Saibara ('Drover's Songs') is the title of a genre of measured Japanese court song, traditionally believed to have been derived from the songs of pack-horse drivers bringing tribute from the provinces to the Heian capital and known to have formed part of the official court repertory at least since AD 859. From literature of the Heian period (782 1184) it is evident that these songs enjoyed great popularity at court as entertainment music practised by noble amateurs. Six songs are still performed today, albeit vastly modified. As well as being of value to musicologists, these volumes will interest readers concerned with early Japanese literature and paleography.

Despite their significance, the writings on Japanese music by Prussian medical scientist and physician Leopold Muller, published in Yokohama in a series from 1874 to 1876, have been nearly forgotten and marginalized even in historical research on the courtly gagaku traditions they focus upon. This study with full translation into both English and Japanese illuminates and reassesses Muller's pioneering contribution. It situates the essay-series historically in the light of an important line of thought about the evolution of ancient gagaku that arose only in the mid-twentieth century, as well as more widely for nearer their actual publication in relation to the emerging scientifically based 19th-century European scholarly discourse of "other" musics. It reveals the author, founder of the Medical Academy in Tokyo and personal physician to the Meiji Emperor, as an important man of his day both in Japan and back at home. And it proposes that, with the recent rise of interest in the medical humanities and a musicological call for embracing the cognitive-scientific along with the historical and ethnographical, Mullers' first hand observations of a foreign music made from the practical body-orientated approach and ethnographic pen of a medical scientist ought also find new resonance nowadays.

This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Despite their significance, the writings on Japanese music by Prussian medical scientist and physician Leopold Muller, published in Yokohama in a series from 1874 to 1876, have been nearly forgotten and marginalized even in historical research on the courtly gagaku traditions they focus upon. This study with full translation into both English and Japanese illuminates and reassesses Muller's pioneering contribution. It situates the essay-series historically in the light of an important line of thought about the evolution of ancient gagaku that arose only in the mid-twentieth century, as well as more widely for nearer their actual publication in relation to the emerging scientifically based 19th-century European scholarly discourse of "other" musics. It reveals the author, founder of the Medical Academy in Tokyo and personal physician to the Meiji Emperor, as an important man of his day both in Japan and back at home. And it proposes that, with the recent rise of interest in the medical humanities and a musicological call for embracing the cognitive-scientific along with the historical and ethnographical, Mullers' first hand observations of a foreign music made from the practical body-orientated approach and ethnographic pen of a medical scientist ought also find new resonance nowadays.