The relationship between Noh and Kyōgen.
Kyōgen actor Nomura Mansai（野村萬斎）
It is said generally that Noh and Kyōgen mention as one at the same time in Japan.
How was the relationship between Noh and Kyōgen?
The truth is that Kyōgen had been rated lower than Noh for a long time.
Once, in the Samurai ages, Samurai has been reflecting a good laugh using one cheek, only every once six months. Then Japanese people had thought that comedy laughter is something neglected and tragedy is respected.
What Kyōgen is a wonderful art, was closed up, it was after the World Second War.
It was elucidated about Kyōgen, which is the origin of Japanese performing arts by historians. Then Kyōgen appreciated in the new era because Kyōgen players had been polishing skills quietly behind Noh performances.
According to the training of Kyōgen players through centuries, it has expressed tough performance and generous laughter. Nowadays, it gives modern people comfort and like the home of the heart, richness, the fun, and relief them from stressful mandain lives.
What is the deference between Noh and Kyōgen?
Noh is a play that has tilted the effort to be an attempt to describe fate itself of human lives on the stage, and how expresses the pathos of humanity, beautifully and purely.
Kyōgen is a play that portrays on the stage of one scene of the human comedy.
Noh is a musical play which seeks beauty of subtle and profound: Ūgen（幽玄）,
and performances and joints with musicians:Hayasikata（囃子方）and a chorus group:Jiutai（地謡）.
Kyōgen is a play which is performed more comical expressions in full of popular color although Noh play is performed dignified . Then Kyōgen is characterized by an expression of witty laugh.
Kyōgen is the basis of Noh play.
It is said that the heart of prayer is the basis of performing arts in Japan.
There is a performance as a prayer, it is called Okina（翁）: meaning, "an old man" .
It was the origin of Noh plays, known as Okina-Sarugaku（翁猿楽）, and it was preserved as a Japanese performing art.
Kanami（観阿弥） and Zeami（世阿弥）: They are father and son, used it as the basis of Noh and created the origin of Noh.
The dance, Okina（翁）is composed of two dancers. One is Shitekata（シテ方）, who performs the main and first character, he is known as Okina, and he prays for a peaceful world and tranquility in the nation. And another is Kyōgenkata（狂言方）, he is called Sanbasō（三番叟）, and he performs the second character, who prays for good harvest.
These two dancers describe the relationship between Noh and Kyōgen and take their position by the division of their parts.
The Sanbasō arrives on the stage on the first act of the dance, known as Momi-no-Dan（揉ノ段）, he doesn't put on a mask and he makes noise stepping around on the stage, which calls forth spirits from the ground.
And later, he puts on a black Okina mask, and performs a dance of appreciation for agriculture, spontaneousness and wealth, with ringing bells. This second act is called, Suzu-no-Dan（鈴ノ段）.
Basically, dancing or "Mau（舞う）", itself was done through the skill of Kyōgen, like the Sanbasō dance. Noh and Kyōgen have the same origin of the art, but each describe a different world.
Nowadays, what is called the performance of Noh is, for example, the skills of not moving and expressing only existence, of singing, talking, using masks and sliding foot steps, these were the skills of Kyōgen originally.
In addition, Kyōgen has other skills, for example, speaking by using spoken language since the Muromachi period, using expressions and laughing.
Kyōgen cultivated the laugh which was unused by Noh.
Kyōgen could be the most unique performing art in the world.
Performance of Kyōgen.
On the Kyōgen stage, there is no Hayashikata (musicians) or Jiutai (singers) like Noh play. There only exists the performers on the stage. They express everything in the play by themselves. It is said that Kyōgen players express with their bare hands.
The sound of their voices use utterance and pronunciation in many play performers to model many aspects of the performance.
Describing scenes are always represented by their speech. It is really a unique style in which Kyōgen performers make imitation sounds.
