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Geinoh Yamashirogumi

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Geinoh Yamashirogumi is a Japanese music collective founded on 19 January 1974 by Tsutomu Ōhashi. The group consists of hundreds of people from a wide range of professions. The name is derived from Ōhashi's pseudonym Shoji Yamashiro and means roughly Yamashiro Performing Arts Collective. Ōhashi was inspired by a postwar group from the 1950s that lived as a commune.

Music and breakthrough

The collective is known for two things: recreating folk music from all over the world, and music that combines traditional and modern elements. For instance, they made an electronic recreation of Indonesian gamelan, because digital MIDI synthesizers could not handle the tuning of that system. Their records from the 1970s and 1980s carry Japanese titles. In 1988 they made the music for the anime film Akira, including Kaneda.

Influence

The music of Akira sounds like a blend of choral singing, percussion and electronic sounds, and is one of the best-known examples of how a large collective could forge traditional sounds into a contemporary film score. Geinoh Yamashirogumi shows that pop music and film could also absorb ideas from far outside Europe and America, and that electronics did not have to sound cold.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to Kaneda and notice the communal singing and the percussion that together give a ritual feeling. Try to hear which sounds seem to come from a tradition and which are electronic.

Discography

Studio albums

In School of Rock

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Mentioned in other articles

Categories: ArtistsAnime