Sunday, 5/28/02
Hello everyone! I am hoping that you all are doing well, and that spring is here with a vengeance, wherever you are. I am thinking about the garage-sized rhododendrons in Olympia, and wondering how our (considerably smaller) ones did without us this year. I am also starting to nervously recognize that my time here is half over. I’ll be back before I know it, and – I hope – before any vicious centipedes decide to take a bite out of one of us! Morgan has started some basil and cilantro seeds in pots, and with the way things grow so well here, they may be ready for use before we return. And, just so you know, (my favorite team) the Hanshin Tigers have soundly thrashed the Tokyo Giants again, and are leading in the Central League. It doesn’t get any better than this! Cary and I were speculating about whether there could ever be a true “world series,” which could include Japan, the Dominican Republic, and other teams. In our lifetime? Hmmm.

I gave my first actual lesson in sean-nos (traditional free-rhythm Irish-language) singing this past week, to Micheal Hishikawa and Jun Takahashi (who came all the way from Shiga prefecture). Jun is the schoolteacher who is plays pennywhistle and step-dances. It reminded me very much of teaching students at home, except that these two men are very familiar with Irish music and were able to pick up the melodies well. Gaelic pronunciation is challenging, to say the least, regardless of whether my students are American or Japanese. Micheal had written out katakana characters for the Gaelic pronunciation, but there’s a voiced guttural roll that’s very hard to create. But it was very heartening to know that some of this beautiful music will have a new home here. Two other people have expressed a genuine interest and are ready to schedule lessons.

My phone has been ringing off the hook for the last couple of weeks because Micheal mentioned on a Japanese website that I had an interesting theory about the musical origins of “Amazing Grace.” Within one day of his posting that comment, a television producer from NHK Tokyo was on the line to my office, asking me specifically for proof of my idea. Yikes. [For the record, I think the tune may be a slowed-down hornpipe that probably came from England via some slaving ships.] I have repeatedly told this producer that I’m just speculating, that I have no proof, and that I think it is impossible to prove. She keeps calling! She wants me to appear in an NHK television documentary to speculate about my theory. Evidently there’s a film crew in Memphis as I write this, looking for examples of choirs singing “Amazing Grace.” They’re working under a deadline (July 1st – the documentary is airing in October) and have talked to another ethno colleague in Mississippi already. He (correctly) told them that the origins of the tune are unknown. NHK doesn’t buy it. Of course I told them to call up the good people at the Folk Song Archive in the Library of Congress. I certainly hope they get in touch with the people who actually know what they’re talking about. Since I’m teaching a class on American Music History, I am apparently the choice for this documentary.

The classes on gospel were fascinating (to me, at least!). All the jaws dropped when I named several popular Japanese “boy bands” (singing, dancing, matching costumes) and said that they came from the American black gospel quartet tradition of the 1940s and 50s. I enjoy teaching moments like that. And I was reminded, yet again, of how much I enjoy the Fairfield Four. When we got into white gospel music (Sacred Harp singing, bluegrass gospel, and oh my, Ralph Stanley’s “O Death”) I might as well have been discussing the music of another planet in Czech. It must have been pretty alienating, literally. At least ten people dropped off to sleep – like they’d been struck – the instant the first guitar chords of “Angel Band” started. And, in wonderful contrast, several people came up and asked questions afterward. This is happening more and more, perhaps as they become more comfortable communicating. I continue to be very pleased and impressed with them for several reasons: they keep coming to class, they are learning to pay attention to music, and they sometimes react to what I say, which makes it a more interactive experience than I had hoped for. Next week we’re dealing with rural folk music, bluegrass, and country music: Bill Monroe, Kitty Wells, Hank Williams…

On Tuesday we ventured out to Okayama and Kurashiki, where I went with all the new students (and Yoko and Donna and Myles) in my first week here. Morgan has been desperate to try kibi-dango (a sort of mildly sweet marshmallow-like treat) for which the area is famous, and the tension had built up when we were prevented from going twice by pouring rain. Well, this time it was fine. The weather was gorgeous, and even though we got a late start and were hampered by train-related difficulties, we got there. Cary wandered through the stunning Ohara Museum (a really magnificent collection of contemporary Japanese, European and American two-dimensional art) while Morgan and I walked along the lovely old canal in the town’s beautiful Edo-period historical quarter. I had already been to the museums. We watched the swans, egrets and herons in the canal, enjoyed people feeding the ancient enormous carp that made their way along the banks, and particularly enjoyed watching the many artists (all Japanese) with their sketch-and-paint pads, capturing remnants of old-style Japan. It was wonderful, and very special for Morgan. She and I also went to the toy museum, with hundreds and hundreds of toys from all over Japan (and an interesting “international” section as well). I was surprised to see perfectly adult musical instruments among the international collection. (?!?) If it’s folk music, they must be toys, right? Oops, American humor again.

