Enduring Songs, Living Circles

Gujo is a mountain city in central Japan, famous for summer dance traditions that fill the streets with song, rhythm, and people dancing together through the night.

Gunsokai bring the living sound of Gujo to WMDF through the songs, rhythms, and festival calls that keep its Bon dance circles moving. The group was founded by the late Goto Naohiro, a master singer of Gujo-bushi, the city’s traditional dance-song style. Their music is rooted in Gujo’s two great dance traditions: Gujo Odori, recognised internationally as part of Japan’s UNESCO-listed folk performing arts, and Shirotori Odori, known for its long history and lively energy. Together, these traditions remind us that Bon dance is not only a performance to watch, but a circle to enter.

For WMDF, Gunsokai appear as a two-piece featuring Inoue Hiroto and Kikuchi Hayaka, focusing especially on the older-style Gujo-bushi. On WMDF’s 360-degree Hub stage, their voices and rhythms will invite the festival space itself to become a circle: a place where enduring songs are sung into motion, shared by bodies, breath, and community.