Senrei's dance for eternity

Once in an eternity  April 12, 2012 Alti Fumin Hall  An Evening With(out) Senrei

There are many “once-in-a-lifetime” performances in Japan. A typical noh play will be performed only once by the shite; even if repeated, the ensemble of chorus and musicians, waki and kyogen will vary. The cost of renting hall and costumes, wigs and dressers, and musicians’ fees and gaining an audience for the many recitals of nihonbuyo happen only once. And actors from all traditions might greet a fushime milestone with a special “one-time only” performance to celebrate a kanreki (60) or 88^th birthday.

            But I’ve never seen a posthumous once-in-an-eternity performance until last night. Nishikawa Senrei, beloved teacher and creative force for 30 years in Kyoto’s conservative buyo world, produced another “evening with Senrei” where as usual she designed the costumes, story, choreography, and musical accompaniment, promoted with posters and leaflets and emails, and watched over the entire process. However this time she didn’t actually dance: she passed away last December 6^th.

            Instead, she asked long-term modern dancer Ogawa Tamae, whom she barely knew, to dance the part. The invitation came in November; the musicians gathered for an all night session at Senrei’s mountain home Dec 4^th; absent Senrei heard the tape and gave notes on 5^th; on 6^th she passed away. And on April 12^th, at ALTI Fumin Hall, her dance was produced, to somber but deeply moved audience.

            The theme was Dreamy thoughts of a Solo Stroll of Rousseau, imagining this philosopher/educator/musician’s final days strolling along the Seine. Senrei had done “fieldwork” to see what he had seen, and heard his footsteps on the riverbank, the beginning of the musical seed. She divided the dance into ten scenes, with silence and little transition, like an unfurling Emaki she wrote in the program. The cross/Catholic dark robes of posing menace of the opening gave way to the (bald-pated) Rousseau’s struggling with ideas, with sickness, with the demands of the body. Hands sawed the air, or were shaken like paint-splattering, the body moved from back to front like some mechanical doll. There was nothing buyo-like about the writhing and shimmying of the tormented soul. And finally release: a now-kimonoed dancer put on the robe, Senrei investing “Rousseau” in a dance of death; she falls to the floor, the robe covering her, and dies. But after a lull, the music begins again, a resurrection: stripped of kimono she is now a sculptural Buddha, released from passion, floating and gliding off-stage, the scroll now closed.

            In her email request (demand?) that dancer Ogawa take on this difficult 40 minute solo, someone with no direct connection to Senrei, or obligation, Senrei wrote tersely, “I have decided it is you who should dance the part; you must do it, because I am always right, and you will succeed.” Senrei was right about this, too.