The 10 Most Popular Kabuki Plays

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In this video, we have a look at the kabuki plays most often performed in the period between 1989 and 2022. Interestingly enough, a table compiled by Samuel L. Leiter, for the period between 1952 and 1965 (in his book "Kabuki at the Crossroads"), yields almost the same results, with Renjishi replaced by Kagami Jishi, Futatsu Chōchō Kuruwa Nikki by Benten Kozō and Koi no Tayori Yamato Ōrai by Imoseyama Onna Teikin, and some small differences in the order.
Special thanks to the Patreon members who make these videos possible, including C. H. White, Eric Pan, SuperGingernutz, calvin and Valerie!
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Опубликовано:

7 сен 2022

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Комментарии : 29

@Wizards0nly Год назад

I watched this with my stick-in-the-mud "friend" to educate him on the glorious performance art of kabuki theater....... needless to say we will be attending all future kabuki events in our area from now on

@vivaldi1948 4 месяца назад

What a beautiful tradition. And the costumes are breathtaking.

@memsesosmo5084 Год назад

Thank you so much for your videos, as I am learning a lot. It's great to have visuals and more context for plays I have only read about in more scholarly, western literature.

@nikanoru13 Год назад

Thank you for the amazing videos 🙏

@maviojordangomesrosa2467 Год назад

Excellent video as always bro. Of course, everyone has their list of favorite Kabuki plays. My top 10 favorite Kabuki plays are: 1. Shibaraku (暫/しばらく) 2. Ko no Tori (神の鳥) 3. Kuruwa Bunsho (廓文章) 4. Kotobuki Soga no Taimen (寿曽我対面) 5. Sukeroku (助六由縁江戸桜) 6. Natsu Matsuri Naniwa Kagami (夏祭浪花鑑) 7. Yoshitsune Senbon Zakura (義経千本桜) 8. Kanadehon Chūshingura (仮名手本忠臣蔵) 9. Sugawara Denju Tenarai Kagami (菅原伝授手習鑑) 10. Narukami (鳴神) As you can see, I have always been fascinated by heroic figures of superhuman strength. About this video and the list I made: 1. We know that Kotobuki Soga no Taimen and Sukeroku are set in the same universe. In Sukeroku, the main female character, Agemaki is a high-end courtesan who is Yoshimura district's top courtesan. In Kotobuki Soga no Taimen, there is a courtesan whose clothes closely resemble the clothes worn by Agemaki in Sukeroku. Is it possible that this character and Agemaki are the same courtesan? Or is she a character that ended up inspiring Sukeroku's Agemaki? 2. This I think no one should have asked you: What is the meaning of the colors of the headbands used by various characters within the Kabuki theater (such as the purple headband used by Yugiri in Kuruwa Bunsho, the pink headband used by Sarugenji in Iwashi Uri Koi Hikiami and the red headband worn by certain courtesans in plays starring Aragoto characters)?

@KabukiInDepth Год назад

1. It is actually quite interesting. The tale of Sukeroku and Agemaki was originally created in Kamigata, and had nothing to do with the Soga brothers. But when it was produced in Edo, it had to be combined with a historical play (jidaimono) to fit the structure of plays in the capital these days. This is why the identification Sukeroku = Soga no Gorō was made. There is a whole book about this topic, called "Sukeroku's Double Identity: The Dramatic Structure of Edo Kabuki", written by Barbara E. Thornbury. It is available for free on pdf in the publisher's page if you just google it! Maybe in the original play Agemaki and Gorō's famous lover, the courtesan Kewaizaka no Shōshō, were the same character. I don't recall that, but it is not mentioned in the play as it exists now. 2. The purple headband used by characters such as Yūgiri, Matsuōmaru and Yasuna is known as the yamai hachimaki, and it signifies illness. Many other are, as far as I know, a stylistic choice, as is Sukeroku's, who originally used a red headband.

@maviojordangomesrosa2467 Год назад

@@KabukiInDepth Oh I got it. But here I remembered another doubt here: do you know any kabuki actors who started out as an onnagata but are now better known as a tachiyaku? I ask this because I saw in one of the episodes of Kabuki Kool and on the website Kabuki21 that Kataoka Ainosuke VI started out as an onnagata but now he is better known for being exclusively a tachiyaku and being one of the main tachiyaku nowadays. Are there other cases like Ainosuke VI? What drives an actor to switch roles (from being an onnagata to becoming a tachiyaku)?

@KabukiInDepth Год назад

Well, most or all actors play onnagata and tachiyaku roles during their formative years. It is only later that they fully specialize, and even then they might play different roles on occasion. Ainosuke VI, for example, still plays onnagata roles from time to time. I can't think right now of an example of an actor going from a pure onnagata to a pure tachiyaku, but kaneru yakusha actors (those able to perform all kind of roles) tend to play mostly onnagata roles in their youth and mainly tachiyaku later in their career: this is the case of Nakamura Kanzaburō XVII, Onoe Kikugorō VII, Nakamura Kanzaburō XVIII, Nakamura Kankurō VI, Ichikawa Ennosuke IV... It must be difficult to keep playing roles of often teenage girls for an actor as he enters his 50s and 60s, but it is ultimately up to his taste and the reception of the public.

