soga, otherwise known as enkyoku, was a type of ceremonial vocal music largely cultivated by the Japanese warrior classes from the middle of the Kamakura period to the middle of the Muromachi period (that is, approx. the period 1250-1500). The figure most closely associated with the formation of the genre was a Buddhist priest, Shami Myoku, who lived in the latter half of the thirteenth century. As a medieval art form it precedes the final development of the music associated with early no, on which it is thought to have had a strong influence, and as a vocal form it bridges the gap between the late Heian-period imayo and the medieval kouta. It occupies a unique place in the history of the Japanese performing arts as a purely melodic vocal form that employed fairly long texts. At present, a group of sixteen manuscripts preserve the 161 pieces classified as true soga and twelve sotomono (“external pieces”). A large number of copies of these manuscripts are preserved throughout Japan, but the performance tradition of the genre itself has been extinct since the sixteenth century.<br>Gamo Mitsuko's new book approaches this genre from a musicological viewpoint, attempting to elucidate its charateristics as a musical form through reconstruction of the music preserved in all existing manuscripts. Until recently, this genre has been treated in detail only by scholars in the fields of Japanese literature and history, and serious attempts at musical examination of the genre have been extremely limited. This book, then, is a well-planned and well-executed attempt which compensates greatly for the lack of musicological research on the genre.<br>The contents of the book are as follows:<br>Introduction Musicological research on soga and problems at issue.<br>Chapter One Bibliographical description of extant soga manuscripts.<br>Chapter Two Notational signs: kan, otsu, ji and sloping flags.<br>Chapter Three Notational signs: goin (5-note scale signs), jo, ge and hakase (neumes).<br>Chapter Four Melody and scale structure.<br>According to the author, the central section of the research is contained in the third chapter which deals with the notational signs most fundamental in terms of pitch notation, the signs indicating scale degrees, pitch directional movement and melodic outline. As can be inferred from the outline of the contents above, the author first deals with the basic problem of bibliographical study of all of the soga manuscripts existing in Japan at the present day. These she has divided into five different categories according to their value as musical sources. Then, the most reliable source for each individual piece has been carefully selected by comparison of all existing versions of that piece. Only after this basic work was fully completed did she begin the task of attempting to interpret the notation, relying as much as possible on analysis of the notation itself and severly limiting the often dangerous method of equating technical terms and items in the notation with those of similar forms used in related genres such as no and shomyo. By treating each element in the notation individually she has succeeded in discovering the regularities in their usage patterns and hence their individual functions in the soga notational system.<br>The results of this study are too detailed to be treated in any depth here, but the following simple explanation which adapts the author's summary may suffice to give some indication of the most important discoveries.<br>1. Three melodic frameworks, ji-form, kan-form and otsu-form, can be distinguished, and each piece uses two or three of these melodic frameworks in its course.<br>2. Each of the frameworks has its own range, and all three fit together into a range of two octaves according to the following scheme,