Esashi oiwake music

Esashi oiwake（江差追分, "Esashi crossroads"） is a folk song from the Japanese island of Hokkaidō. It started in the town of Esashi in Hiyama Subprefecture.

The song consists of three sections:

Oiwake was originally a horseman's song (mago-uta) from Oiwake village in Nagano Prefecture but spread throughout Japan during the Edo period. Once in Esashi, the melody was modified and also enlarged by adding starting and ending sections.

The song's lyrics changed, describing nature, customs and fishing in Esashi instead of a horseman's life in the mountains. This is reflected in fishing lyrics:

The Japanese Shakuhachi flute accompanies the singing, which has a free rhythm rather than a mechanical, fitted meter. In Esashi, the song was originally just called Oiwake Bushi (bushi = melody, song), but the song was so popular with visitors that the prefix 'Esashi' was added as part of the town's efforts to reinvent itself as a tourism destination at the end of the 19th century after local herring fisheries failed.

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