• NOH: 胡蝶, 天鼓 (Kocho, Tenko)

9/21/25 (Sun), Umewaka

Kocho: This winter piece is rather unseasonal in these still humid days, but it’s always a pleasure to watch. A butterfly laments to a monk that she has never seen a plum, which blossoms in the late winter, since butterflies don’t live that long. The monk recites a sutra for her, and the power of prayer allows her miraculously to enjoy the flower.

You’d have to look hard to find any profound theme in this, but it’s a light and lovely show. The program notes call this Third Category (kazura-mono) Noh a stepping stone to more difficult pieces in the category, like Izutsu, and says that it is often taken by younger actors. Umewaka Kagehide was very fine, especially in the elegant second-act dance around the flower prop. The ai was played by the young Yamamoto Rintaro, who gave another solid performance.

Tenko: We learn that a boy who had received a drum from heaven had been hunted down and drowned by the emperor, who took the instrument for himself. However, the ruler discovered that the instrument would not make a sound. This is where the drama opens, as he orders the boy’s father to come to the palace. The father figures he is being set up, assuming that he will be killed if he can’t make the drum play. Still, he wants to see the drum in memory of his son. When he beats the drum, it in fact does make a beautiful sound. The delighted emperor rewards the father and sends him home, then holds a memorial service for the boy on the banks of the river in which he died. There, the ghost of the boy appears with the drum. He joyously dances and plays the drum until dawn.

While numerous interpretations are possible, I assume that the boy was playing the drum through the father via the overwhelming power of love. The author is unknown, but the action and dialogue would suggest to me a later piece (though it’s sometimes ascribed to Zeami). In any case, it’s dramatically effective from the start, when the aged father cries at the memory of his murdered child. He is distressed that he cannot shake off his love for his late child, an attachment that will prevent him from going to heaven. That movingly expresses the grief of a mourning father. His agreement to play for the emperor is phrased in a way that could be taken as cynical, understandable enough since it was the emperor who killed the son. That said, the son himself in ghostly form admits that he was wrong to hide the drum from the authorities and says his punishment was justified. He thanks the emperor profusely for his wisdom and mercy in holding the service, which sounds like the play’s author sucking up to authority for some reason.

Whatever the truth of that, the show is full of highlights, especially the father’s frail movements, his beating of the drum (he drops his sticks in surprise), and the son’s superb dance in the second half. The large holder with the small hand drum was a nice prop. A great show all around with fantastic music, helped by another terrific performance by the ever-active Kawaguchi Kohei and great support by Noguchi Takuhiro as the emperor’s envoy.