THE "TENKO, OR CELESTIAL DRUM."

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13226, 21 September 1908, Page 8

THE "TENKO, OR CELESTIAL DRUM."

(Concluded.)

* (Bt Pbofessor J. Mac-ollan Bbown.

(SPECIALLY WIUITEK FOE. "THE PRESS. : ) The second play we stayed to see was called "Tenko, or the Heavenly Drum." The story that it represents is this: A noble lady dreams that as she is conceiving tho hero, a drum descended into her from heaven, and when he is born he is called Tenko, or Celestial | Drum. And there comes to him, when he is grown, a drum from tho sky, which he alone can play. Ho draws from it such divine music that its fame fills the land, and the Mikado seeks to get it from him. He refuses to give it . up, and on tho request being still fur- | ther pressed ht> flees, to the mountains. Soldiers are sent after him, and ho is put to death and tho drum seized. But it ceases to give forth music, and obstinately remains irresponsive to tho stroke of any sticks or fiugers. The monarch therefore sends for the father of tho dead hero to come aud play it. He comes reluctantly, believing that it will remain silent to his touch, and that death at tho tyrant's hand will bo the consequence. Ho arrives at the court, and is compelled to strike it. The sound makes him weep at tho memory of the dead. And tho dead appears and brings forth again divine music from it. The tyrant is delighted and sends for the Buddhist sacred writings, and has been read to tho ghost. The consolation allays tho feelings of the perturbeu spirit, and it is satisfied to leave the drum in tho hands of the cruel Mikado, and along with it its power of response to his touch. BUDDHISTIC INFLUENCES. The story has elements that come from very ancient times—the times when tho drum was not only tho chief, but tho only, musical instrument. But those havo been taken up by the Buddhist priestly writers, and used for their own purposes. And this must have been done at a comparatively lato period of Buddhist influence in Japan; in fact, in tho period when her ancient religion, Shinto, tho essence of which in historical times was worship of tho Mikado, had been abandoned by the rulers of tho little empire for the new faith. It is acknowledged on all hands that most of those No. 1 operas havo been composed by Buddhist priests, though many of them have no reference to Buddhism. And this reveals tho secret of the overwhelming success of this South Asiatic faith in this northern land. It adapted itself completely, to its environment, whilst retaining only for tho initiated the full purity of its doctrines. It objected to no religious element it found amongst any people it strove to 1 convert, and it practically absorbed Shintoism whereever that primitive faith had any power over its worshippers. Thus it drew all the efficiency of the old religion to itself. It found in tho old gods avatars of Buddha, or some ono of his divine disciples; it connected the ohl • rudo stories of the gods and heroes with its own rites ot usages, and, if it could not do this, it made a nicho for them in some now or adopted art. And round the ■ -whole of it threw such a gorgeous robe \of rites and ceremonies and temples, and of appeals to all the emotions and needs of human nature, that it practically extinguished the influence of the simple old faith, without apnearing to antagonise it or harass it. The.result has been that Shinto became insignificant till the Restoration of tho Mikado in 1868, and the two faiths .remained in not unfriendly juxtaposition, except in. the south of Kyushiu, the last stronghold of tbo aboriginal Caucasians, where this "originally Caucasian worship of the powers of Nature that appeared also . in the Polynesian mythologies, had naturally its firmest hold. And so .we have the strange phenomenon in Japan of th© great majority of tho people belonging to two religions at once, arid worshipping alternately in the shrines of either. . These-Buddhist composers took even the most* primitive stories and elements and used them to master the feelings' of the aristocracy. They mad© no bones of the palaeolithic orchestration and dancing, leaving them as primitive as' thoy had been accepted by the now Malayo-Japanese conquerors from the aboriginal Caucasians thoy had conquered, introducing none of tho new instruments from India or China, and non<e of tho new pedal movements from the Indian dances. They added to the and dancing a drama that is manifestly exotic, but they used tho old iprehistoric stories to dramatise. THE ACTING OF "THE CELESTIAL DRUM." In this drama, or rather opera, there are two scenes. That which w© saw begins with the placing of tho little hourglass drum on a flimsy but elaborate stand, andibearing it in to the front of the 6tago by an attendant, whilst the orchestra slowly and majestically files in to its place at the back of the stage. Then enters up the'; wooden highway the waki, or subsidiary, as an elderly man, the messenger of the Emperor. Ho purses his lip_ ia th© approved method, and noisily mumbles his words as he sings th© story of his -message. Ho has been sent bo bring the father of the dead drummer. As he settles in the righthamd corner of the 6tage, the usual place for the waki, the chief actor, or shite, a«ppeaT kneeling at tho lower ond of the pathway from the dressingroom ; he has on his face the mask of an old man, silvered in features as well as in hair; and he acts th© old man ■with great skill; his limbs and voice tremble; he straightens himself only occasionally ; he weeps often and prays. He tells the story of his son* and himself with much emotion; he hesitates and fears to do tho Emperor's behests; he slowly totters up tho highway to tho stago; he takes nearly an . hour to get up to tho drum; and then, on© can. feel from th© breathleasness of the audience that the psychological moment has come; the orchestra does its wildest and most wooden climax,- the ante yell-, and the young drummer howls and yowls "Yao-oh-oh, Yao, Yao-oh-oh-oh" in 'prolonged ear-piercing masterpieces of canine pathos- The old •man raises th© tiny drumsticks, no bigger than chopsticks, and the drum j» supposed to give the response; we did not hear it, we could not have heard it had the shriek-howl-clun-k fallen absolutely silent. But we could feel from the faint ehiver through the whol© theatre that something extraordinary had occurred. Tho drumsticks fall from the hands of th© old man, and he sinks on his knees and ■' ©ovors his eyes with his hands as if weeping at the memories the sound recalls- The Emperor pities him; and th© Imperial messenger follows him slowly as h« retires down the pathway, s through the .theatre, aided by tho kokennin, or stage attendant. The second scene, -which w© were too tired to sit out, is more rapid in its movement, ita dancing, and its music. It is toss mournful and pathetio. Everything is settled up with the ghost of the dead drummer, whom the chief actor represents; and tho religious moral of th© play is dragged in by the " „- head and shoulders; it is that the Mored writings of the Buddhists can ■sooth all difficulties, whether in this

