Nov 21, 2018 at 04:55 am
#07 - Have you heard the Yosakoi Naruko Odori?
Update posted by Daniel RolandiClick here to return to our campaign overview!
One of the requirements to participate in the Yosakoi Festival is that our song must use an excerpt from the ‘Yosakoi Naruko Odori’ (よさこい鳴子踊り) song (source). There are several great resources out there about that song so we'll provide a summary here and some links you can click through for more details!
Yosakoi Naruko Odori is a song from the "shin-min-you" (新民謡 - modern folk song) genre [1]. It was written by Takemasa Eisaku based on the ‘Yosakoi-bushi’ [2]. According to Wikipedia, Takemasa Eisaku has given the copyright on "Yosakoi Naruko Dancing" to the public, which I believe is what allows everyone to make remixes based on it. Yosakoi-bushi itself is a poem from Kochi.
Some excerpts:
| Kouchi no jouka e kite miiya jinma mo banba mo you odoru naruko ryoute ni you odoru you odoru |
Come to the town by Kochi castle Grandpa and grandma are dancing well Dancing well with naruko in both hands |
| Tosa no Kouchi no Harimayabashi de bousan kanzashi kau wo mita yosakoi, yosakoi |
In Kouchi of Tosa At Harimaya Bridge I saw a priest buying kanzashi [3] Yosakoi, yosakoi |
I found an interesting source in this Life in Kochi blog by S. Minami. The translation above comes from that blog combined with my knowledge of Japanese and advice from teammates (thanks, Will, Kasia, and friends!). It uses Kochi dialect and older variant of Japanese so take it with a grain of salt.
As the blog goes, back then (and probably now too?) Buddhist priests weren't supposed to be in a relationship with women so to find a Buddhist priest buying a hair ornament is a rare sight! The couple in that story is immortalized in a statue by the Harimaya Bridge, which is also featured in the poem above.
Please visit the Life in Kochi blog for more pictures and details.
Complete lyrics and audio files can be found in Kochi City Tourism Association's website here.
Now go back to the video of our performance in 2018. Can you find the lyrics and melody of Yosakoi Naruko Odori?
// Daniel - click here to head over to the campaign page and make a donation
[1] Source: page 288-289 "Traditional Folk Song in Modern Japan: Sources, Sentiment and Society"; https://books.google.pl/books?id=yfV5DwAAQBAJ
[2] Source: Wikipedia; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yosakoi
[3] "kanzashi" is an ornamental hairpin.
