Indian and Japanese music traditions and musical instruments accord careful attention to melody and rhythm, while Western music and its instruments are built around harmony.  In both India and Japan, vocal music is central and microtone (shruti) is an important element of melody, and the performance progresses from slow to medium to fast (vilambit-madhya-drut, or jo-ha-kyu in Japan).  Furthermore, the Japanese language is closer to Indian languages in phonetic, grammatical and poetic structure than it is to Chinese or Western languages.  Prof. T.M. Hoffman, an expert exponent of Indian and Japanese music at a lecture-demonstration in IGNCA (March 17) said there is a great potential for sharing between Indian and Japan in relation to musical and linguistic arts, and such interaction can promote understanding and development within and between the respective traditions and in the broader context of music in Asia and the world.

He spoke about some Japanese musical instruments and explained how they can be adapted to Indian music.  Shakuhachi is the Japanese vertical flute, made from the lower (including root) portion of bamboo, with five finger holes.  Producing a wide  dynamic and tone quality range, it is performed solo in the meditative honkyoku style, together with koto and shamisen in traditional trio ensemble sankyoku, infolk music, and in a wide variety of modern music.  A vertical flute like shakuhachi is found in ancient cave paintings of Bhimbetka, near Bhopal.

Koto is the Japanese zither, made in paulownia wood and with (usually) 13 strings of wound silk or nylon.  Strings are plucked with plectra tsume made of ivory or plastic worn on the thumb, forefinger and middle finger.  An instrument like koto is known as Narayan veena in India.

Shinobue is a horizontal bamboo flute resembling the Indian bansuri, (flute) with six finger holes.  It is used mainly in festival ensembles and other folk music and dance.

T.M. Hoffman, born 1951 in Pennsylvania, is a master in Indian and Japanese music – vocal and flute.  He has traveled worldwide promoting the two steams of music.  He had delivered a lecture in IGNCA last year (Events, March-April 2002) on ‘Aural Arts Across Cultures’ highlighting the aural arts in India and Japan.