The ma of great expectations

"You have such great ma with a sword," my dance teacher informed me, "I can't understand why you don't have it when you dance!"

"I didn't know it was genre-specifc," I responded, morosely.

This discussion has gone on, on some level, over the past 1-1/2 years.  Up until that time, my Nihon buyo (classical Japanese dance) teacher had never seen much of my iai.  That all changed last year when we organized a performance and included 5 minutes of an iai demonstration.  Ever since she saw me do iai, my teacher has marveled aloud at how someone with talent in one area can be so untalented in another, albeit related, area.  (To be honest, she says I am not totally untalented; but she wonders why I am not better.)

It's a good question, because truly, I am better with a sword.  And I also wonder.

To begin with, it helps to discuss ma a little bit.  Ma is one of the most difficult of Japanese concepts to explain in words.  In Japanese kanji, it is depicted as the sun seen through a gate.  In English it is sometimes called "interval," which does not help much unless someone has studied music.  It is literally the timing between the notes.  Music students struggle with ma all the time, though some definitely have a better innate sense of it than others.  My teacher, a classically-trained musician, knows exactly whereof she speaks.  Sometimes even Japanese people refer to ma with the English word, timing.  I also think of it in terms of the word talent.  No matter how beautiful, a dancer with no ma is no fun to watch.

In dance or budo, ma is how one moves; in Nihon buyo, it could be said how one moves to interpret the lyrics of the song, as well as successfully moving in the timing between sung lyrics and rhythmic passages that make up the dance.  It is much more difficult to dance to a slow piece than a fast one. 

Sound tough?  Tell me about it.  Like budo and many western movement genres, learning the choreography is not even the start of performing a dance (though I know a number of buyoka who are content with simply memorizing choreography).  Like the painter who copies an old master in order to try to get into the head of the famous artist (as well as learning some useful techniques), the student dancer endeavors to learn the timing of her teacher as an example, though of course, eventually, she has to develop the ma she has in herself in order to make the piece effective.

So, what's my problem?  There may be several explanations.  One is time served, I think.  Though I have taken Nihon buyo classes for years, up until recently, I only attended a class twice a month with my first teacher (who retired a number of years ago).  Though the classes were long, the teacher was only able to spend a few minutes with each person.  In the past few years, we have shorter classes that take place every week.  I consider this an improvement; and up until the abovementioned conversation, thought I might be improving too.  In contrast, budo classes have taken up 2-3 hours, anywhere from one to 3 times per week!  Not to mention practicing on my own (which I have only occasionally done for Nihon buyo).  And I have done this for 25 years.  Budo also has some consequences for bad ma - the budoka who cannot block a strike in time will end up getting sore someplace.  In Nihon buyo, the only thing that gets hurt, occasionally, is pride. 

When I was a little kid, someone read a story to us from the Readers' Digest about the great ballerina Anna Pavlova.  The story was extracted from a memoir of some sort (remember I was small enough that the story was being read to us).  After spending some time extolling the brilliance of Pavlova on stage, the writer related seeing her once as a total klutz on a diving board.  The swan on stage was not as good in actual water, and of course it confounded everyone's expectations that the graceful ballerina was a terrible diver.

I am hardly comparing myself to Pavlova, but maybe the lesson is that no one is good at everything.  Or maybe that we can only spend our time doing a handful of things well (really, really well in the case of Pavlova, who surely should never have needed to apologize for anything).  In any case, it seems that being a goofball around the pool did not prevent Pavlova from enjoying the water, which is maybe the best and biggest point.

For my part, I feel I should either quit Nihon buyo, from which I have learned a very great deal, or else ask for private lessons in order to work harder.  Being stuck in mediocre-land is one interval I am getting pretty tired of.