*Shimogawara
This is the area of Kyoto where Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s legal wife, Kitanomandokoro, had Kodaiji Temple built and took the name Kodaiin Kogetsuni when she became a nun and lived there in her later years. At that time, women skill in the Geiko and Maiko arts moved to the area. After Kodaiin died, these women of the town became known as Yamaneko Geishas, and this was the start of the Hanamachi pleasure district. Subsequently it became one of the quarters officially licensed to do business under the Shimabara authority.
*Yachiyo Inoue III (1838 – 1938)
Her real name was Haruko Katayama (maiden name Haruko Yoshizumi). Born the second daughter of Yoshizumi Hikobee, of the Osaka family that owned the company Osaka Sumiyoshi. She studied dance under Sato and Aya and was given the Inoue name (artists name: Inoue Haru) and became successor to the school. Her husband was Katayama Kurouemon VI of the Kanze school of Noh. In 1872, she choreographed the first of what would become the Miyako Odori for the 1st Kyoto Cultural Exhibition, making it a large-scale group dance performance different from what had been until that time the small rental tea room Geisha dance art. With this success, the Inoue school became the established school of Gion and would remain there for the generations to come as the exclusive school of dance officially allowed in Gion.
*The play Kyomai
This play by Hideji Hojo premiered at the Meiji-za theater in 1960. The play focuses on the later years of Yachiyo Inoue III (age 82 to 101) and depicts the life of the classical dance artists with scenes like Yachiyo strictly teaching her disciple Aiko (Inoue IV).
*Yachiyo Inoue IV (1905 – 2004)
Her real name was Aiko Katayama. Debuted as a Maiko at the age of 10, and at the age of 13 was adopted as the daughter of Yachiyo Inoue III and became an inner-circle apprentice of the Inoue school. She received her artist name if Aiko Inoue at the age of 14, and in 1923 she became an instructor of classical dance at the Yasaka Nyokoba Gakuen. Her husband was the grandson of Inoue III, Hiromichi Katayama (Kurouemon Katayama VIII) of the Kanze school of Noh. Along with Inoue III’s senior disciple Sada Matsumoto she led the way to a flourishing of the Inoue school. She was eventually named a Living National Treasure by the government.
* Yachiyo Inoue V (1956 – )
Her real name is Michiko Kanze. Her grandmother is Yachiyo Inoue IV and her father is Kurouemon Katayama IX of the Kanze school of Noh and her younger brother is Kurouemon Katayama X. Her husband is Tetsunojo Kanze IX of the Kanze school of Noh. She was apprenticed to her grandmother, and in 1975 she became an instructor of classical dance at the Yasaka Nyokoba Gakuen. She is named a Living National Treasure by the government.
* Bokushin no Gogo ( Afternoon of a Faun )
A production of the series “Japanese Classical Dance x Orchestra – Traditional Collaboration” produced by the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan theater, in which dance artists of the various schools of classical dance choreograph and stage classical ballet masterpieces including Les Sylphides , Romeo and Juliet , Petrushka , Afternoon of a Faun , and Bolero . For this production the overall directing was done by Jusuke Hanayagi. Yachiyo Inoue V collaborated with the choreography for the nymph role with Jusuke choreographing for the Faun role and the two performing together.