Many Asian countries celebrate the ancient bon festival around the seventh lunar month, although in Japan the festivities are usually held in the middle of August. The festival is ancient and dates back to one of Buddha's disciples, Mokuren, who wanted to ameliorate the suffering of his deceased mother. To do this he danced what Japanese people call bon odori (bon dance), which is performed by everyone in the community to welcome the spirits of the dead, to celebrate their ancestors.
Kawachi-ondo dancers at Kinshicho station, Tokyo.
The bon festival in Japan is a time when people go back to their villages and hometowns, where they meet with their families, tend the graves of their ancestors and celebrate with their communities. Every region has its own style of dance, usually centred on a platform upon which a drummer and shamisen player perform, around which villagers dance.
Tokyo has its "Tokyo Ondo" varients, while in Northern Japan, in places such as Hokkaido, there is the fisherman's ondo, "Soran Bashi". The central Kansai region, based around satellite cities such as Kawachiya and Goshu, has my favourite bon dance styles: kawachi-ondo and goshu-ondo. Move to the deep South to Okinawa and the Ryukyu archipelago and you get the exciting Ei-sa festival at the end of this month.
It was my local barber Mr Suzuki who introduced me and my partner to the delights of our local Fuji Television Avenue bon odori festivities in Shinjuku, Tokyo, many lunar moons ago. We were standing around gawping at the colourful crowd slowly and rhythmically moving around the platform tower and big Taiko drum, and he and his wife took us by the hand and led us into the gently swaying circle of dancers, stopping to introduce us to his friends and local officials.
Kikusuimaru Kawachiya
As August in Japan is as hot as it is in Bangkok _ this week temperatures have soared to 40C _ locals all dress in light cotton yukatas (summer kimonos), although those hauling the heavy shrine through the streets wear Japanese-style loin cloths, and the streets are filled with all kinds of festival food. It's a full-on celebration, and if you attend your local event, probably one of the best ways to get to know your neighbours.
We really felt part of the community after we'd participated in our first bon odori. The one thing that did disappoint me though was something I noticed at my son's junior school dance events here in Thailand: no one played any live music, so all the dancing was done to recorded CDs. At our bon festival in Shinjuku, we all danced to cassette tapes with a live taiko drummer playing over the pre-recorded music. I asked why this was and was told that there were just so few musicians who could play traditional (minyo) folk music.
To get an idea of a "living" bon odori festival you have to head south to the summer kawachi-ondo season in the Kansai region, or hop on a jet to Okinawa for the three-day Ei-sa festival. The Okinawa festival, which I've written about at length in previous columns, is quite different to the rest of Japan where, apart from the one-day bon odori, much of the celebrations are held privately with families indoors. The Okinawans don't use a platform to dance around; instead, they take to the streets in huge troupes of up to 100-strong musicians playing paranku hand drums, san-ba castanets and three-stringed sanshins (the progenitor of the more famous shamisen found in the rest of Japan). Like Brazilian carnival bands, these troupes are organised into "schools" each with a clubhouse and multi-generational members. And they play all night.
After my first bon odori, I went to as many summer festivals as I could find and there is one in Tokyo that I recommend you join if you're in the city around this time of year _ Kinshicho, which is in Sumida on the metro system. The annual kawachi-ondo festival there is well worth visiting as all the big stars of this summer folk style will be there _ people such as Sakuragawa Tademaru and Kawachiya Kikusuimaru _ and you'll be gently taken into the huge dance circle and shown the ropes. It's a very colourful event and it reminded me of a typical ngan wat (temple fair) you get in Thailand because there are street market vendors selling glittery trinkets and regional goods, as well as food stalls offering hard-to-find summer delicacies.
There are some musical similarities between kawachi-ondo and Thai local styles such as molam and lam tad; all these genres are narrative folk styles that have gone electric in the past 50 years. Perhaps because of similar pentatonic roots and vocal techniques, they do sometimes have a similar groove.
One of my dreams is to have on one stage kawachi-ondo and molam artists, perhaps that will happen at Kinshicho station festival one day, or maybe an enlightened Thai producer will bring kawachi-ondo musicians here to play. Dream on.
In the meantime, there are plenty of examples of all these kinds of music on YouTube and related sites. Check them out and enjoy the summer heat.
The writer can be contacted at clewley.john@gmail.com