When we got together with Cary again, we bought two beautiful tulip-shaped teacups in the roughly done Bizen style (that’s the area of Japan from which some of the tea ceremony cups come from). It took us a long time to choose, but luckily for Morgan the shop was playing a gorgeous, and I mean gorgeous CD of traditional folk music – just voice and shamisen. We were in heaven. I wish I’d found out what the CD was; it was wonderful. Then we had the chance to watch someone make fresh udon in a shop window – what fun! So, laden with carefully wrapped teacups, multiple folk toys from the toy museum gift shop, and three boxes of kibi-dango treats, we made our way to Okayama and the beautiful giant park there (Korakoen). It is famous as one of Japan’s top three parks (indeed, I went there on my previous visit with Yoko, Donna, and Myles), and one of the reasons it’s famous is because it has such an enormous expanse of lawn! Morgan was thrilled to see the cranes, one of which saw us near the cage, and came right over. The red patch of feathers on top of their heads is stunning.

On Wednesday night Cary went to a jazz club and I went to Murphy’s Pub in Osaka. It was a small room on some upper floor of a building, and it looked precisely like an Irish pub: etched mirrors, Irish flags, obligatory black-and-white photographs of famous Irish writers, soccer on the television, World Cup stuff everywhere, ashtrays, musicians playing away, others talking. There was one American fiddler among the musicians, and the rest were all Japanese, mostly young people in their twenties (five fiddles, whistle, flute, bouzouki, two bodhrans – yikes – and guitar). Most of them were men, but the two best fiddlers were women, both of whom studied classical violin for years. Those two had perfect intonation, and one of them really had the right “feel” for Irish music; the tunes simply danced right off the bow. At first it was pretty cacophonous, but the more I drank, the better they sounded. (!) I really did enjoy myself, of course, and it was such a pleasure to be listening there. They invited me to sing three songs. It was a surprising experience to be at a session where I was welcome as a singer – one almost never sees singers welcomed at instrumental-only sessions at home or in Ireland. It reminds me that there are just a few people in the world who actually like the old style of Irish singing.

The American (Peter Damashek) and one of the two women fiddlers work at Universal Studios in Osaka, at “Finnegan’s Pub” in “Old New York.” Evidently the Universal Studios theme park has an “Old New York” section, and the pub is a restaurant that seats 250 with a bar that seats 40. They play on stage ten times a month, alternating with other musicians. Peter told me later that Universal Studios pays about $100,000 a year, just on Irish music for its pub in the theme park. I had no idea! I must have missed seeing the ad in Irish Music Magazine asking for musicians to apply. I did hear that they originally wanted the “Three Irish Tenors” to work there. Right. Until now, I had no plans to visit the place, but I may have to make the pilgrimage just to see Irish music in a pub in a theme park in Japan. I had a long conversation with Peter about Irish music here – he himself studies fiddle with a Japanese fiddler who learned everything he knows from videotapes of Irish musicians, and who knows only about twenty songs but has great technique. What a complicated scene this is! He said he was 47, then turned to me and said “You’re in your late 40s too, aren’t you?” Ouch. I will welcome a comment like that twenty years from now, but not today! As I arrived at Osaka station I noticed that the next train to Kobe was coming at 11:30. Subway trains stop dead at 12:30. By the time I got to the downtown Kobe station, everyone was running in every direction to catch subways and trains. I started running too – by the time I was at the entrance to my subway, the guards were standing next to the gates, and the loudspeakers were loudly broadcasting “Auld Lang Syne.” I got on the very last train out of downtown Kobe and everyone on the train was breathing hard and smiling at each other in relief.

The weather has been lovely and warm in the evenings – t-shirt weather where you can leave the window open (as long as the screen is in place). The jasmine flowers are all out and filling up the air with their fragrance. As I walked home from the subway that night, the warm air and the jasmine flowers mixed with the scent of newly-cut grass, reminding me of being a teenager at my first bluegrass gig in the California foothills. It was really evocative. This week I read Annie Proulx’s The Shipping News, and Gish Jen’s Typical American; a couple of weeks ago I read Akira Yoshimura’s Shipwrecks. I’m now just starting Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Dreams. I have been enjoying all of them! What a luxury it is to read novels for fun, and to go from wintry Newfoundland to Chinese America to 19th century remote coastal Japan to the American Southwest in just a couple of weeks.

