I recently received an e-mail from a foreign journalist in Japan asking me to comment on "the ongoing boom in Japan of traditional music." The request both puzzled me and made me think. Traditional Japanese music, hogaku, is not exactly booming. Attendance at traditional concerts and enrollment in university hogaku courses remain at about the same (or lower) levels, major record companies rarely release CDs of traditional music unless the artist agrees to purchase outright a certain number of the product, and most young hogaku musicians rely on supplementary means of income to make ends meet. I wondered exactly where this putative boom might be?

Careful reading of the journalist's mail revealed that she was referring to the phenomena of folk (rather than traditional "art") hogaku -- more specifically, Tsugaru shamisen. Certainly, the popularity and CD sales of groups like the Yoshida Brothers, the female duo Anmitsu and individuals like Hiromitsu Agematsu and Shin'ichi Kinoshita have rocketed. All of them are solid musicians who have worked hard to master the basic Tsugaru shamisen music while developing their own styles; yet they, or perhaps their management, ultimately have to rely on artificial means to maintain their mass popularity; for example, youthful sex appeal (both the Yoshida Brothers and Anmitsu have this in abundance) or musically questionable ventures into rock and other forms of commercial pop music. Given the nature of the commercial music industry, this is probably necessary, but oftentimes the artifice obscures the natural beauty of the music.

The folk music boom is not a recent phenomena, however. This genre became a viable commercial form during the mid-'70s with the so-called min'yo boom, fueled by NHK's min'yo specials and nationwide contests. During that period, folk singers such as Akiko Kanazawa became superstars with their renditions of folk melodies from around the country. About the same time, legendary shamisen performers Takahashi Chikuzan, Chisato Yamada and Yujiro Takahashi introduced the country to the powerful rhythms and melodies of Tsugaru folk music. Taiko music was made popular by the pioneering group Ondekoza and its successor, Kodo, from Sado Island. The current "boom" in folk music is an extension and reworking of this earlier phenomena.

One must differentiate between folk and classical music, however. Folk music, with its roots in popular urban and rural culture, is easier to package and sell than art hogaku. Many of the forms of hogaku art music just cannot survive the transition to the popular mode. An example is the hichiriki performer Hideki Togi, who broke away from the Imperial Household Agency gagaku orchestra to pursue his own brand of commercial music. Although an accomplished player of the hichiriki (an oboe-like instrument), Togi's mindless "feel-good" pop music cheapens the instrument and denigrates the genre. That in itself would be acceptable if he stuck with his own compositions, but (at least during the concert I attended) he bragged how the nobility of the gagaku tradition informed his own music then proceeded to perform very substandard gagaku. That is not the way to educate and inform people about hogaku.

Togi notwithstanding, one can hope that a trickle-down effect of commercial hogaku would make the younger generation more aware and appreciative of art hogaku, since it is through the mass media that they receive most of their education. The Ministry of Science and Education has mandated that from 2002, public junior high schools offer instruction in at least one Japanese instrument. The schools and teachers don't yet have the resources to satisfy this requirement, but one hopes that 10 or 15 years down the road there will be a true "boom" in the appreciation of the beauty and subtlety of both popular and art hogaku music.

The National Theater, in conjunction with the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, will present the fifth Hogaku Composers' Competition concert. Last year's winning entry by Tamami Tono, "Hoshigatami," for sho, hichiriki, fue and wagon, was an excellent example of how gagaku can inspire new music. The first half of the program will feature this year's five entry compositions. Tono's "Hoshigatami" and Shinichiro Ikebe's "At the Treetops," for 20-stringed koto, will be performed in the second half.

"Kokuritsu Gekijo Sakkyoku Concours," June 21, 6 p.m., at the National Theater Small Hall near Hanzomon Station. Admission is 1,500 yen; students 1,000 yen. For more information and tickets, call the National Theater Ticket Office at (03) 3230-3000.

The Asahi Beer Music Caravan Committee, along with the Japan Foundation, is presenting a concert of shamisen music, tracing its origins from China to Okinawa to mainland Japan. Artists from these three areas (including the Tsugaru group Anmitsu) will perform various styles of shamisen.