Shakuhachi recital
Presented by the Japan Society of Scotland in association with the Consulate General of Japan in Edinburgh

Music included Honshirabe; Kumoijishi (The cloud and the lion); Esashi Oiwake (Fisherman's song); Komoro Bushi (Song of Komoro); Karibushi Kiriuta (Harvest song from Kyushi); Shika no Tone(The song of the deer); Hanagasa Ondo (The umbrella song)
Performers Clive Bell (shakuhashi); Alan Spence (poet)
Date 20 November 2002
Venue The Playfair Library,
Address University of Edinburgh, Old Quad, South Bridge, Edinburgh
Reviewer Pat Napier

Playfair Library © Hodgson & Napier

The elegant Playfair Library in Edinburgh University's Old Quad was the setting for a unique cross-cultural evening which turned out to be a most memorable event: a recital of bamboo flute music (shakuhachi) and an improvised poetic and musical dialogue between the Edinburgh-based poet Alan Spence and the London musician Clive Bell.

The hundred-strong audience, which included Mr Ota of the Japanese Consulate general in Edinburgh, was a mixture of very knowledgable Japanese people and Edinburgh residents, so this was a very wide and testing range of expertise in the culture and the music we were about to hear, for the musician was not a native Japanese master.

Clive Bell brought only two bamboo flutes, his shakuhachi, to this recital and willingly allowed everybody to examine them afterwards. The one he played most often was dark in colour and about the size of a clarinet and the other was larger and lighter in colour. The shakuhachi is played by blowing down the instrument and not across it, as the Western flute is played. Each piece was introduced, its name translated and its story told. Snippets about the shakuhachi and its playing were also interwoven throughout.

Clive Bell

Honshirabe set the scene and was followed by a very old, festive piece, Kumoijishi, simultaneously symbolising power (the lion) and success (the cloud) as well as brilliant success. An impressive variety of techniques was demonstrated, from expressive little sideways headshakes underlining musical points, through embouchure-driven 'breathy' passages to fluttering sounds achieved by the fingers varying the sound hole openings. Then came Esashi Oiwake, distinguished by the need to draw very long breaths; this is a song so famous in Japan that whole competitions are held to sing only this song!

Clive Bell ended his solo performance with a very famous piece called Shika no Tone (The call of the deer) which lends itself to being played as a duet since it evokes the mating calls of the deer on distant mountains. Here, however, Clive Bell played Kohachiro Miyata, his teacher's solo version, while walking up and down the central aisle so that those at the back could see and hear close up. If any criticism may be made, it would be that more music exploring the lower range of sound should be included, since it seemed to concentrate on the higher end.

Then came the impromptu, excitingly improvised and unforgettable part. From his introduction to Alan Spence, it was abundantly clear that these two had never met before now. Alan Spence's Seasons of the heart, his "30 years of haiku writing compressed into a format of the seasons of a single year" had been published in 2000. It was simply a stroke of genius to put these two men together and see what happened.

Alan Spence

They shook hands and Bell said he'd reply musically to Alan Spence's poetic images. Spence casually pulled out his tiny book out of his pocket, flipped through the pages stopping wherever he felt he'd like to read a haiku and after giving us a few of them, Bell then played an instant composition based on all the images which appealed to him. None lasted more than two minutes but were equally concentrated to match the haiku.

Out of the five groups, two were especially memorable: the fly haiku on page 36 triggered a dazzling, humourous take on the fly's buzzing, erratic flight, descent to eat crumbs before flying off; and then the autumn group depicting high winds outside and the indoors feeling of a cat's rasping tongue as it licks the poet's hand.

This final fifteen minutes' marriage of poetry and music was an unadulterated success, the air crackled with the buzz of it all and left the audience excitedly comparing notes about the aspects they liked best. The Japan Society had asked for ideas in a questionnaire handed out before the recital. A repeat performance of this musical/poetic dialogue must surely be at the top of our 'want list'.

© Pat Napier. 22 November 2002

For more information on:
Events supported by the Consulate General of Japan in Scotland go to http://www.edinburgh.uk.emb-japan.go.jp/
Alan Spence's haiku go to http://www.canongate.net/