Biwa


The biwa is a Japanese short-necked fretted lute, often used in narrative storytelling. The biwa is the chosen instrument of Benten, goddess of music, eloquence, poetry, and education in Japanese Buddhism. The biwa is a plucked string instrument that was first popular in China and then spread throughout East Asia. It is said to have arrived in Japan from China during the Nara period, and is even thought to have roots that trace back to Persia. It is generally 60 - 106 cm in length and made from wood. The instrument consists of a water-drop-shaped body with a handle, and while there are generally four strings, five-stringed varieties also exist. In Japan, the biwa is generally plucked with a bachi instead of the fingers, and is often used to play gagaku. In addition, it is used as musical accompaniment when blind monks recite scriptural texts, or when reciting The Tale of the Heike, a war chronicle from the Kamakura era.
The origin of the biwa is the Chinese pipa. It arrived in Japan in two forms. Since that time, the number of biwa types has more than quadrupled. Guilds supporting biwa players, particularly the biwa hoshi, helped proliferate biwa musical development for hundreds of years. Biwa hōshi performances overlapped with performances by other biwa players many years before heikyoko and continues to this day. This overlap resulted in a rapid evolution of the biwa and its usage and made it one of the most popular instruments in Japan.
Yet, in spite of its popularity, the Ōnin War and subsequent Warring States Period disrupted biwa teaching and decreased the number of proficient users. With the abolition of Todo in the Meiji period, biwa players lost their patronage.
Furthermore, reforms stemming from the Meiji Restoration led to massive, rapid industrialization and modernization. Japan modeled its development on Europe and the US, praising everything Western and condemning everything native. Traditions identifiably Japanese became associated with terms like backwards or primitive. Such associations even extended into areas like art and music, and the biwa.
By the late 1940s, the biwa, a thoroughly Japanese tradition, was nearly completely abandoned for Western instruments; however, thanks to collaborative efforts by Japanese musicians, interest in the biwa is being revived. Japanese and foreign musicians alike have begun embracing traditional Japanese instruments, particularly the biwa, in their compositions. While blind biwa singers no longer dominate the biwa, many performers continue to use the instrument in traditional and modern ways.

History

The biwa came to Japan in the 7th century and it was evolved from the Chinese instrument pipa, while the pipa itself was derived from similar instruments in Western Asia. This type of biwa is called the gaku-biwa and was used in gagaku ensembles and is the most commonly known type. While the route is unclear, another type of biwa found its way to the Kyushu region, and this thin biwa was used in ceremonies and religious rites. Before long, as the Ritsuryō state collapsed, the court music musicians were faced with the reconstruction and sought asylum in Buddhist temples. There they assumed the role of Buddhist monks and encountered the mōsō-biwa. They incorporated the convenient aspects of mōsō-biwa, its small size and portability, into their large and heavy gaku-biwa, and created the heike-biwa, which, as indicated by its namesake, was used primarily for recitations of The Tale of the Heike.
Through the next several centuries, players of both traditions intersected frequently and developed new music styles and new instruments. By the Kamakura period, the heike-biwa had emerged as a popular instrument. The heike-biwa could be described as a cross between both the gaku-biwa and mōsō-biwa. It retained the rounded shape of the gaku-biwa and was played with a large plectrum like the mōsō-biwa. The heike biwa was also small, like the mōsō-biwa and was used for similar purposes.
While the modern satsuma-biwa and chikuzen-biwa both find their origin with the mōsō-biwa, the Satsuma biwa was used for moral and mental training by samurai of the Satsuma Domain during the Warring States period, and later in general performances. The Chikuzen biwa was used by Buddhist monks visiting private residences to perform memorial services, not only for Buddhist rites, but also for telling entertaining stories and news while accompanying themselves on the biwa, and this form of storytelling was thought to be spread in this way.
Not much seems to have been written about biwas from roughly the 16th century to the mid-19th century. What is known is that three main streams of biwa emerged during that time: zato, shifu, and chofu. These styles emphasized 琵琶歌 —vocalization with biwa accompaniment—and formed the foundation for 江戸歌 styles such as shinnai and kota. From these styles also emerged the two principal survivors of the biwa tradition: satsuma-biwa and chikuzen-biwa. From roughly the Meiji Era until the Pacific War, the satsuma-biwa and chikuzen-biwa were popular across Japan, and, at the beginning of the Showa Era, the nishiki-biwa was created and gained popularity. Of the remaining biwa traditions, only higo-biwa remains a style almost solely performed by blind persons in the post-war era. The higo-biwa is closely related to the heike-biwa and, similarly, relies on an oral-narrative tradition focusing on wars and legends.
By the middle of the Meiji period, improvements had been made on the instruments and easily understandable songs were composed in quantity. In the beginning of the Taishō period, the Satsuma biwa was modified into the Nishiki biwa which was popular among female players at the time. With this the biwa met a great period of prosperity, and the songs themselves were not just about the Tale of the Heike but songs connected to the Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War such as "Takeo Hirose", "Hitachimaru", "203 Hill" gained popularity. However, the playing of the biwa nearly became extinct during the Meiji period as Western music and instruments became popular, until players such as Tsuruta Kinshi and others revitalized the genre with modern playing styles and collaborations with Western composers.