We had two adventure days this weekend. On Friday we took the subway (wonderfully uncrowded for a change) to Shin-Kobe station and got on the cable ropeway up to the top of Mt. Rokko. First of all, I hadn’t been on one of those gondola things for several decades. It was hilarious and exhilarating to be swinging along, way above the trees. I couldn’t stop grinning. We got to the top in about ten minutes! Whee! The weather was just perfect, and I was wearing my new sneakers so I could hike comfortably. No problem finding shoes in my size here, by the way. At the top there was a strangely out-of-place alpine chalet with European food, where we had a very good lunch. It’s the only time in my stay in Japan that I’ve been called by the suffix “-sama” instead of “sensei” or just “-san.” Considering that I was wearing hiking clothes, the disjuncture was startling. Anyway, they had a rose garden at the top – everything in full bloom – and a fragrance museum with fine old perfume bottles and extraction machines and (Japanese-language) explanations of the process of extracting essences. We smelled everything and really enjoyed ourselves. Then we visited the greenhouse, a large structure perched on the mountain with a great, great view of the water and the city. The greenhouse had an herb and spice exhibit where you could grind up various herbs and spices and smell them. The place was so aromatic, it just cheered you up to walk in the room! Walking back down to town, we passed through a thriving herb garden with multiple kinds of each herb (12 different mints, etc.). Everything was in bloom; they even had fragrant blooming grasses. We walked through a bower (I think that’s what it’s called – a long archway) made of solidly-blooming pink roses. Standing there inside the roses was heavenly. The place wasn’t crowded (Morgan was the only child around), and the people we saw were cheery and smiling, chatting with their friends. As we walked downhill, we passed by a tall, robust waterfall, where we had a snack on a lookout bridge.

That evening we went with Yoko and her brother and sister-in-law to hear bluegrass at Fortworth, a country/bluegrass bar near where Yoko lives. The walls were festooned with photos of country stars, there were cowboy hats all over the place, and rows of single cowboy boots near the door, along with a large collection of stringed instruments. We were greeted by the apparent proprietor at the door: jeans, large cowboy hat, giant belt buckle, boots, big smile and firm handshake. We met friends of Yoko’s brother, who spoke some English, and drank draft beer and had little snacks and pizza and spicy rotini. The musicians were called the “After Lunch Pickers” – they all work for the same company, and have been playing for forty years!! They were dressed in matching jeans, boots, and purple shirts shot through with silver thread. You should have heard them: their accents were quite good most of the time, they completely achieved that high lonesome sound, and the playing was very smooth. It was so interesting, and such a good, closely-knit sound. I was especially impressed with the fiddler; his playing was very sweet sounding with great tone. The mandolin player was the leader, responsible for all the between-song patter (the parts I could understand, and the parts Yoko translated for us, were hilarious!). Our companions told the musicians that Cary played bluegrass, so he was introduced all round, and later was asked to sit in on electric bass. He did a great job, and politely refused an invitation to sing a bluegrass tune. The mandolin player was making funny comments (“He’s tone deaf, that’s why he won’t sing!”), but also referred to Cary as “sensei.” What a delightful evening! We were lucky to catch one of the last subway trains back home.

There was a big clean-up effort around the apartment building on Saturday; I didn’t realize it was happening (there was a sign posted, but it was all in kanji) until it was basically over. The large drains around the parking lot were scooped out (dislodging dozens of mukade – centipedes – and other large crawly things), and the grounds were carefully weeded. Then that afternoon the whole building threw a barbecue party. It was so much fun! We brought a large fruit salad, and other families set up “stations” for their small barbecues, making takoyaki, yakitori, vegetables wrapped in foil, desserts, etc. All the families came out. We took lots of pictures and had all kinds of fun conversations with various people. A boom box was playing J-pop hits. It was such a friendly and warm event – lots of laughter – and we were delighted to be a part of it.

On Sunday we met several folks from the Kobe jazz scene (all of whom are English teachers in their day jobs) and went hiking. It was another glorious day. We took the subway, then a bus, up to the base of Mt. Takatori. It’s a steep climb up numerous stairs, passing many little shrines with fox statues. Many of the shrines (and their attendant foxes) were badly damaged by the earthquake, so there was some new reconstruction that had happened, and some ruins. In several places there were rows of beautiful vermilion torii (Shinto shrine gates); it’s one of my favorite aspects of Japanese shrine architecture. Or, as Morgan put it rather resignedly, trudging uphill through gate after gate, “Mom is QUITE fond of gates.” She was a great sport, though, and really enjoyed herself at the top where we had the great view of everything and a cooling breeze. The downhill climb was hard on our knees; now I know why people say that downhill is sometimes harder than uphill, especially when it’s extremely steep. All the hikers were calling out “Konnichi-wa!” to each other, us included, and Morgan joined in as well. We stopped in at a small café-type place on the way down, where our friend Robin Eve (the same fellow who played jazz shakuhachi at the club I went to with Yoko a month ago) knew the owner. There was a crowd of her Japanese friends all drinking and shouting and having a great time, and we sat outside under the trees for a picnic supplemented by endless supplies of canned coffee, beer, and juice. Robin played his shakuhachi, we talked and laughed, Morgan played with the friendly dachshund, and we all tried our hand at the ring toss game. I could barely throw from laughing. We had many photos taken with the folks at the other table. When we finally made it down to the bottom of the hill, we stopped in at a cave-like underground jazz club and listened to that evening’s group warming up: blues harmonica, electric guitar and bass. They were pretty good! I continue to be utterly mystified by harmonica techniques. We also saw a group of Korean musicians playing in front of a new Korean food store. Lots of music in one day.

Cheers, Sean