Kanze Kosetsu (観世紅雪)
Kosetsu KANZE (1843 - March 31, 1911) was a Nohgakushi (Noh actor) playing shite (principal roles) of Kanze-ryu school.
The fifth family head of the Tetsunojo KANZE family, and his name was Kiyohisa. The oldest son of the Kiyohisa TETSUNOJO, the fourth. His father died in 1855 and he took over as the head of the family the following year. He reached the manhood and succeeded the stage name Tetsunojo in 1859.
The head family of Kanze-ryu school accompanied the Tokugawa family who moved to Shizuoka at the time of the Maiji Restoration. He used to accompany with Minoru UMEWAKA, called himself Rokuro at the time, who adapted Kosetsu's younger brother Genjiro. In 1872, he performed 'Dojoji' (Dojo-ji Temple) at the Umewaka theater for the first time in several decades as a Kanze-ryu school. His wife was a niece of Minoru UMEWAKA. After changing his name to Rokuro UMEWAKA and leaving the Umewaka family to become the founder of Yoshiyuki KANZE family, his younger brother still accompanied the Umewaka family. When the family head Kiyotaka KANZE died in 1888, he became the conservator of the successor Kiyokado KANZE, who was very young at that time.
In 1906, he fell sick during a Noh performance. He let his oldest son Orio to succeed the name Tetsunojo, and he started to call himself Kosetsu in 1910. This was the first time for any member of the Tetsunojo family to use the setsu-go (a name including setsu, 雪 in a Chinese character) while still alive.