Kasai Akira Post Butoh Performance “Dancing Chopin”
As part of the annual dance performance for new students of Keio University I would like to welcome students with two pieces by Chopin “Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor Op. 11” and “Funeral March” under the title “Dancing Chopin.” Chopin is for me one of the “dancer-like composers.” I always have the impression that he was dancing with the piano as his partner, rather than improvising upon it. In some ways his Piano Concerto No. 1 is distinctly unusual, since he rarely composed grand symphonies in the manner of Beethoven and Mozart. It is also a concerto attesting to the intensity of his love for his homeland of Poland. His heart was always located in Poland, outside the salons of the French aristocracy, and he kept the flame of revolution alight in his chest, constantly ready to rise up with a gun in hand. As our times seem poised on the verge of drastic changes, I again wish to immerse myself in Chopin.
Akira Kasai
★Flyer
Date
19 October 2022, 16:30-
Venue
Keio University Hiyoshi Campus, Raiosha
Audience
Only for students at Keio Uni.(Reservation required)
Cost
Admission Free
Enquiries and bookings
Keio University Art Center
2-15-45 Mita, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 108-8345
Tel 03-5427-1621
pj.ca.oiek.c-tra@otomihsi
Performance［Keio University Freshman Event 2022］
Date
19 October 2022, 16:30-
Venue
Keio University Hiyoshi Campus, Raiosha
Audience
Only for students at Keio Uni.(Reservation required)
Cost
Admission Free
Booking
Reservation required
Lecturer/Performer
Performance title: “Dancing Chopin”
Performer: Akira Kasai
Sound/Lighting: S.O.G.A.
Kasai Akira was born in Mie Prefecture in 1943. His childhood was marked by the strict discipline of his father Torao, a judge, who he lost to the Toya Maru ferry accident on September 26, 1954. Although he has never been baptized, he has extensive experience with the Christian lifestyle, and it would be safe to characterize the historical “Resurrection of Jesus” as one of Kasai’s lifelong themes. He entered the world of dance following his studies at the studio of Eguchi Takaya and Miya Misako, and would go on to meet Ohno Kazuo and study directly under him for three years. In October 1963 he encountered Hijikata Tatsumi as a dancer in the Gi-gi (“Sacrifice Ceremony“) at Asahi Hall and would later perform in “A Rose-colored Dance: A LA MAISON DE M. CIVECAWA” at Sennichidani Hall, in November 1965. He established his own studio, the Tenshi-kan (“House of Angels”), in 1971, and lived in Germany from 1979 to 1985. His practice takes in eurhythmy and pantomime, and is not constrained by “butoh” in its narrow sense.
A highly regarded writer, his position of emphasizing mystery and spirituality is expounded in his books Tenshi-ron (“About Angel”), Seirei Butoh (“Spiritual Butoh”), and Tomei Meikyuu (“Crystal Labyrinth”) – a photographic collection produced in collaboration with Eikoh Hosoe – among many other published works. His works cover a broad range of topics from Western occultism through to Oishigori Masumi’s Shinkun Kojiki (“Chronicles of Shinkun”), and sublimates them into “dances” which transcend mere quotidian language, earning him an ardent fan base as an author. Meanwhile, just as he puts it that: “I can hear the music of the heavens” (Spiritual Butoh, p.9), and asserts that “The Holy Spirit is energy, and one cannot live for a single moment without it” (Spiritual Butoh, p.26.), as a dancer he gives his audiences a sense of the cosmic as well as of tradition, transcending Modern Japan through a pre-modern, European, “Dance Cosmology.” He is, in essence, embodying the irresoluble mysteries of the gods found, for example, in the poetry of Sir John Davies, 1569-1626.
As Kasai states at the beginning of The Body and Life: Super Generational Dance: “As long as history is a living entity in the continual process of change, any era is a turning point. Nevertheless, rather than each person living continually across all eras, humans are confined to specific time periods, with their own sense of how the era in which they actually live constitutes a turning point. Such perception will involve marshaling their imaginations to achieve a bird’s eye view of history as a whole.” Such sentiments illustrate Kasai’s strong awareness that modernity and the social are also pivotal to dance. A recipient of the Minister of Education Award for Fine Arts for his 2013 performance “Dancing the Constitution of Japan.” This is the fourth occasion on which Akira Kasai will be the performer for Keio University Freshman Event, following on from the poetry and dance session “Sphere, Flashing Souls: REQUIEM,” a collaboration with Gozo Yoshimasu, in 2010, “Dancing the Constitution of Japan,” in 2020, and “Dancing John the Apostle,” in 2021. (Hayato Kosuge)
Enquiries and bookings
Keio University Art Center
2-15-45 Mita, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 108-8345
Tel 03-5427-1621
pj.ca.oiek.c-tra@otomihsi
Organiser(s)
Hosts: Hiyoshi Art and Performance Project (HAPP) and Keio University Art Center (KUAC)
Cooperation: Keio Senior High School
Coordinator: Hayato Kosuge