Skip to content
1981
Resonating across Oceanic Currents: Maritime Histories of Popular Music in and from Japan, 1920s-60s
  • ISSN: 2051-7084
  • E-ISSN: 2051-7092

Abstract

This article examines the personal experiences and memories of Japanese tango musicians in Manchuria in the years leading up to and immediately after the Second World War, revealing the tensions between migration and movement, on the one hand, and memory and loss, on the other. By engaging with the ideas surrounding tairiku (‘continents’) in early to mid-twentieth century Japan, this article moves away from triangulating the transoceanic movements of Japanese tango musicians and musical commodities across Japan, China and Latin America at this time. Instead, it considers such movements as the sonic manifestation of the island/continent dichotomy that framed Japanese maritime thinking in the first half of the twentieth century. Consequently, in offering a Japan-reflexive scholarship for the study and writing of global music histories, this article argues for the need to move beyond a geo-oceanic approach in examining transoceanic circulations.

Funding
This study was supported by the:
  • European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (Award 846143)
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1386/eapc_00122_1
2024-04-26
2026-04-15

Metrics

Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Anon. (1935a), ‘Manshū no butōkai’ (‘The worlds of dancing in Manchuria’), Manshū Nippō, 27 June, n.pag.
    [Google Scholar]
  2. Anon. (1935b), ‘Manshū no butōkai (ichi) butōba’ (‘The worlds of dancing in Manchuria [1] the dance hall’), Dansu to ongaku (‘Dance and music’), October, n.pag.
    [Google Scholar]
  3. Anon. (2020), anonymised upon the interviewee’s request, personal letter from an interviewee to Yuiko Asaba, 26 March.
  4. Armitage, David, Bashford, Alison and Sivasundaram, Sujit (eds) (2018), Oceanic Histories, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  5. Asaba, Yuiko (麻場友姫胡) (2020), ‘Nijusseikini okeru tangono juyōto “honba” ishikino keisei: Naimenka sareta modānitii toiu shitenkarano ichikōsatsu’ (‘The reception of tango and the creation of its authenticity in twentieth century Japan: A study from the perspective of “internalized modernity”’), Popyurā Ongaku Kenkyū (Popular Music Studies), 24, pp. 315.
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Asaba, Yuiko (forthcoming 2025), Tango in Japan: Cosmopolitanism beyond the West, Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  7. Asada, Kyōji (浅田喬二), Mitani, Taichirō (三谷太一郎) and Ōe, Shinobu (大江志乃夫) (eds) (1993), Kindai Nihon to shokuminchi 7 (‘Moden Japan and Colony 7’), Tokyo: Iwanamishoten.
    [Google Scholar]
  8. Atkins, E. Taylor (1999), ‘Jammin’ on the jazz frontier: The Japanese jazz community in interwar Shanghai’, Japanese Studies, 19:1, pp. 516.
    [Google Scholar]
  9. Byl, Julia and Sykes, Jim (eds) (2023), Sounding the Indian Ocean: Musical Circulations in the Afro-Asiatic Seascape, Oakland, CA: University of California Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  10. Collins, Sarah and Dana, Gooley (2016), ‘Music and the new cosmopolitanism: Problems and possibilities’, The Musical Quarterly, 99:2, pp. 13965.
    [Google Scholar]
  11. Fellezs, Kevin (2019), Listen But Don’t Ask Question: Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar across the Transpacific, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  12. Field, Andrew D. (2010), Shanghai’s Dancing World: Cabaret Culture and Urban Politics, 1919–1954, Hong Kong: Chinese University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  13. Fujisawa, Ranko (藤沢嵐子) (1987), Kantando: Tango to Ranko to Shinpei to (‘Cantando: Tango, Ranko and Shinpei’), Tokyo: Rokkou Shuppan.
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Furukubo, Sakura (古久保さくら) (2003), ‘“Kindai kazoku” to shiteno Manshū nōgyōimin kazokuzō: “Tairikuno hanayome” wo meguru gensetsu kara’ (‘Understanding Manchurian Japanese farming immigrants as “modern families”: On discourses surrounding the “brides of the continent”’), in S. Obinata (ed.), Nihon kazokushi ronshū 13 Minzoku・sensō to kazoku (‘Collected essays on the history of family in Japan 13: Ethnicity, war, and family’), Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, pp. 15265.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Haneda, Masashi and Oka, Mihoko (eds) (2019), A Maritime History of East Asia, Kyoto: Kyoto University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  16. Hoshino, Yukiyo (星野幸代) and Nishimura, Masao (西村正男) (eds) (2020), Idōsuru mediato puropaganda: Nicchū sensō kara sengoni kaketeno taishūgeinou (‘The media and propaganda in motion: Popular arts between the Sino-Japanese War to the postwar era’), Tokyo: Bensei Shuppan.
    [Google Scholar]
  17. Iguchi, Junko (井口淳子) (2019), Bōmeishatachi no Shanhai gakudan: Sokaino ongakuto baree (‘Music worlds of refugees in Shanghai: Music and ballets of the settlements’), Tokyo: Ongaku no tomo sha.
    [Google Scholar]
  18. Imai, Keiko (今井圭子) (2001), ‘Aruzenchin shuyōshini yoru senzenno nihon imin wo meguru hōdō’ (‘Images of Japanese immigrants in the main Argentine newspapers before World War II’), The Bulletin of the Faculty of Foreign Studies Sophia University, 36, pp. 14970.