world or the next, and can condone &li cruelty and tyranny. A JAPANESE CONCERT. Between the two plays there canto one of the most tedious musical performance I have ever had the patience to listen to. A chorus of singers enter and sauat on tho stago. lifting their fans when singing, and laying them aside when silent. They sang the story of the maiden who could play the Into so well that the Mikado longed for her at his court; and she would not com©; but she had fascinated him by her playing, and ho could not do without her; so ho sent messenger after messenger for her; and at last heknew she was coming; for ho heard the divine music of her lute in the distance. This was spun out in solos and choruses for three-quarters of an hour; and no greater gamut than five notes was emIt was, therefore, monotonous in the extreme to a European ear. In the solos it seemed to be merely intoning the story; but the part-6inging was effective. Yet these musicians often take as long as ten years to perfect themselves fn this art that sounds so simple and primitive to us. CONTRAST TO THE FOLK-PLAYS. The same extraordinary application is needed by the actors of the if No" plays; for there are two hundred of them that aro commonly played, and they havo the whole of them, including every movement, gesture, and tone, by heart, so that they may play any one at a moment's notice. For tho others they aro allowed timo to prepare. Tho art to mc seemed almost primeval, and yet most of the audience had books of the words and tho music, and wero diligently consulting them all through tiio performance. The actors aro all of the best blood of Japan, descendants of Daimyos and Samurai; and they prido themselves on their profession. Even tbo great Hideyoshi, the Napoleon of tho sixteenth century in Japan, used to tako part in these operas. It had always been an honoured rolo for tho highest nobles and tho greatest warriors till the abolition of feudalism,at the restoration in 1868. Since the passing of tho European mana that followed that event, tho operas have been revived, and are tho delight of tho old noblcsso.