@lacknerflorian7254 2 месяца назад

Never see an Kabuki but some of them seem really really interessting and fun played , ty for share (should i get some day a chance to see some i will for sure ) wish an nice day💐

@mielei16 Год назад

I have learned so much about this gorgeous art form from your videos! Could you perhaps do one about a bunraku show later set up as a Kabuki play? As far as length of scene, how much of the original scenes are usually in each performance, and why a show would be written for the puppet theater first? (Is it cheaper than full staging? Or a test of popularity before the expense and effort of human actor performance?) The play would be of your choice, I would just love to understand even more of these intertwined arts. 😁

@kagamisan9952 Год назад

If I remember correctly the reason they the playwrights liked bunraku was that the actors couldn't change the script or improvise so there original ideas could stay the same because the tayu the narrator bowed before the script and promised to read it as it is interestingly enough the tayu has a belt and a special chair that helps with the chanting and lines of the characters

@KabukiInDepth Год назад

Actually, I've already done something similar, covering the first scene of Yoshitsune Senbon Zakura from the point of view of kabuki, and then looking at the differences in the bunraku version (this is the comparison: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ie9t442Auy4.html). Not many people watch the videos I make about bunraku, so I never get around to make more, but the interplay between these two forms of theatre is one of my favourite topics. If I feel there is more interest I will make many more in the future! During much of the XVIII century, bunraku was extremely popular and profitable in Osaka, so some of the best artists dedicated themselves to create works for the puppet theatre, which, if they were successful, could easily be adapted to kabuki. Other playwrights created plays directly for the kabuki stage. It is difficult to generalize, as the economic, artistic and political circumstances changed quickly throughout that part of the Edo period. But there was certainly a great demand for plays to be produced for bunraku theatres such as the Takemoto-za and the Toyotake-za.

@JokerMxyzptlk Год назад

This channel is a great service to English speakers!! Thank you so much for creating this! It’s a shame that the channels getting the most views are the ones talking about basically gossip drivel. Where do you get all your information? Is there a list of all kabuki plays even the ones that aren’t in the modern repertoire anymore?

@KabukiInDepth Год назад

Thank you for your kind words! I use several sources, including Japanese books and online databases. An invaluable resource in English is the website kabuki21, which has the synopsis for most plays in the repertoire (and many which aren't), in addition to information on actors, theaters, etc). A complete list of plays is elusive. I've been working on one for a long time, but the task is incredibly difficult, as literally thousands of plays have been written and revived, often under different names or in revised versions.

@JokerMxyzptlk Год назад

@@KabukiInDepth oh that’s interesting, i would have guessed that some entity in Japan would have compiled the list long ago. That’ll be quite a project then! You’d prolly have to look everywhere right? One other question i had is about the language of kabuki. Is there a good resource for learning about that?

@govindaoli2966 10 месяцев назад

Wow .. Just wow.....😮😮

@koroba01 10 месяцев назад

I used to travel to Japan a lot during the years 2005 and 2012 for business. The company I dealt with had offices in Tokyo and their factory was in Mie Pref. I became good friends with the VP and she took me many places as she knew of my intense interest in Japan. Around 2006 or 2007 she took me to the National Theatre in Chiyoda and I forget the play and the plot but one memory is vivid around the middle of the play; they had a very famous elderly Kabuki actor who came out of retirement for this one play, the dance of a scorned and depressed courtesan. He was fantastic and elicited many calls of his name through this scene. This experience only endeared myself to Japan more. It is not much information but any idea who this actor might have been?

@teppinchan 2 месяца назад

You can look up the past performances of the program from the website of the Digital Library of Japanese Culture. You can look up past performances at the National Theatre of Japan from the website of the Digital Library of Japanese Culture. www2.ntj.jac.go.jp/dglib/plays/search?division=plays&class=kabuki&type=series&sid=1&pdate_Y=2006&pdate_M=01&pdate_Y_to= 2007&pdate_M_to=12

@teppinchan 2 месяца назад

It was here.　www2.ntj.jac.go.jp/dglib/plays/submenu?division=plays&class=kabuki

@pinkpanther6228 5 месяцев назад

kabuki scares me..

@angelajessahifume Год назад

This is an amazing video! Thank you for sharing! May I know if which play portrays Mie the most? Do you have any suggestion for plays that portrays Mie? I need it for my performance in school. Thank you so much

@KabukiInDepth Год назад

I'm glad you enjoyed it! There are several mie poses in most aragoto plays: Shibaraku, Narukami, Kanjincho, Kurumabiki... Not sure which one has the most, though!

@MsMimiDiamond Год назад

The first clip on the video is from a play called sagi musume or the heron maiden

@BuckBlaziken Год назад

Music back then is so different than what it is today. To some, old traditional music sounds like howling, to others it’s sounds like raw emotion. Even in other cultures like ancient Egypt and Greece music was similar. Either way, it’s a bit odd to ponder how music has evolved from this to what it is to this day.

@gabedom_ 9 месяцев назад

It's all about the intended purpose of the music. I doubt music back then was written with licensing deals and awards shows in mind. Traditional music from most all cultures sounds like this, visceral wailing or chanting or droning, music that hit straight in your soul.

@Adaendoza 4 месяца назад

I’m gonna get the 10 out of 100🎉🎌👍🏻

@synthasandwich 5 месяцев назад

Hi. Does anyone know of a play where a soldier insults his superior while on watch duty and ultimately ruins his career.... I think it ends with himself and his wife taking their own life. Definitely Kabuki, can't find what it's called. Thanks