Flute and the Shakuhachi: Convergences An Acoustic Analysis of Performance Techniques
• A Survey of Contemporary Music for Shakuhachi by Japanese Composers
• Index