rōkyoku

thumb|A scene of recitation in a hall|348x348px Rōkyoku (; also historically called naniwa-bushi, ) is a genre of traditional Japanese narrative singing. This genre is performed by a singer accompanied by a shamisen, rōkyoku became very popular in Japan during the first half of the 20th century.

In modern Japanese slang, is sometimes used to mean "a sob story", since the songs were often about sad subjects. The stories were commonly about folktales and myths with themes of loyalty and human emotion. It shares roots with older narratives such as jōruri, sekkyō-bushi and kowaka emerged alongside kōdan and rakugo as dominant narrative arts during its peak popularity.