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Haisai gusuyo! It was such a nice flight this time around, as compared to last June on China airlines. United had all the senior citizens working on the flight, but siting in a spacious seat was great, and even to Okinawa on ANA. The service and food on both were nice. Anyway, Okinawa is HOT! Deeji achisanyaibindo! There is a breeze though so its still bearable. Today I’ll be going to the taikai rally in Ginowan. There are posters and huge banners all over as well as the newspapers filling the pages with articles and commentary. It seems like this is going to be very big. I went this morning to Shuri to pay respects to the royalty and ask to watch over the events for today. I also went to an exhibition of the Sho royal treasures which is on display at Pallet Kumoji’s new Naha City Historical Museum. It was awesome to see the treasures of our royal past, especially the symbol of out LooChoo kingdom…the crown. These artifacts have been given by the current descendent of the royal line to the city of Naha and a decision has been made not to take it to the new National Museum when its opened in a few months. Thats a relief. Anyway, I will post as I can. Time to get ready to go to the taikai. Mata atu hanase usagaimisebiri!

Since both of the main musicians of the Kabudan are also students of Nakasone-sensei, we’re posting this. Though Nakasone-sensei has the highest national honors in both the US and Japan, he has a very poor web presence. Hopefully this post will help others who want information on the master.

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Uta nu michi – “the path of the singer” – is an endless road to musical perfection. The longer one travels, the farther he realizes he must go, perpetually encountering trials and obstacles, but always discovering new insights into his art and, ultimately, his soul. Few have treaded this path as long or as faithfully as uta-sanshin grand master Harry Seishō Nakasone. Through a career that continues after more than eight decades, Nakasone-sensei’s journey has earned him countless commendations and a following of faithful cultural enthusiasts. More importantly, he has built a legacy that future generations of Okinawan musicians can proudly build upon.

Harry Seishō Nakasone was born in He‘eia on the island of O‘ahu on February 12, 1912, the eldest son of Kamasuke and Naeko Nakasone. As an infant of only three months, Nakasone was taken to live with his grandparents in the village of Goya in central Okinawa. As with many kibei, he was sent to his parents’ homeland to be raised and schooled as a Japanese citizen; however, growing up in an economically depressed land under foster care meant immense hardship for young Nakasone. Nonetheless, these burdens were eased by the music that filled and surrounded the Goya village home. Both of Nakasone’s grandmothers were well-acclaimed singers and his uncle was considered one of the best musicians in the village. Nakasone recalls his uncle Matsu’s musical passion:

He always wait for the rainy day…when it’s good day, clear day, nice day, you cannot stay home and play music [or else] the neighbor[s] will [say] you [are] lazy…so he wait for the rainy day. He so happy, he come home and he start plucking the samisen and singing[1].

All of the memories of his early years in Okinawa, good and bad, would shape the master’s musical career.

By the time he was nine, Nakasone had taught himself to play the sanshin by ear. Whenever his uncle stepped out of the house, Nakasone would sneak and play the prized instrument he was forbidden to handle. Though he would berate young Nakasone for playing his sanshin, Matsu recognized his nephew’s talent and love for music. When Nakasone was ready to return to Hawai‘i in 1925, his uncle presented him with a sanshin as a parting gift—an instrument he still cherishes until today.

Life in Hawai‘i was not much easier for Nakasone upon his return. Like most Okinawan families in the 1920s, the Nakasones struggled to make ends meet. Nakasone, now in his teens, became a delivery boy for a plantation store in Waimanalo. As the oldest son, he was obligated to contribute to the family’s income, but at the price of his education – unfortunate circumstances that Nakasone regrets to this day.

The family fortune eventually improved and by 1938, Kamasuke and Naeko opened a produce store in Honolulu. With the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the growing public suspicion of Japanese aliens, the business was handed over to Nakasone who renamed the company Asahi Produce. He successfully ran the business until his retirement in 1967.

Even after returning to Hawai‘i, Nakasone continued to be surrounded by music. His mother was an Okinawan koto instructor and his father was a founding member of their village club, Goeku Sonjinkai. The Nakasones’ Mō’ili’ili residence was often used for club parties and was frequently visited by well-known musicians from Okinawa. It was not until 1933, however, that Nakasone began formal training in classical uta-sanshin. By Nakasone’s own account, his mother overheard him plucking a tune on the sanshin in their living room one day:

My mother was cooking in the kitchen and when she heard somebody playing samisen she thought it was okyakusan (guest) came so she ran out to the palour, she look and I was playing.[2]

Pleasantly surprised at his interest and prowess, Naeko introduced her son to his first teacher, Ryōkin Nakama, and thus Nakasone’s formal study of Nomura Ryū classical music began. Over the next 20 years, Nakasone-sensei would supplement his study under several great Nomura Ryū masters including Seisei Okuma, Sōjirō Nishijima, and Kīki Ikemiya.

