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The biwa (Japanese: 琵琶) is a Japanese short-necked wooden lute traditionally used in narrative storytelling. The biwa is a plucked string instrument that first gained popularity in China before spreading throughout East Asia, eventually reaching Japan sometime during the Nara period (710–794).
Biwa hōshi (琵琶法師), also known as "lute priests", were travelling performers in the era of Japanese history preceding the Meiji period. They earned their income by reciting vocal literature to the accompaniment of biwa music. Biwa hōshi were mostly blind, and adopted the shaved heads and robes common to Buddhist monks.
Biwa hōshi organized into a guild-like association. The biwa is Japan's traditional instrument. [citation needed] Lafcadio Hearn related in his book Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (1903) "Mimi-nashi Hoichi" (Hoichi the Earless), a Japanese ghost story about a blind biwa hōshi who performs "The Tale of the Heike". [7]
Traditional Japanese musical instruments, known as wagakki (和楽器) in Japanese, are musical instruments used in the traditional folk music of Japan. They comprise a range of string , wind , and percussion instruments.
Blind musicians known as biwa hōshi at Tōdōza improved the instrument and created what would be the shamisen. They used the plectrum of the Japanese biwa to play the shamisen, thus creating the beginning of jiuta as shamisen music. Ishimura-Kengyo is particularly regarded as originator of shamisen music.
The biwa, particularly the satsuma biwa is another Japanese instrument which is known for its sawari. The make of the instrument is such that the strings are stopped by pulling them between frets that are raised centimeters from the neck of the instrument, allowing the player to create the desired sawari effect at each fret.
The Biwa-bokuboku was modeled after the biwa (琵琶), a short-necked, wooden lute. Toriyama Sekien reports in his work Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro (百器徒然袋) that the biwa was designed after Chinese instruments such as the bokuma and the genjō. [1] [2] [3] The Biwa-bokuboku belongs to a special group of yōkai: the Tsukumogami (Japanese ...
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