Opening a door, "Guwarari Guwarari Guwarari （グワラリ グワラリ グワラリ）",
Closing a door, "Sara Sara Sara Sara, Battari （サラサラサラサラ、パッタリ）",
Cutting through a wood with a saw, "Zuka Zuka Zuka （ズカズカズカ）",
Breaking a fence, "Meri Meri Meri （メリメリメリ）",
When two followers, Tarōkaja（太郎冠者） and Jirōkaja（次郎冠者） drop a big cup which is their master's most precious one, and broke it by mistake, they make the sound: "Guwarari... Chiin! （グワラリ、チーン）",
Ringing a bell in a temple and spreading the sounds in all directions, "Jan, Mon Mon Mon Mon （ジャン モンモン モンモン）",
Serving sake, "Dobu Dobu Dobu （ドブドブドブ）",
Shaking and listening to the sound of the little remaining in a bottle of sake, "Pisho Pisho Pisho （ピショ ピショ ピショ）".
Noh is a musical play, but Kyōgen is a speech play.
The basis of a Kyōgen play is Mai: dancing and Utai: singing.
The Mai in Noh is used as the main performance, but Mai in Kyōgen isn't the main performance.
It is used as an entertainment at a drinking party.
The Utai in Kyōgen contains and reflects the popular songs in the Middle Ages. For example, a song describes that a woman doesn't want her boyfriend to say goodbye and to leave her house after having stayed with her during the night.
And Utai explains about the representation of the mind of the characters and the changing scenes on the stage.
For example, in the play, Busu（附子）, the story is about two followers, Tarōkaja and Jirōkaja, who are staying at their master's home when their master goes out. Their master puts a tag on a vase, "Don't touch my precious vase, because it has the deadly poison, Busu（附子） in it." But in fact, it has very sweet black sugar in it, that the master doesn't want them to eat it during his absence. In these ages, sugars were valuable and rare to get.
Additionally, Utai has the effect of making a situation funny.
For example, during a scene, Utai is used when they are approaching the vase.
And in another scene, Utai is used after they broke another precious item of their master by mistake, and they try to die eating the black sugar, "Busu" in the vase to apologize to their master.
ーOf course, it was very delicious, but then they were't able to die. Their master was shocked to have lost his "Busu".ー
Characters in a Kyōgen play.
A strong wawashii woman.
Demons in Kyōgen plays are friendly and they have something in their nature that everybody can't hate. And Gods look like commoners, it's a different style from the Gods in Noh plays.
There many strong female characters in Kyōgen plays.
They are uproarious, loud and vulgar. This is known as Wawashii（わわしい）. They are Wawashii women. By contrast, men are weak-willed and husbands are idle.
For example, in the play,"Kamahara （鎌腹）", the wife gets angry because her husband doesn't work well, then she goes out and chases him with a sickle and a stick.
In another play, Kintōzaemon（金藤左衛門）, a woman is stronger than a bandit. The bandit met a woman who was coming back to her house from her parent's house. He tried to rob her and take her belongings from her. But he was stripped of all his belongings instead. The woman is a tough person.
Of course, there are different kinds of women in Kyōgen plays. For example, in the play "Mikatsugi（箕被/みかつぎ）", a husband becomes obsessed with Renga（連歌）: The writing and composing of small poems: Tanka（短歌）with many people, so then his wife becomes determined to divorce him. But later she falls back in love after reading his lovely Renga. It is a peaceful and pleasant story of a couple. And in another play "Iori-no-Ume"（庵の梅）, it has as its main characters, Shite（シテ）, many women. They visit an old woman who lives in a humble cottage, and they have a drinking party. It is a tasteful play.
Of course, historical heroes appear in Kyōgen plays.
For example, in a play which describes Ariwara-no-Narihira（在原業平）, a passionate poet, and the main character of Ise-Monogatari（伊勢物語）, entering in the Noh play Izutsu（井筒）as well, but in the Kyōgen play, he is a very hungry handsome guy and he stole a rice cake from a rice cake shop and choked on his rice cake. Later, he became very worried about a girl who is the daughter of the master shopkeeper, and the master made him get married.