In 1954, Nakasone sponsored the renowned master Kamechiyo Kōchi to live with him for six months of intensive study. Of all of his teachers, Nakasone cites Kōchi-sensei as his greatest mentor and inspiration. “He treated me just like his son,” Nakasone often remarks when fondly remembering Kōchi-sensei. Even after Kōchi-sensei returned to Okinawa, Nakasone made frequent trips to continue his study until the master’s death. Nakasone recounts the grand master’s words on his deathbed:

Sensei told me just before he died (in 1973), he said he was so happy I was better than him now… [I told him] “Please sensei, don’t say that.”[3]

Today, a picture of Kōchi-sensei hangs in a high place of respect in Nakasone-sensei’s studio.

Indeed, Nakasone lived up to his mentor’s praise. His diligent study and remarkable talent earned him the distinction of being one of the most celebrated uta-sanshin masters in the world. In 1952, Nakasone became the first non-Japanese citizen ever to be awarded an instructor’s license from the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai. Six years later, he was presented the title of shihan or “master”. In 1963, Nakasone earned Okinawan music’s highest honor, the Ryūgaku Saikōshō.

In recognition of his top honors and contributions to Okinawan music, five of the top traditional music organizations in Okinawa sponsored a special concert for Nakasone-sensei in1988. “Furusato nite Utau” (“Singing in the Homeland”) was held in Urasoe City, Okinawa and featured a cast of almost 200 musicians and dance masters performing to feature and pay tribute to Nakasone’s musical mastery. Never before had any musician born outside of Okinawa received such an honor.

Nakasone-sensei’s recognition would not cease at the borders of the Okinawan performing arts circles. After more than four decades of study, mentoring, and performing, the uta-sanshin master received national recognition in both the United States and Japan for his life’s work. In 1991, Harry Seishō Nakasone was named to the National Endowment for the Arts Folk Heritage Fellowship, making him a national living treasure in the United States and becoming the first Asian-American musician to receive such a distinction. Three years later in 1994, he received the Fifth-class Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays from the Emperor of Japan – one of the highest national honors in Japan, and the highest attainable honor for a non-Japanese citizen.

In spite of his national and international recognition and countless commendations, probably the greatest legacy Nakasone-sensei has built has been as a teacher. Shortly after receiving his teaching credentials, Nakasone founded his own school, the Nakasone Seifū Kai in 1953. In 1966, he extended his teaching to the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa where he became a lecturer in the Music Department’s Ethnomusicology Program until his retirement in 2002. The grand master would reach beyond Hawai‘i’s shores and became the musical director of the Kariyushi Kai in San Francisco in 1990. Meanwhile, between 1991 and 2004, Nakasone-sensei mentored several key students with intensive individual lessons through the Hawai‘i State Foundation for Culture and Art’s Master-Apprenticeship Program. Throughout his career, Nakasone-sensei has produced more than a dozen instructors and has literally touched hundreds of students of all generations and ethnicities with his gift of music.

Nakasone-sensei’s legacy goes beyond his own students. In 1967, he played an integral part in founding the Hawai‘i chapter of the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai to organize the many scattered schools of classical Okinawan music in Hawai‘i. He became the first president for the organization and is today its only remaining founding father. Since its formation, the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawai‘i Shibu has played a vital role in preserving classical uta-sanshin in Hawai‘i, especially for the latter-generation descendants of the original Okinawan immigrants. On April 22, 2007, on the occasion of the organization’s fortieth anniversary, Nakasone-sensei will be honored for all of his achievements and his contributions to keeping Okinawa koten ongaku (“classical music”) alive.

Harry Seishō Nakasone’s journey is truly remarkable. Indeed, only a few pages of text cannot fully do justice to the achievements of this great musician and his importance to the community. His own words probably describe the journey best:

Koten [music] is hard…You may think you get ‘em already, but you don’t. You have to go and then go some more. Everyday I’m learning.[4]

The walls of his Mō‘ili‘ili studio are lined with photos and certificates that attest to those words. It is here that the grand master, now 95 years old, still spends most of his evenings passing on his art to others, paving new roads for those who wish to follow in his footsteps. Though those shoes will be very difficult to fill, the path that Nakasone-sensei has cleared and illuminated for us all has ensured that generations of musicians will follow on the uta nu michi.

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[1] State Foundation for Culture and Arts audio interview, 1993 (Honolulu)

[2] Video interview by Koki Tamashiro and Andre Ajimine, September 2001 (Maui)

[3] Honolulu Star-Bulletin article, May 24, 1991

[4] SFCA interview, 1993

Since both of the main musicians in the Ukwanshin Kabudan are members of the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Shibu, I figured we’d post this history of the organization in Hawaii….