    [Google Scholar]
  19. Irving, David R. M. (2010), Colonial Counterpoint: Music in Early Modern Manila, New York: Oxford University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Itoh, Mayumi (2010), Japanese War Orphans in Manchuria: Forgotten Victims of World War II, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
    [Google Scholar]
  21. Iwano, Yuichi (岩野裕一) (1999), Ōdō gakudono kōkyōgaku: Manshū shirarezaru ongakushi (‘The symphony orchestra of the royal paradise: The unknown history of music in Manchuria’), Tokyo: Ongaku no tomo sha.
    [Google Scholar]
  22. Kanie, Takeo (蟹江丈夫) (2006 unpublished), ‘Nihon no tango gakudan’ (‘Tango ensembles of Japan’), The Association of the Yokohama Porteña Music Twentieth Anniversary Project (tango association booklet), Yokohama: Porutenia Ongaku Dōkōkai.
    [Google Scholar]
  23. Kasai, Amane (葛西周) (2015), ‘Nicchūsensōkino Manshūni okeru bunkakōsaku oyobi ongakujanrukan ni kansuru kōsatsu’ (‘A study on cultural productions in Manchuria during the Sino-Japanese War and perspectives on music genres’), in B. Takeshi (馬場毅) (ed.), Takakuteki shitenkara mita Nicchūsensō: Seiji・keizai ・gunji・ bunka・minzokuno sōkoku (‘The Sino-Japanese war from multiple perspectives: Frictions between politics, economics, military affairs, culture and ethnic groups’), Fukuoka: Karansha, pp. 17596.
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Koizumi, Tatsuji (小泉達治) (2020), in-person interview with Yuiko Asaba, 24 February.
  25. Koga, Yukiko (2016), Inheritance of Loss: China, Japan, and the Political Economy of Redemption after Empire, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  26. Koh, Bunyu (黄文雄) (2003), Nihon no shokuminchino shinjitsu: Taiwan, Chosen, Manshu (‘Truths about Japanese Colonialism: Taiwan, Korea, Manchuria’), Tokyo: Fusosha.
    [Google Scholar]
  27. Matsuda, Matt (2012), Pacific Worlds: A History of Seas, Peoples, and Cultures, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  28. Monna, Toshio (門奈紀生) (2014), in-person interview with Yuiko Asaba, 9 April.
  29. Nathaus, Klaus and Nott, James (eds) (2022), Worlds of Social Dancing: Dance Floor Encounters and the Global Rise of Couple Dancing, c.1910–c.1940, Manchester: Manchester University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  30. Nor, Mohd Anis Md. and Stepputat, Kendra (eds) (2019), Sounding the Dance, Moving the Music: Choreomusicological Perspectives on Maritime Southeast Asian Performing Arts, London and New York: Routledge.
    [Google Scholar]
  31. Ouyang, Lei X. (2022), Music as Mao’s Weapon: Remembering the Cultural Revolution, Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  32. Palomino, Pablo (2020), The Invention of Latin American Music: A Transnational History, New York: Oxford University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  33. Sakaguchi, Mitsuhiro (坂口満宏) (2010), ‘Darega imin wo okuridashitanoka: Kantaiheiyō ni okeru nihonjin no kokusai idō・kishi’ (‘Who sent over the immigrants: An overview of the Japanese international movement across the Pacific’), Ritsumeikan Gengobunka Kenkyū, 21:4, pp. 5366.
    [Google Scholar]
  34. Satoh, Kumiko (佐藤くみ子) (1957), ‘Sakamoto Masaichi shi hōmon’ (‘Visiting Mr Sakamoto Masaichi’), Chunanbei Ongaku, 49, September, pp. 2229.
    [Google Scholar]
  35. Solis, Gabriel (2015), ‘The Black Pacific: Music and racialization in Papua New Guinea and Australia’, Critical Sociology, 41:2, pp. 297312.
    [Google Scholar]
  36. Sugikawa, Yūichi (杉川雄一)(2009), ‘Ima, watashiga kangaeteiru koto: Bandoneon sōsha Sagawa Mine san ni kiku’ (‘What I am thinking now: Interview with the bandoneonist Mr Sagawa Mine’), Shunyu HIROSHIMA, 26, pp. 7881.
    [Google Scholar]
  37. Tajima, Hayato (田島隼人) (2009), ‘Modan Nihon no merodrama teki sōzōryoku to “ekkyō”: Aruzenchin/tango wo meguru gensetsu bunseki’ (‘Modern Japan’s melodramatic imagination and “border crossing”: Discourse analysis of Argentine tango’), Bigaku Geijutsu Kenkyū, 27, pp. 157205.
    [Google Scholar]
  38. Takaya, Terunobu (高谷照信)(2020), telephone interview with Yuiko Asaba, 31 January.
  39. Takayama, Masahiko (高山正彦) (1957), ‘Takayama Masahiko kibō taidan (3) Gesuto Sakamoto Masaichi’ (‘Much desired interview [3] Guest Sakamoto Masaichi’), El Tango Porteño, 1 March, pp. 1924.
    [Google Scholar]
  40. Tamanoi, Mariko A. (2009), Mamory Maps: The State and Manchuria in Postwar Japan, Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai‘i Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  41. Tominaga, Tanako (冨永孝子) (1986), Dairen: Kūhaku no roppyakuichi: Sengo, sokode naniga okotta (‘The empty six hundred days: What happened in Dalian after World War II’), Tokyo: Shinhyoron.
    [Google Scholar]
  42. Zhang, Canon (張佳能) (2020), ‘“Dareka Riru o shinaika?” “Shanhai Riru” o meguru ongakushiteki kōsatsu’ (‘“Where is Lil?”: A music historical study on Shanghai Lil), Popyurā Ongaku Kenkyū (Popular Music Studies), 24, pp. 85100.
    [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1386/eapc_00122_1
Loading
/content/journals/10.1386/eapc_00122_1
Loading

Data & Media loading...

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a success
Invalid data
An error occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error
Please enter a valid_number test