What is Itchu Bushi?

Itchu Bushi is one school of music with chanting accompanied by shamisen which was developed by Miyako Itchu I in Kyoto at the end of the Genroku Period (1688 - 1704). This was a time of great cultural activity in all the arts. It was just the time when Ogata Korin and Honami Koetsu were creating a lavish new style in the visual arts, Matsuo Basho was transforming haiku from light comic verse into profound poetry and Ihara Saikaku was writing comic fiction that showed all the foibles and tragedies of the world of commoners. In the theater Ichikawa Danjuro I in Edo was creating the bombastic aragoto style of acting, while in Kyoto and Osaka, Sakata Tojuro was creating a realistic, romantic style of acting called wagoto. Chikamatsu Monzaemon and Takemoto Gidayu were creating a sophisticated, adult musical drama in the puppet theater.


Itchu Bushi is one school of music with chanting accompanied by shamisen which was developed by Miyako Itchu I in Kyoto at the end of the Genroku Period (1688 - 1704). This was a time of great cultural activity in all the arts. It was just the time when Ogata Korin and Honami Koetsu were creating a lavish new style in the visual arts, Matsuo Basho was transforming haiku from light comic verse into profound poetry and Ihara Saikaku was writing comic fiction that showed all the foibles and tragedies of the world of commoners. In the theater Ichikawa Danjuro I in Edo was creating the bombastic aragoto style of acting, while in Kyoto and Osaka, Sakata Tojuro was creating a realistic, romantic style of acting called wagoto. Chikamatsu Monzaemon and Takemoto Gidayu were creating a sophisticated, adult musical drama in the puppet theater.



Miyako Itchu I was the heir to a temple who decided, instead, to make his life with music. He began with the innovations of Chikamatsu and Gidayu and created his own musical style. Instead of long pieces that narrated a story all in the same honjoshi tuning, he developed shorter pieces with great musical variety by inserting short popular songs in ni agari tuning. These pieces could be used for climactic scenes in a play, dances and the michiyuki travel scenes which were the poetic and musical highlight of love suicide plays. During the time of Miyako Itchu I and Miyako Itchu II, Itchu Bushi became a featured part of kabuki plays in both Kansai and in Edo and so many amateur musicians learned Itchu Bushi that in 1737 it was written that ﾒthere is no house without mice droppings or Itchu Bushi practice books.

Not only was Itchu Bushi extremely popular, one of Miyako Itchu Iﾕs students, a man named Miyakoji Bungo-no-Jo became the ancestor of many schools of narrative music, including Tokiwazu, Tomimoto, Kiyomoto and Shinnai. After these other styles became dominant in the kabuki theater, Itchu Bushi disappeared from the stage, but continued to be performed as a form of chamber music and this is the form in which Itchu Bushi is performed today.