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Of all of their cultural treasures, Okinawans have always held a special place for music in their lives. Through political upheaval, economic depression, and World War II, uta-sanshin (“song and sanshin”) music has continued to be the lifeline to the hearts of the Okinawan people. In their songs, they have carried their history, their thoughts, their emotions, and most importantly, their identity.

This musical heritage has even survived the long journey over turbulent seas to far away lands, and finally, through time to the present day. The resilience of Okinawan music is evidenced in the survival of one of Hawai‘i’s oldest Okinawan music organizations, the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Shibu. Now in existence for forty years, the association has become a pillar in Hawai‘i’s Okinawan cultural community and an exquisite flower in the islands’ lei of musical traditions.

The Roots of Nomura Ryū Music in Hawai‘i

The seeds of the Nomura style of classical Okinawan music (Nomura Ryū) in Hawai‘i were planted by Ryōei Nakama. Nakama began learning uta-sanshin from the age of twelve, and by sixteen, he was employed by the Okinawan royal family and placed under the tutelage of the great Nomura Ryū master Ryōshin Kuwae. In 1906, Nakama immigrated to Hawai‘i and brought his musical knowledge with him to a growing Okinawan immigrant population that had started to arrive six years earlier.

In 1921, Nakama summoned his son, Ryōtarukin, from Okinawa to join him in Hawai‘i. Ryōtarukin had been playing music since he was a child and had won awards for his musical proficiency by the time he was in his teens. In Hawai‘i, Ryōtarukin (later renamed Ryōkin) furthered his study of music under his father alongside, among others, Eikichi Miyagi. Together, Ryōtarukin Nakama and Miyagi would be instrumental in establishing the foundations for the current Nomura Ryū organization.

By 1933, both Eikichi Miyagi and Ryōtarukin Nakama were actively teaching. Miyagi had formed the Miyagi Gensei Kai and his leading students were Shinsuke Yamashiro, Seikō Ikehara, and Kanyei Izumigawa. Nakama formed the Nakama Ongaku Kai (later changed to Nakama Kinpū Kai) and his leading disciples were Kōsuke Nakaganeku and Seishō Nakasone. All of these students would eventually go on to form their own schools which would later become the basis for the Hawaii Shibu.

The Establishment of the Hawaii Shibu

Okinawan music was becoming increasingly popular in Hawai‘i and by the 1950s, several schools and clubs had emerged. In 1954, six classical music schools organized themselves into the Hawaii Ryūkyū Ongaku Kyō Kai. This early organization’s main purpose was to perpetuate classical Okinawan music by sponsoring recitals and forming partnerships with other performing arts groups in the islands. Four years later, in 1958, three of the schools reorganized with six other music groups to form the Ryūkyū Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Honbu.

In 1967, the Hawaii Ryūkyū Ongaku Kyō Kai and the Ryūkyū Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Honbu merged to form the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Shibu. To commemorate the formation of the new organization, a two-day recital was held at Farrington High School auditorium from September 22, 1967. The program featured both local musicians and dancers, as well as artists from Okinawa including the renowned Nomura Ryū master Kamechiyo Kōchi.

It would be ten years before the Hawaii Shibu would sponsor another major event. In October 1977, the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Shibu gathered its membership along with more than thirty guest performers from Okinawa in a special concert commemorating its ten-year anniversary. This would be the last self-sponsored event for the Hawaii Shibu for the next three decades.

The Hawaii Shibu in Changing Times

In the interim, the Hawaii Shibu has participated in numerous local events such as the annual HUOA Okinawa Festival, as well as dance and music concerts by both local and visiting artists. Along with the Ryūkyū Sōkyoku Kōyō Kai Hawaii Shibu, the organization has sponsored annual combined recitals. While these recitals were once done twice a year in spring and fall, it was made into an annual event from 2002.

In 2002, the Hawaii Shibu filed a petition with the U.S. federal government for official recognition as a non-profit entity. The 501c license was granted on June 3, 2002, and the current Board of Directors and officers were instated. The organization is now eligible for grants and other funding free of taxation.

While the Hawaii Shibu has been become well established in its four decades of existence, it faces several challenges. The first and main challenge has been the recruitment of new membership, especially among the younger generations. With the passing of almost all of the first-generation immigrants from Okinawa and the aging of the second-generation, Hawai‘i’s Okinawan community is now largely comprised of third-, fourth-, and even fifth-generation descendants of the original immigrants. Generation gaps and language barriers continually present challenges to the preservation and propagation of traditional culture. With the passing of each generation, these schisms only seem to deepen.

A second major challenge the Hawaii Shibu is facing is the general dwindling interest or lack of awareness of Okinawan classical music. Even among Hawai‘i-born Okinawans, few people know of the existence of a classical music tradition or the difference between classical and folk repertoires. People who are marginally familiar with classical Okinawan music generally veer away from its study, deeming the music as boring or too difficult. For younger generations, there are many other more popular forms of music to study such as Hawaiian or western music. In general, there are only very few outlets for Okinawan classical music to be exposed. Often, these outlets are for small groups of people and do not often extend outside of the Okinawan community.

