‘Goze’ girls - blind blues banjo, Japan
Ain’t That a… Shamisen?
WFMU’s Beware of the Blog: February 13, 2008 (MP3s)…In not-so-ancient Japan, the inferior status of women and the disabled…you can only imagine the island nation’s treatment of its unsighted females. Cast out by a disdainful society, these doubly afflicted souls nevertheless crafted for themselves a new identity as wandering musicians, spreading news and social commentary while eking out a threadbare existence of alms……Known as goze, blind women shamisen players have been traveling and performing a circuit of remote villages dating back to the early 17th century…
With their shamisen, fretless 3-string banjos, blind female singer/story-tellers would wander old Japan in small troops of two or three with a partially sighted leader. Singing the blues was the only way they could feed themselves if their family couldn’t. Listen to and download the goze girls’ MP3s that public radio station, WFMU, has posted.
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