Ainu Music

Ainu music is the music of the Ainu, the Indigenous people of northern Japan, centred on Hokkaidō, Sakhalin and the Kurils. Its traditional core is sung: upopo dance songs in call and response, rimse round dances and yukar epic chant, accompanied by the five-string tonkori zither and the mukkuri mouth harp. Suppressed under Japanese assimilation policy, the tradition was carried into the recording era by singer *Umeko Ando* and rebuilt for modern audiences by *Oki Kano*, whose dub- and rock-inflected productions took Ainu instruments onto world stages.