Nō can be understood as a form of musical poetry in which the emotions of a character are expressed through utai, a term that contains both the notions of “poem” and “chant”. Utai refers to the chanted portions of the text of a nō play including the parts that are delivered in stylized speech (kotoba). In performance, the text is given voice, with every line rendered in a specific style. Even spoken conversations between characters are intoned according to a stylized model. The melody of the chant may be plain or ornate. Rhythmically, it can be loose or strict and is variously textured. The elements that define nō chant-rhythm, voice quality, mode, and style – are introduced in what follows. Variations in these elements serve as structural indicators within the shōdan system.
In this section
- Rhythm
- Voice production
1. Rhythm basics
Melody in nō is expressed in the chant of actors and chorus and with the flute. Rhythm is expressed by the drums, either the two hand drums working in tandem, or with the addition of the stick drum. Two basic rhythmic conventions are used to combine chant with the drums. In one, the syllables of the song or notes of the flute are matched to the drum beats, both melody and drums following an eight-beat unit. This is called hyōshi ai (translated either as “matched” or “congruent” rhythm). When the song matches syllables to beats, the drummers also match their playing to the song, beat by beat. There are several methods of matching syllables and drums, discussed below. With the second rhythmic convention, the syllables of the song are not aligned with specific beats of the drums and are therefore said to be “unmatched” or “non-congruent” (hyōshi awazu). With “unmatched” rhythm, chant and drumming progress together, but independently.
The two most basic rhythms are:
- Matched rhythm（拍子合 hyōshi-ai) in which the chant matches syllables of text to the beat.
- Unmatched rhythm（拍子不合 hyōshi-awazu), in which chant and music progress independently, yet begin and end together at designated times.
A significant characteristic of nō music is that even when the chant, drums, and flute follow the same eight-beat rhythmic unit, the performers intentionally avoid using evenly-spaced intervals between beats, in order to avoid the sense of a monotonous regular beat. Following an even beat would be considered artistically inferior and amateurish. The amount of elasticity in rendering a passage differs by individual and by nō school and may change with each performance. As a result, during a performance, the singers and instrumentalists must be constantly listening to each other and mutually adjusting their rhythm.
The most conspicuous passages that require performers to constantly listen and adjust to each other are the unmatched sections, where the chant is not bound to the eight-beat unit played by the drums and is rendered in a freer rhythm. For these sections, the drums still play patterns derived from the eight-beat units but freed from a constant beat. Because the chant proceeds without heeding the beat, the drummers have to measure (mihakarai) the speed with which they play their stipulated patterns and adjust their timing to coordinate with the chant. They make these adjustments by expanding or contracting the patterns. For instance, the instructions might be, “repeat pattern A until XYZ words in the chant”. The drummers might repeat A three times, only twice, or possibly four times. To make sure the chant and drum cadences end at the same moment, they might contract two patterns into one, playing the first half of A and joining it to the second half of B. These unrehearsed adjustments happen as part of the performance. They constitute an element of the here-and-now manifestation on the stage of the event of the play, as well as a measure of the performers’ skill.
When the rhythm of the chant does not correspond to the rhythm of the drums, the sounds that reach the audience follow different timings. It might seem like improvisation, but it is not. Rather, the sequences of patterns accord with a system that makes unmatched execution possible. Certain vocal interjections (kakegoe) are used to signal a shift to a new sequence of patterns (e.g., from repeating A in a loop to a closure pattern). Once one drummer switches to the next pattern, the others will follow.
The role of empty spaces (間 ma)
The fluid integration of drummers and chanters that creates a unified ensemble despite the lack of a metronome-like rhythm depends on the underlying concept of ma 間, a composite of the ideas of “space”, “interval”, and “the in-between”. For instance, in sections with a matched beat (hyōshi ai), each of the beats in the eight-beat measure has a unique position signaled by specific drummers’ kakegoe, such as “yo”,”ha”, “yo-i” or “ya” that precede the actual drum stroke. In the simplest hand-drum pattern (koi-ai + mitsu-ji), the drum strokes come mostly on odd-numbered beats: 3, 5, and 7. Singers and instrumentalists alike mentally mark the even-numbered beats: 2, 4, 6, and 8. For the drummers, marking the beat is often silent and internal, a “cue” (komi) rather than a drum stroke. This cue, a voiceless internal contraction, precedes the drummers’ calls on the half-beat in preparation for striking the hand drum on the odd beat. Likewise, the singers take a breath on beat 8 and match syllables of the chant to beats 2, 4, and 6. The way in which the “interval is taken” (ma wo toru) colors the mood evoked: large and expansive ma for slow, feminine pieces, or clipped and sharp ma for vigorous gods or warriors.
