I got off at Shibuya and took the building 109 exit to emerge on the ground. I saw on my left "Kujira-ya," an old and famous restaurant. Soon I was walking up on a gentle slope and saw the sign of「Kanze Nohgakudo (観世能楽堂)」on the side wall of an oldish concrete building three-story high. I felt "Oh, sheet" and at the same relieved, as I reached at my destination without getting lost even once.
I entered Kanze Noh-gakudo and opened the door of auditorium. Inside, there are a traditionally roofed Noh-stage building on the right side of the open ceiling space and the long corridor extending from the stage to the left. Seats are spacious and surround the L-letter shaped traditional Noh theater structure comfortably.
The main Noh stage made of Japanese cypress is glittering softly. It sticks out deep in the audience seat, which is dark compared to the stage, though the audience seat never gets as dark as that of a western auditorium even during performance. The Noh stage looked as if it were the other side of the real world, that is, it appears unreal and is blissfully beautiful. Drawn on the backdrop of the stage is a stylized pine tree whose clusters of needles simmer in bluish green. On the backdrop of the right side of the stage, thick bamboo sticks are in soft green as if they are shining in a sun ray right after a passing shower. I suddenly understood why we Japanese describe a personal big moment as "standing on the stage." The Noh stage appeared to be such an exorbitantly happy place.（Snapshot below is from the Kanze Nohgakudo home page)
Performance begins without any audio announcement or greeting.
Four men wearing hakama and carrying instruments with them came on the stage from the small door located at the corner on the right wall (with bamboo drawing) of the stage and sat on the floor with their back against the pine. Five more men and one woman came on and sat their back against the bamboos. "Mai-bayashi or 舞囃子," one kind of Noh about which I had had no idea of what it was like, was about to begin. The four men on the left began playing a Japanese drum, a knee drum, a shoulder drum and a whistle respectively. The five men who'd perform Noh chant, or "jiuta," sat on the floor with the woman in Japanese kimono at the top of their triangle formation.
I was surprised at how extraordinarily well jiuta men carried their voice in chanting. The knee and shoulder drums would resonate as if to cut jiuta men's penetrating voice in slices. Intoned shouts of "Oh,""Yei," or "Ha" would chime in between knee and shoulder drums and whistle's often sharp melodies. The men's shouts were so clear and loud that I couldn't help wondering where in the body those voices had come from. The combination of the percussion and human chants and shouts was crisp, rhythmic and so cool.
My friend danced and chanted a piece called "Ukon." I was stunned and wondered how she was able to project such a loud voice especially because I've known her as having rather thin voice.
Performance suddenly ended and the next one began.
Watching several performances, I imagined how Lord Nobunaga Oda, a 16th century war lord and a Noh lover carried his body on a stage. And many samurai worriers. In between their wars.
I got it why some people are absorbed to the world of Noh. It's a happy, pure and brilliantly creative space in which stylized human shouts resonate with chants, in which the sounds of instruments slice the air and human voices in myriad ways and angles, on whose floor white tabi socks glide gracefully and occasionally with thumps. The shiny wooden stage appears as if it were floating above the oblong garden lined with white ballast and dotted with pine shoots. And the closeness of the performer and audience gives an air of conspiracy (or a promise) that both contribute to the construction of a happy, creative space.
P.S.: There is an Inari shrine right next to the Noh-gakudo on the same premise. I wonder what kind of relationship they have between them.
