The Last Goze

Five years ago, I listened to a documentary radio program on NHK early in the morning. The radio interview show was about an old woman who was said to be the last goze. Her name was Kobayashi Haru and she was about 100 years old then. I was really into the program. I was fascinated by her goze songs. Her voice and tone moved my deep inside. 

A goze is a blind female singer with playing shamisen, a Japanese traditional musical instrument. They had a long history from Muromachi era or more older. Four or five gozes made a group and they performed door to door in the local villages. The old style gozes are no longer exist. 

The interview reveled her harsh long life of goze. She became a goze when she was only five and since then she traveled around Niigata area singing goze songs. 

After that, I've read several her biographies. The stories were far more pitiful than Oshin, but finally, she became a human national treasure. 

Today, I've found her CD on a website. She recorded the CD when she was in her nineties. I ordered it and I'm really looking forward to listening to it. 

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