Chihei Hatakeyama - Forgotten Hill '2019

Tracks list

From Chihei Hatakeyama
A few years ago I went on a trip to the Asuka region. This album,
‘Forgotten Hill’, draws all of its inspiration from this trip. The
experiences I had on this journey were used as compositional guides to compile
the sonic impressions I experienced during this time.

The Asuka region was once land that hosted the capital of Japan from the 6th to
7th centuries. Today, it is an unpopular rice-drenched rural area, and although
there are few tourists compared to Kyoto and the northern part of Nara, the
region still draws people as there it features various burial mounds, known as
’Kofun’. One of these old burial mounds is called the
‘Ishibutai Kofun’, which loosely translates as Stone Stage. When I
was a child, I learned about the existence of this old burial mound through
Tezuka Osamus Manga and since that time, I always wanted to visit there.

The Ishibutai Kofun has a special characteristic, as the stone chamber/tomb has
become bare. It sits barren, having fallen outside of time, left on the slope of
the hill. Usually this stone chamber should be buried in the soil, however this
one is exposed. I do not know why it is exposed, whether it was under
construction or if it was destroyed, but this sense of time and place
surrounding this object really captured my imagination.

It was the spring when I visited there, and yet I was the only person in sight.
I have no idea what kind of stories are trapped within this tomb, all those
things seen and heard by the rock. When I stood in front of it, I was captured
by the feeling that I wanted to get on the stone stage, to be consumed by the
burial mound. As I went inside the stone chamber I felt a strong sense of
pressure. While getting down the stairs leading to the dark stone chamber, this
pressure grew stronger, it was a very particular and strange sensation.

I’d always imagined being in the the stone chamber would feel like
stepping into the past, but somehow the sense of time gradually collapsed and I
even felt as if I was in the future.The interior of the stone chamber was like
an alien landscape. I couldn’t help but think about the Monolith from
Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. I probably stayed for about 10 minutes
in there, and then I felt a strong urgency to leave that place.

I headed next to Asuka-Temple where there is a large Buddha said to be the
oldest in Japan, it’s just down the hill.
The Great Buddha is circled by rice fields. The former palace, now in ruins is
also in the middle of a rice field. I rode my bicycle in through what felt like
endless rice fields. It was coming toward night and dusk was becoming heavy.
Looking around me, I wondered if this was once a city; if it was, those memories
are now buried by the land, by rice fields and mountains, and prefectural roads
with sparse traffic lights dotting them.

On the west side of the Great Buddha, there is a hill that is quiet, and known
as the Amakashi Hill. It is a hill where there was a residence of Mr. Soga who
once flourished in this era. It is quite difficult to imagine the prosperity of
the former capital looking at a field of nothing. If I close my eyes, I almost
feel like I can go back to the past.

With this record, I aimed to create music, like a labyrinth, based on these days
spent in the Asuka region. This is a record about time, about losing direction
in time and wondering where it is exactly the past, the present and the future
might meet, and under what circumstances this might happen. 

01. Chihei Hatakeyama - Forgotten Hill (4:01)
02. Chihei Hatakeyama - Cherry Blossom Petals Fall Like Heavy Snow (5:22)
03. Chihei Hatakeyama - Falling Star (4:07)
04. Chihei Hatakeyama - Sleeping Queen (4:53)
05. Chihei Hatakeyama - The Constellation Space (4:18)
06. Chihei Hatakeyama - Staring at the Mountain (2:24)
07. Chihei Hatakeyama - Buddha Statue Without Roof (3:41)
08. Chihei Hatakeyama - The Big Stone Tomb (3:39)
09. Chihei Hatakeyama - Fugitive from Wisteria Filed (4:53)

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