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• The traditional form of popular theater began at the end of the 16th century and soon became the most succesful theater entertainment in the red-light districts of the great cities.
• Together with Nōh, it is considered the most important Japanese contribution to World Theater.
• Both Nōh and kabuki are unique and genuine expressions of the Japanese spirit and nature.
• Vocal Pattern and Techniques is Ipponchōshi or the continuous pattern, Nori technique, Yakuharai technique
• Ipponchōshi or the continuous pattern is used in speeches building up to an explosive climax in the aragoto(oversize, supernatural, rough hero) style. Requires an extraordinary breath control
• Nori Technique is adapted from the chanting of jōruri, implies a very sensitive capacity of riding the rhythms of the shamisen (string instrument), declaiming each accompaniment
• Yakuharai technique, the subtle delivery of poetical text written in the japanese metrical form of alternating seven and five syllables.
• Dances and movements are accompanied by shamisen music which collected and popularized a number of aspects from all previous forms of Japanese music from Gagaku, kagura, nō, down to the folk songs and fashionable songs of the day
• Nagauta music is very flexible
• Kabuki is a Japanese traditional theatre art that is performed in a stylized manner which combines acting, singing, and dancing.
• Kabuki term in modern japanese means ka "song", bu "dance", and ki "skill".
• Kabuki was founded by Okuni in 1603, a Shinto priestress. She and her troupe performed dances and comic sketches on a temporary stage set up in the dry riverbed of the Komagawa River in Kyoto
• Kabuki is translated as "the art of singing and dancing".
• Kabuki is derived from the word kabuku meaning "to lean" or "to be out of the ordinary"
• Kabuki can be "bizarre" theater
• The expression kabukimono referred to those who were bizzarely dressed and paraded on a street
• 1. Hanamichi is a flower path, a walkway which extends into the audience and via which dramatic entrances and exits are made; Okuni also perform on a hanamochi stage with her entourage.
• 2. Kogakudo - kabuki theaters that ve stages in both front of the audience and along the sides help create a bond between the actors ans viewers.
• Mawaro butal - the interior of the theater that contains a revolving stage
• Suppon - a platform that rises from the below of the stage
• Hanamicho - a walkway that cuts through the audience seating area to connect the stage with the back of the theater
• Magicians and supernatural beings often nake their enteances from trap doors in the hanamichi. Some stages have 17 trapdoors
• Jidai-mono - historical or pre-sengoku period stories.
• Sewa-mono - domestic or post-sengoku stories
• Shosagoto - dance pieces
• Mie - in which the actors holds a picturesque pose to establosh his character and his house name yagō, is sometimes heard in a loud shout (kakegoe) from expert audience members.
• Most plays are aragoto, because of its super-stylized masculine, heroine style
• Onna-gata female roles
• Aragoto - male roles
• Rice powder is used to xreate the white oshiroi base
• Kumadori enhances or exagerrates facial lines
• Red lines are used to indicate passion, heroism, righteousness, and other positive traits
• Pink for youthful joy
• Light blue for an even temper
• Pale green for peacefulness
• Blue or black for villainy, jealousy, and other negative traits.
• Green for supernatural
• Purple for nobility
• Jo for auspicious and slow opening which intruduces the audience to the characters and the plot
• Ha for speeding the events up