Now under third- and fourth-generation leadership, the Hawaii Shibu is seriously studying these problems to create viable solutions. To increase membership and awareness of the music, the organization has been very active in participating in community events. While most of these events have been through the local Okinawan clubs, the Hawaii Shibu has also become involved with other cultural organizations such as the Hawai‘i State Foundation on Culture and Arts and TRADEX. Through partnerships with other organizations, the Hawaii Shibu has been able to participate in community lectures and concerts that reach out to people of various generations and ethnicities.

The Hawaii Shibu has recently started to actively reach out to neighboring islands as well. The Honolulu-based organization now has members in Maui and also participates in events on Hawai‘i-island and Kauai. In the near future, the Hawaii Shibu hopes to be able to send instructors regularly to all neighbor islands and be able to offer aid in flying members to Honolulu to participate in group events.

Despite the challenges that bear down on the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai Hawaii Shibu, the organization clings to its legacy of preserving one of Okinawa’s most treasured cultural assets. Nourished by the roots of its forefathers, the Hawaii Shibu will continue to grow and extend its reach out to the larger community in Hawai‘i, the US, and the world.

赤犬子 Akainko. Akainko was a well-renowned traveling singer who lived during the reign of King Shō Shin (1477-1527). Born on the island of Tsuken, he later settled on the main island of Okinawa. He is the legendary “father of uta-sanshin” who is said to be the first to couple the plucking of the sanshin with singing. A monument stands in his memory in Yomitan, where he is said to have lived and taught until his death.

湛水親方 Tansui Uwēkata (1623-1683). Tansui Uwēkata, known also as Kōchi Kenchū, is often referred to as the “father of classical music” because he is credited with formalizing uta-sanshin music into a serious art form in the royal court. All subsequent styles of classical uta-sanshin music find their roots in his style. Tansui is also credited with composing the musical pieces “Tsikuten Bushi”, “Janna Bushi”, “Shuyi Bushi”, “Shudun Bushi”, “Akatsichi Bushi”, and “Hai Tsikuten Bushi,” which are all still played in varying forms today. Though only a few songs survived, his original style is today preserved as Tansui Ryū.

屋嘉比朝奇 Yakabi Chōki (1716-1775). Yakabi Chōki was a student of Terukina Mongaku and inherited the music style created by Tansui Uwēkata four generations earlier. Trained in Noh, Yakabi introduced elements of this Japanese art into uta-sanshin music. He is most noted for leaving behind a collection of 117 sanshin transcriptions—the oldest known sanshin scores in existence today. These scores would serve as the basis for later transcriptions, including the ones used by all uta-sanshin players today. Yakabi is also known for composing the songs “Nubui Kuduchi” and “Kudai Kuduchi.”

安富祖正元 Afuso Seigen (1785-1865). One of the two dominant styles of Okinawan classical music, Afuso Ryū, is based on the music style of Afuso Seigen. Afuso studied under Chinen Sekkō alongside Nomura Anchō and is said to have retained his master’s style. One of Afuso’s most noted works is the “Kadō Yōhō”, a primer on the proper conduct and performance of a classical musician.

野村安趙 Nomura Anchō (1805-1871). Nomura Anchō was a student of Chinen Sekkō alongside Afuso Seigen and Ōnaga Peichin. He served as musical director at the investiture ceremony for the last Ryūkyū king, Shō Tai. Under the king’s orders, Nomura worked with his students Matsumura Shinshin and Yamauchi Seiki to compile and edit song scores which would later become the basis for the Nomura Ryū scores. While former scores were written freehand, Nomura introduced a system of blocks to clearly demarcate the rhythm. This is the format that is universal to all sanshin scores today. Nomura also revolutionized classical music by introducing a singing style that was simpler and more natural than the predominant style at the time. Today, Nomura Ryū is the largest school of Okinawan music in the world.

伊佐川世瑞 Isagawa Seizui (1872-1937). Isagawa Seizui inherited the musical style of Nomura through Kuwae Ryōshin. In 1924, Isagawa founded the Nomura Ryū Ongaku Kyō Kai (“The Association for the Nomura Style of Music”) and became its first president. The association has since grown to be the largest Okinawan classical music organization in the world with branches in Hawai‘i and the Americas. Isagawa’s most noted contribution is his co-authorship of the Seigakufū-Tsuki Kunkunshi with Serei Kunio, which was released in 1953 long after his death. These were the first sanshin scores to include vocal notations which were created by Serei and based on Isagawa’s singing. This compilation (and the song style) has become the standard for all Nomura Ryū practitioners since.