Kyōgen shows a rebel spirit, a way against authority through comedy.
Othertimes, Kyōgen describes tragic ghosts like Mugen Noh（夢幻能）, but they are comedy plays which have characters like, ghosts of cicadas and octopuses without the ghost of Rokujō-no-Miyasunndokoro（六条御息所） or Minamoto-no-Yoshitsune（源義経）.
In Kyōgen plays, many civilians flourish in the Middle Ages.
For example, Rengashi（連歌師）: a professional person, writing and composing Tanka（短歌）with many people. they also include, fortune tellers, a entertainer using monkey dance, craftsmen of Japanese lacquer, cooking pot vendors, persimmon vendors, kelp vendors, thieves, gangsters, gamblers, a stingy master and wise follower, Tarōkaja（太郎冠者）, a good-natured master and an innocent and cheerful follower, Tarōkaja, an idle husband and an uproarious, loud and vulgar wife, and so on. They based on the general lives in this age.
These plays are performed on a Kyōgen stage .
Although it looks like a very simple play, these performances describe many characters vividly and merrily on the stage. It depends on the Kyōgen actors skills and stage direction.
Kintōzaemon（金藤左衛門）, a woman is stronger than a bandit.
Gods look and act like commoners.
Demons in Kyōgen plays are friendly.
The diversity and possibility of Kyōgen.
We don't know the writers of Kyōgen scenarios like Noh.
Kyōgen players are based on a tradition by Genne Hōin（弦恵法印/げんねほういん）, who was a scholar monk in the Hieizan temple（比叡山）in the 13rd century.
Noh is a musical play, it hasn't changed from the rule book since it was made by Zeami. But Kyōgen is a speech play, so there is often the use of ad-lib performance.
In Kyōgen, it is said that the text book, Tensyō Kyōgen-bon（天正狂言本） are the oldest books in the Momoyama period. There are 260 kinds of repertoires in Kyōgen, but less than half of them are performed on tha stage these days.
Kyōgen is the performing art of speech, and, it is said "The art of speech".
It is established in a time without wireless microphones. The diction which creates sounds that travel the length and breath of the stage, are learned by schools of actors and announcers.
Once, in a play "Yūzuru（夕鶴）" written by Kinoshita Junji（木下順二）, and stage directed by Takechi Tetsuji（武智鉄二）, a man saved a crane, and then the crane transformed into a beautiful woman and returns the favor to him.
The play was preformed with Noh actors and Kyōgen actors. On this occasion, the diction of Kyōgen actors was known by many people and getting more and more popular.
A Kyōgen actor Shigeyama Sennojō（茂山千之丞, 1971-1986）. (above)
He performed a character, Yohyō（与ひょう）in the play "Yūzuru（夕鶴）".
He was approached for the European play written by Samuel Beckett and as a stage direction of Opera.
Nowadays, the skills of Kyōgen players are used in TV drama and new styles of stage performances. New scenarios are created and performed, for example, "Fox and Alien" written by a novelist Komatsu Sakyō（小松左京）. It's a new modern work. Kyōgen has new ideas and initiatives.
A Nobel prize-winning physicist, Yukawa Hideki（湯川秀樹）suggested how to appreciate a Kyogen play.
"Our ancestors from the Muromachi period to the Edo period, were very curious people, and thought up, and took in new ideas.
I think, from the people making Kyōgen plays, the people of performing Kyōgen plays and those appreciating Kyōgen plays, all had open minds.
I think, in Noh plays, everyone goes into their mind, but in Kyōgen plays, everyone responds to everything surrounding them."
Please enjoy Kyōgen plays on stage.
This play "Yūzuru（夕鶴）" has been performed by many actors and actress on stage.
ーThis information is based on the book: Morgue by Masuda Syōzō （増田正造）.ー