Types

There are more than seven types of biwa, characterised by number of strings, sounds it could produce, type of plectrum, and their use. As the biwa does not play in tempered tuning, pitches are approximated to the nearest note.

Classic biwa

Modern biwa

Generally speaking, biwa is considered one of Japan's principal traditional instruments, and, as such, it has both influenced and been influenced by other traditional instruments and compositions throughout its long history in Japan.
In Hogaku, musical instruments usually serve as accompaniments to vocal performances. Song dominates hogaku, and the overwhelming majority of hogaku compositions are vocal. In this context, the biwa was one of the prominent instruments.
Gagaku was usually patronized by the imperial court or the shrines and temples. Gagaku ensembles were composed of string, wind, and percussion instruments, where string and wind instruments were more respected and percussion instruments were considered lesser instruments. Among the string instruments, the biwa seems to have been the most important instrument in gagaku orchestral performances.
While biwa was not used in shōmyō, the style of biwa singing is closely tied to shōmyō, especially mōsō and heike style biwa singing. Both shōmyō and mōsō are rooted in Buddhist rituals and traditions. Before arriving in Japan, shōmyō was used in Indian Buddhism. The mōsō-biwa was also rooted in Indian Buddhism, and the heike-biwa, as a predecessor to the mōsō-biwa, was the principal instrument of the biwa hōshi, who were blind Buddhist priests.

Biwa Aesthetics

Generally speaking, biwas have four strings. That being said, modern satsuma and chikuzen biwas might have five strings. The first string is thickest and the fourth string is thinnest . The varying string thickness creates different timbres when stroked from different directions.
In biwa, tuning is not fixed. General tones and pitches can fluctuate up or down entire steps or microtones. When singing in a chorus, biwa singers often stagger their entry and often sing through non-synchronized, heterophony accompaniment. In solo performances, a biwa performer sings monophonically, with melismatic emphasis throughout the performance. These monophonic do not follow a set harmony. Instead biwa singers tend to sing with a flexible pitch without distinguishing soprano, alto, tenor, or bass roles. This singing style is complemented by the biwa, which biwa players use to produce short glissandi throughout the performance. Biwa singing style tends to be nasal, particularly when singing vowels, the consonant N, and notes containing "g". Also, biwa performers vary the volume of their voice between barely audible to very loud. Since biwa performances were generally for small groups, singers did not need to project their voices as do opera singers in the Western tradition.
Biwa music is based on a pentatonic scale, meaning that each octave contains five notes. This scale sometimes includes supplementary notes, but the core remains pentatonic. The rhythm in biwa performances allows for a broad flexibility of pulse. Songs are not always metered, although more modern collaborations are metered. Notes played on the biwa usually begin slow and thin and progress through gradual accelerations, increasing and decreasing tempo throughout the performance. The texture of biwa singing is often described as "sparse".
The plectrum also contributes to the texture of biwa music. Different sized plectrums produced different textures; for example, the plectrum used on a moso-biwa was much larger than that used on a gaku-biwa, producing a harsher, more vigorous sound. The plectrum is also critical to creating the sawari sound, which is particularly utilized with satsuma-biwas. What the plectrum is made of also changes the texture, with ivory and plastic plectrums creating a more resilient texture to the wooden plectrum's twangy hum.

