User Contributed Dictionary
Etymology 1
Phonetic Southern US dialectal spelling of sure.Adverb
- (Southern US) nonstandard spelling of sure, based on dialectal pronunciation
Etymology 2
From Japanese 笙 (shō).Noun
Japanese
Kanji reading
sho (hiragana しょ)Extensive Definition
The is a Japanese free
reed musical
instrument that was introduced from China during the Nara period.
It is modeled on the Chinese sheng,
although the shō tends to be smaller in size. It consists of 17
slender bamboo pipes,
each of which is fitted in its base with a metal free reed. Two of
the pipes are silent, although research suggests that they were
used in some music during the Heian
period.
The instrument's sound is said to imitate the
call of a phoenix,
and it is for this reason that the two silent pipes of the shō are
kept - as an aesthetic element, making two symmetrical "wings."
Like the Chinese sheng,
the pipes are tuned carefully with a drop of wax. As moisture
collected in the shōs pipes prevents it from sounding, performers
can be seen warming the instrument over a small charcoal brazier
when they are not playing. The instrument produces sound when the
player's breath is inhaled or exhaled, allowing long periods of
uninterrupted play. The shō is one of the three primary woodwind instruments used in
gagaku, Japan's imperial
court music. Its traditional playing technique in gagaku involves
the use of tone
clusters called aitake (合竹),
which move gradually from one to the other, providing accompaniment
to the melody.
A larger size of shō, called u (derived from the
Chinese yu),
is little used although some performers, such as Hiromi Yoshida,
began to revive it in the late 20th century.
A detailed book in English on the shō and the
gagaku (court orchestra music) it is associated with is titled
Music of A Thousand Autumns: the Togaku style of Japanese Court
Music by Robert
Garfias.
In contemporary music
The shō was first used as a solo instrument for contemporary music by the Japanese performer Mayumi Miyata (宮田まゆみ). Mayumi and other shō players who specialize in contemporary music use specially constructed instruments whose silent pipes are replaced by pipes that sound notes unavailable on the more traditional instrument, giving a wider range of pitches.Beginning in the mid-20th century, a number of
Japanese composers have created works for the instrument, both solo
and in combination with other Japanese and Western instruments.
Most prominent among these are Toshi
Ichiyanagi, Toru
Takemitsu, Jo Kondo,
Maki
Ishii, Joji Yuasa,
Toshio
Hosokawa, and Minoru
Miki.
The American composer John Cage
(1912-1992) created a number of works for Mayumi just before his
death, after having met her during the 1990 Darmstadt summer
course.http://robhaskins.net/writings/sho_notes.htm
Other notable contemporary performers, many of whom also compose
for the shō and other instruments, include Hideaki Bunno (Japan),
Tamami Tono (Japan), Hiromi Yoshida (Japan), Kō Ishikawa (Japan),
Randy
Raine-Reusch (Canada), and Sarah
Peebles (Canada). Notable 20th century composers who studied
the instrument in Japan include Benjamin
Britten and Alan
Hovhaness, the latter of whom composed two works for the
instrument. German avant-garde composer Helmut
Lachenmann used the shō at the climax of his opera, Das Mädchen
mit den Schwefelhölzern. Otomo
Yoshihide, Japanese experimental improv musician, incorporates
the shō in some of his music.
The instrument was introduced to a wider audience
in 2005 by
Icelandic artist Björk, who used
it as the primary instrument in three songs performed by Mayumi for
the soundtrack album to Drawing
Restraint 9, a film by her contemporary media artist boyfriend
Matthew
Barney, about Japanese
culture and whaling.
See also
External links
- History of the Free-Reed Instruments in Classical Music History and sound sample
- Columbia House Japan Photographs of modern-made instruments
- Randy Raine-Reusch's World Instrument Gallery Photograph and sound sample
sho in German: Shō (Instrument)
sho in Spanish: Sho
sho in French: Shō
sho in Italian: Sho
sho in Japanese: 笙