And the position becomes moro piquant when we consider that tho actors in tho popular plays wero a despised race, not much higher than the eta or pariah class. I hoard a folk-play at Kyoto, and a greater contrast could not be found in any art than that between this drama of the common people, and tho aristocratic operas. There was no music in the former; only once was the orchestra brought into requisition, and this was stringed; there were neither drums nor flutes; it consisted of ono samisen, or three-stringed harp or banjo, played by someone behind a latticework at the side of the stago. There was no dancing and no chorus. The scenery'and stage appurtenances wero roalistio instead of symbolic. Tho scene was a mountainous country, and a paper snowstorm was whitening the mountains. There was a real Japanese house on the stage, and when its shoji, or front shutters, were slid aside there appeared a real interior, with a Daimyo and his attendants seated rigidly like waxworks. There was a sake housoat tho side, into which tho threo rogues wont and) got drunk; and tho get-up of the characters was as like life, instead of the gorgeous . chasublo-and-alb-liko dresses of tho "No." ..There.was tho wooden highway from th© dressing room at the back of the audience to the stage, up and down which the actors came and went; but it. was right through the audience, instead of at the side, and some of the most amusing comedy was enacted on it as the rogues retired. For there was 4is much farce as tragedy in this popular play; the three ragged vagabonds kept up a farcical drunken scene for'nearly half an hour, making the audience laugh greatly In short, this drama of tho people was vital and realistic, and allowed real scop© for fine acting, for there wero no masks used, only powder, paint, and get-up. The aristocratic drama was frigid, mechanical, and fixed by traditional rule, and might havo been played by automata, so little of real life was there in it. Yet tho usual timo to sit it out is from early morning till sunset. Fiv© different operas, with interludes or* ballad-concerts in between, are usually given. Thore is no connecting thread in the stories, as there was in ,the ancient Greek tetralogies. But there is a sequence; two still and stately dramas must come first, getting quicker in time and more animated in tho acting; then comes a play of fiercer and more vigorous action, followed by two of tho moro passive typo. HISTORY AND RELATIONSHIPS % OF THE OPERA. Th© recorded history of this opera is comparatively brief, but it waa always hiiglily aristocratic both in actors and audience. Five centuries ago it was m full swing under the Ashikaga Sliogunate. But it did not tako its final and fixed form till the beginning of the seventeenth century, when tho Tokuzawa Shoguns adopted it at their court in Yeddo as tne fashionable ceremonial entertainment under th© guidance of the Buddhist priesthood. When this military dynasty fell in 1868, and the Mikado came to his own, the 'Tso' opera ceased.- But in 1882 the wave of Europeanism began to recede, and this ancient drama was revived, and in Tokyo it shows a vigorous lifeunder th© .patronage of the old noblesse. It is,•played, in four different theatres in' the metropolis, some of them in private hands, others in the hands of tho Buddist priesthood. It was intimately connected with the Bushido. the ideal ethical and physical code of tho Samurai, or professional warriors, attached to the courts of tho Daimyos. As men pledged to honour and self-control and every form of manliness, they objected to all mere emotionalism and sent'imentalism as effeminate. As there was nothing approaching to this in th© ''No" onera, they readily appropriated it; even the dance was suited to their vigorous and masculine ethics. It was stately, and was evidently like the Polynesian, and ©specially tho Maori dances, an evolution from religio-military exercises. The music was absolutely free from all mere appeal to emotions, and the' predominance of the drum marked its warlike origin and cue. The singing or recitative was more like the oratory 1 of warriors, and the use of the fan as the only appurtenance of the actor has warlike significance; it was the baton of all the great generals, with which they directed the movements of their troops. With this the actor did all his gesturing and action ; it became a sake bottle or 1 cup or a Into, or anything else he was supposed to have in his hand, at the call of imagination. Opening it and closing it, raising it and lowering it, were the chief movements of his dance, besides -advancing, retreating and circling round. In pre-restoration times women were not allowed to have any share in- the amusement either on the stage or in the audience. Now they freely como to hear the opera; but that is in accordance with the slow progress towards the European attitude to women that is taking place in Japan. There were many women in the theatre that evening I was present, and many" of them . were young and beautiful women.

But this innovation is undoubtedly looked upon by scholars as degeneracy. The opera is masculine in every feature, except the moral ana religious atmosphere that the Buddhist composers of the. libretto have thrown round it. It had, as is clear in all its other characteristics, its origin on tho battlefield and the military training-ground, like its close congener, tho Polynesian dance. And it was fit. except for its shrilling flute, to be admitted to Plato's ideal republic, wherein, the warrior class was to be allowed no effeminating

or exercises. As clearly do we see that it was in its earlier stages an open-air entertainment; the rootage for the stage and for the audience, as in the Oberainmergau passion play, was evidently a later introduction, when it became the exercise of courts instead of battlefields. It is seldom that an art or amusement carries on it so plainly the marks of its history and development.