Use in modern music

Biwa usage in Japan has declined greatly since the Heian period. Outside influence, internal pressures, and socio-political turmoil redefined biwa patronage and biwa image; for example, the Ōnin War during the Muromachi period and the subsequent Warring States period disrupted the cycle of tutelage for heikyoku performers. As a result, younger musicians turned to other instruments and interest in biwa music decreased. Even the biwa hoshi transitioned to other instruments such as the shamisen .
Interest in the biwa revived during the Edo period when Tokugawa Ieyasu unified Japan and established the Tokugawa shogunate. Ieyasu favored biwa music and became a major patron. He helped strengthen biwa guilds by financing them and allowing them special privileges. Shamisen players and other musicians found it financially beneficial to switch to the biwa, and, as they crossed over, they brought new styles. The Edo period proved to be one of the most prolific and artistically creative periods for the biwa in its long history in Japan.
In 1868, the Tokugawa shogunate collapsed, giving way to the Meiji period and the Meiji Restoration. In Meiji, the samurai class was abolished, and the Todo lost their patronage. Biwa players no longer enjoyed special privileges and were forced to support themselves. At the beginning of Meiji, it was estimated that there were at least one hundred traditional court musicians in Tokyo. Yet, by the 1930s, there were only forty-six traditional court musicians in Tokyo. A quarter of these musicians died in the war. Life in Post-war Japan was difficult, and many musicians abandoned their music in favor of more sustainable livelihoods.
While many styles of biwa flourished in the early 1900s, the cycle of tutelage was broken yet again. Currently, there are no direct means of studying biwa in many biwa traditions. Even higo-biwa players, who were quite popular in the early 20th century, may no longer have a direct means of studying oral composition, as the bearers of the tradition have either died or are no longer able to play. Kindai biwa still retains a significant number of professional and amateur practitioners, but zato, heike, and moso-biwa styles have all but died out.
As biwa music declined in post-Pacific War Japan, many Japanese composers and musicians found ways to revitalize interest in it. They recognized that studies in music theory and music composition in Japan almost entirely consisted in Western theory and instruction. Beginning in the late 1960s, these musicians and composers began to incorporate Japanese music and Japanese instruments into their compositions; for example, one composer, Tōru Takemitsu, collaborated with Western composers and compositions to include the distinctly Asian biwa. His well-received compositions such as November Steps, which incorporates biwa heikyoku with Western orchestral performance, revitalized interest in the biwa and sparked a series of collaborative efforts by other musician in genres ranging from J-Pop and enka to shin-hougaku and gendaigaku.
Other musicians, such as Yamashika Yoshiyuki, who is considered by most ethnomusicologists to be the last of the biwa hoshi, preserved scores of songs that were almost lost forever. Yamashika, born in the late Meiji, continued the biwa hoshi tradition until his death in 1996. Beginning in the late sixties to the late eighties, composers and historians from all over the world visited Yamashika and recorded many of his songs. Up to that time, the biwa hoshi tradition of songs was completely an oral tradition. When Yamashika died in 1996, the era of the biwa hoshi tutelage died with him, but the music and genius of that era continues thanks to his recordings.

Recordings