2. Voice production
In order to chant nō, singers keep the chin pulled back, and let the voice resonate in the chest and abdomen, producing a vibrato that seems to originate from the depths of the body. Different voice techniques are used together. Singers alternate between an open projected voice and a restrained voice produced when the breath is pulled down (hiku) into the inner body. Variations in the method of voice production also characterize the different shite schools.
The style of singing differs depending on the role type. For example, shite characters tend to sing slower and at a lower pitch than the tsure, who sings in a lighter and slightly higher-pitched voice, and some waki performers minimize vibrato to emphasize the words. Pitch is relative, changing with the role and the level of intensity or excitement, and not necessarily related to the gender of the character. As a result, a shite playing a female role may sing at a lower pitch than the waki performing a man.
Modes: yowagin and tsuyogin
Japanese traditional music used to be based on a pentatonic scale with five pitches in the octave, but after the development of shamisen music in the seventeenth century, performers began to use pitches outside the old mode, incorporating partial shifts in key. However, nō music is essentially restricted to pitches in the fundamental pentatonic scale. Rules govern the way one sound is linked to the next, and these rules are not broken. Furthermore, unlike Western classical conventions developed from 19th-century European music, nō chant does not conceive of absolute pitch. Indications of pitch are relative, and depend on the pitch that is established by the shite or by the chorus leader. Many features of nō singing – the limited number of pitches, the set ways pitches are connected, the indication of the initial pitch for each chant section, and the predetermined end pitches – can also be found in other medieval Japanese musical arts, including narration with lute (biwa) of texts like Tales of the Heike, and Buddhist narrative chants (kōshiki).
The type of melody and rhythm used for the utai are important musical elements for both the expression of the content and for establishing the structural base. Modern utai distinguishes between two modes of delivery: yowagin, the “soft voice” or melodic mode, and tsuyogin, the “strong voice” or dynamic mode. Characters of women and old people appearing in calm, quiet scenes use yowagin, the melodic mode, while gods, demons and strong figures sing in tsuyogin, the dynamic mode. Yowagin has a steady, comparatively light vibrato, and the shifts in pitches are easier to distinguish. However, in tsuyogin, the breath is exhaled with force, producing a wide but less controlled vibrato. Compared to yowagin, tsuyogin has fewer differences in pitch.
Yowagin 弱吟
The yowagin mode has three main or pole pitches, jō-on (upper pitch), chū-on (middle pitch), and ge-on (lower pitch), each separated by a perfect fourth and connected by intermediary pitches. The singer alternates between letting out and holding back breath. Pitches are associated with distinctive singing styles: passages that are more chant-like tend to modulate around jō-on, the pole pitch of the upper register and to use quite a bit of vibrato.. Narrative passages tend to be set in the middle register, being sung centered on chū-on and without vibrato. Above jō-on, is the pitch called kuri, which uses a special vibrato called nabiki. Rising to kuri lays emphasis on the words, often expressing strong feeling or sorrow. Although there are a limited number of pitches in nō melody, by controlling the breath to change pitch level, voice quality, and the amount of vibrato, and by manipulating the intervals (ma) between syllables, chanting is minutely modulated to express the scene.
Tsuyogin 強吟
Tsuyogin uses four pitches: jō-on, chū-on, ge-no-chū-on (“lower middle pitch”), and ge-on, but in present practice jō-on and chū-on are essentially the same pitch, as are ge-no-chū-on and ge-on. Despite pitch difference being almost indecipherable to the ear, jō-on and chū-on continue to be differentiated in the notation. To simulate the nonexistent shift in pitch descent from jō-on to chū-on, the singer increases the intensity of the vibrato immediately preceding the notation indicating lowering the pitch, effectively producing a rising pitch and thus the illusion of descent when returning to the preceding pitch. On the other hand, no change in pitch marks an ascent from chū-on to jō-on. The same principle holds for movement between ge-no-chū-on and ge-on, except that ge-no-chū-on uses a softer exhalation than ge-on. Thus, the retention of notations like jō-on or chū-on are used not to indicate pitch levels, but rather to mark changes in breath support.
The lack of distinct pitch characterizing tsuyogin means that it is difficult to identify as a song. Today, tsuyogin is valued for clearly transmitting the force and the meaning of the words. In certain scenes, tsuyogin and yowagin are combined. For scenes with frequent interchange of these dynamic and melodic modes, such as scenes with crazed characters, the shifts in voicing suggest a complex psychological state.
Contributor: Takakuwa Izumi and Monica Bethe