TOP > Episode3 Interview
Interview
Andō Mitsuko on Hijikata Tatsumi and Chickens
About Andō Noriko
This interview was recorded at Andō’s home on the 7th June 2015. Unfortunately we were unable to contact her directly to let her know about this Re-Butoooh showing, but we would like to express our sincere gratitude to her and her family for this footage. She spoke to us very frankly about many things during the interview, including several anecdotes about Hijikata Tatsumi.
There is not a lot of information available about Andō’s dance career, but based on the performance programmes and previously published books we were shown at the recording of this interview, we can see that her dance career began around 1935. During the 1950s she appeared in live performances and on TV programmes using the name Andō Mitsuko Dance Troupe. Although a member of the Contemporary Dance Association of Japan, her work was often referred to as “jazz dance” or “jazz ballet”. Andō herself mentioned during the interview that “jazz was not a word used by proper artists at the time”. The music for many of Andō’s works was composed by Taku Kōji, a jazz pianist, composer and professor of piano at Tokyo University of the Arts. Her piece The Raven (1954) included a stage designed by Okamoto Tarō and a guest appearance by Ohno Kazuo. In addition, some of her works, such as those performed by Yada Shigeru (Dan-Yada-Dancers) suggest a connection with show dance, indicating a broad and unique range of work. She also nurtured several young dancers. Hijikata’s dance partner at the time Zushi Akiko (Ōhara Akiko) emigrated to Brazil in 1961 with artist Ōhara Hisao and established a ballet company on a yuba farm which continues to this day. Tanaka Min also appeared in her 1986 staging of Moby Dick.
Hijikata Tatsumi first took part in the Andō Mitsuko Dance Troupe in 1953, and appeared in several works under the name Hijikata Kunio. It is likely that Hijikata first met Ohno Kazuo in person when Andō invited Ohno to perform as a guest artist in The Raven.
Biography
Born in 1928. In 1935 she studied under Takata Seiko. Besides establishing the Andō Noriko Unique Ballet Troupe, she also worked as an instructor for the graduate school of opera at Kunitachi College of Music and as a director of dance at Ishizaka Musical Enterprises. The following is a list of her key works.
As Andō Mitsuko Dance Troupe:
1951 Received 1st prize in the Contemporary Dance Competition for Silver Sonata
1953 Received 1st prize in the Contemporary Dance Competition for Broken Tune and its Variations
1954 Presented The Raven and Thrill Junction and others under the name Mitsuko Ando Dancing Heels, which were performed by Hijikata Tatsumi, Ohno Kazuo and Ohno Yoshito. Stage design by Okamoto Tarō.
As Andō Noriko Unique Ballet Troupe:
1970 Modern Dance / The World of Manga
1974 Ketch-Yawl Street, PATCH-UP! and Ceremony Towards Death
1977 The Future’s Eve
1980 Tonight and Allan Poe and Nocturne Op.3
1981 Love / Violence / Anarchy and Cool Package No.7
1983 Moby Dick (premiere) and Op.5
1986 Cool Package No.7 and Moby Dick (restaged)
The following is an extract from the programme for Andō Noriko’s performance Moby Dick, which was performed at the Shinjuku Bunka Center on the 21st February 1986.
Hijikata had passed away one month prior, on the 21st January 1986.
(Extract)
I often thought of Hijikata Tatsumi.
From the moment he burst into my studio, he shocked me with his extraordinary, insane yet delicate style. I taught him my technique with hard words, which he took on board gradually in his own way. I loved the delicacy of his soul as he engaged with the great task of changing the world of contemporary dance. I only wish he could have seen today’s performance of Moby Dick. He passed too quickly, torn away with the cold January winds.
Performance Programmes
Navel and A-Bomb
Navel and A-Bomb first premiered for two days at a video hall that could once be found at the Saisho Kaikan in Yurakucho (Tokyo) on the 21st and 22nd October 1961, along with five other 16mm films and a stage production as part of “Jazz Film Laboratory”, an experimental film festival whose theme was “modern jazz”. The other five films were X [pronounced Batsu] (written and directed by Tanikawa Shuntarō, co-directed by Takemitsu Tōru); IRON (a short piece written and filmed by Okamoto Yoshihiko); Yoru ga Kuru [Night Comes] (written by Ishihara Shintarō), TOOBLUE (written and directed by Shirasaka Yoshio, music by Takemitsu Tōru) and Catology (written and directed by Terayama Shūji). The performance was called Art Blakey (composition and poetry by Terayama Shūji, choreography by Hijikata Tatsumi). The music for each of these films was composed by jazz musicians including Maeda Norio and Yagi Masao. Unfortunately, it is not known what happened to the five films apart from Navel and A-Bomb. The entire of Navel and A-Bomb can be found on the DVD of Ohno Yoshito, Flowerbird (Canta Co. Ltd).
Quoted below are the description and credits for Navel and A-Bomb as they appeared in JEUNE, a programme booklet that was published in conjunction with Jazz Film Laboratory.
21st, 22nd October 1961 at Video Hall
No.1 Experimental Films on the theme of Modern Jazz
A work by Hosoe Eikoh, Navel and A-Bomb
Written and Directed by Hosoe Eikoh
Poetry: Yamamoto Tarō
Music: Maeda Norio
Cameraman: Tōhō Meiki
Narration: Mizushima Hiroshi
Performers: Hijikata Tatsumi, Ohno Yoshito, four fishermen and others
Film provided by Fuji Photo Film. Co. Ltd.
Sponsored by the Ohara Tourism Agency in Chiba Prefecture
About this work
The word “navel” was chosen to represent the origin of life, the essential connection between life and sex, contrasted to an “A-bomb” [atomic bomb] which destroys absolutely everything.
The story is incredibly abstract, but the meaning behind it is symbolic. Human history begins at the moment Adam and Eve eat the apple in the Garden of Eden, and the A-Bomb (printed onto the film strip using a negative) drops when the two are condemned to be expelled from paradise. This is where human history begins. If I explain it in full it will become too long, but in a nutshell, this is the history of men and women. Be there wars, or changes in the world, beneath it all are humans. To outline the film: a bleached post-Genesis world gradually clears to become a full image, when an adult appears in the midst an idyllic world of children and mischievously pulls an atomic bomb from the navel of a child which explodes. The world then returns to its desolate pre-human state. In short, what I wanted to say was that anything we do, whether in reality or fiction, can cause irreversible damage. It is precisely in this time of crisis, when we do not know when a third atomic bomb, or even a begadon bomb [a fictional bomb said to be 50,000 times more powerful than the atomic bomb that appeared in a manga at the time] could fall at any moment, that life must be cherished. This was also an attempt to depict black humour using modern jazz with bizarre film footage.
Hosoe Eikoh
Andō Mitsuko on Hijikata Tatsumi and Chickens
Interviewer: Mizohata Toshio
Film Production & Editing: iina naoto
Video Clip: Navel and A-Bomb by Hosoe Eikoh