DaisyField→Music→!Japan→About Kappore-Honen Search
	Daisyfield Archive of Japanese Traditional Music About "Kappore-Honen"

Back to the songs        Puccini

Title in English: "Harvest Dance of Love"

History

"Kappore-Honen" dates to before the Meiji Period. It often accompanied some rather vulgar street dancing.  It must not be confused with a different song, "Kappore", also available on this website.

Text

Remarks

"Kappore-Honen" appears several times in Giocomo Puccini's opera Madama Butterfly., where it is always associated with Butterfly's son.  The most powerful example is the moment of great drama when Butterfly shows her son to Sharpless for the first time, and asks, "Could he forget this too?"  Another notable example is the use of "Kappore-Honen" in the aria "Che tua Madre", sung by Butterfly to her son. 

For a list of Puccini's Japanese songs, with details of where each song is used in the opera, see Japanese Songs in Puccini's Madama Butterfly on this website.

References

Nagai, Y., and Kobatake, K., Japanese Popular Music, A Collection of the Popular Music of Japan Rendered in to the Staff Notation, S. Miki & Co., Nos. 106 and 107 Shinsaibashi Road, Osaka, 1892.

Hara, Kunio, Puccini's Use of Japanese Melodies in Madama Butterfly, Master's thesis, University of Cincinnati, 2003.  Download from http://www.ohiolink.edu/etd/send-pdf.cgi?ucin1060955367 [Large pdf file, 3MB].

Powils-Okano, Kimiyo, Puccinis "Madama Butterfly", Verlag für systematische Musikwissenschaft GmbH, Bonn, 1986 (in German).