Otemoyan is a Japanese folk song (min'yo) from Kumamoto Prefecture. It is played by mass performers dancing in the streets of Kumamoto in the summer. It is usually accompanied by shamisen, taiko drums and other percussion, and the Japanese used has a southern Kumamoto accent.
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Origin
Originally, it was a song played during drinking parties with geisha girls. Several hypothesis have been formulated on the origin of the name and the most creditable one among them is that Otemoyan was a girl named Tominaga (1868-1935) who really lived near the present Kumamoto Station. The writer/composer was Ine Nagata, a teacher of Shamisen and Japanese dances. This song made a debut made by Akasaka Koume in 1935. The oldest reference of this song is in 5 Pairs of Shoes, a book published in 1907 by five promising men of letters, Tekkan Yosano, Mokutaro Kinoshita (pen-name of Masao Ōta (太田正雄, Ōta Masao)), Kitahara Hakushu, Hirano Banri and Yoshii Isamu who visited Kumamoto at that time.
Meaning
The song is about Chimo, a young maiden in the Meiji period, who is in love with a man with smallpox scars on his face. They just got married but she hesitates to hold an open wedding ceremony due to possible comments made by the townspeople about her new husband's look. Anyhow, she is still charmed by him regardless of his look.