Itsuku-shima Gojohraku was dedicated to Kashiwabara Shrine, Kagoshima City, on the new year day of 2024.
Shoko Hara, the organizer of Hara-Sho-Kai, found that the Gojyoraku, which is now performed by a man in a barbarian costume, used to be danced by a woman, when she read the “Collection of Oral Traditions of the Buddha,” Vol. 10.
It said that “Two of the country’s maidservants, one black and the other red, were dressed in Tang attire, their hair up, and they danced”.
In 2000, she had a chance to show female court dance performance at Itsuku-shima Shrine. She decided to reproduce Gojoraku as a female dance for this opportunity.
She got the idea of costume design from the description of the dance; “I remember that the sleeves of the Gigaku Bodhisattva are waving in the air, and I am so happy”.
In order to reproduce this description, she made a new, shabby costume from Ancient China. However, she had a lot of troubles with its color design. While searching for a description of the color scheme, she found a picture of four female court servants, standing facing each other on the stage of Itsukushima Shrine, dressed in blue and red shaded costume, in “Ippen Shonin Eiden” (Nihon no Emaki 20, published by Chuo Koron-sha). Based on this painting, she revived it under the title “Itsukushima Gojyogaku”.