What Did We Buy at the Asano Taiko Sale?

Unfortunately, we didn't have any luck in the Asano Taiko drawings this weekend. We got about 10 raffle tickets, but we didn't win anything. A couple people I know did win 10,000 yen gift certificates, though.

We might not have had any luck in the drawings, but in another sense, we did have some luck. We had a certain budget for the drums we could purchase and it so happened, that there was an Ohirado Taiko that didn't go over our budget too much. For the Odaiko of our group, we had decided on getting a large Oke daiko. It is the type that is tightened with ropes and is much lighter, compared to an Ohirado Taiko. There were two reasons we had made that decision. One was price and the other convenience. The price was half of what a Keyaki Ohirado would cost, and since there are only two of us at the moment, we thought it would be easier to move it around. But when we saw this Ohirado on sale for just a little bit more than the same size Oke daiko, we couldn't pass it up. Here it is. Our very own Ohirado Taiko.

It's 3.5 Shaku. 1 shaku is about 30 cm, or 1 foot, so that makes this drum 105 cm, or about 3 1/2 feet in diameter. It's just the size I wanted. Of course, it looks cool to have an even bigger one, but anything much bigger than this starts to get impractical. It's too heavy to move around, you need a bigger truck to transport it and sometimes it won't fit through doorways. So this is just right for us.

One reason it was so much less than we had expected is because it is not made of keyaki (Zelkova), the preferred wood for taiko drums. Most Odaiko, or Ohirado Taiko are made out of either Keyaki or Bubinga (from Africa). The one we are buying happens to be made of Bubinga. Actually, it is hard to even find Keyaki trees large enough to make the really big Odaiko. Besides, I honestly like the grain of Bubinga wood a little better than the Keyaki for this type of drum. Just look at the beautiful patterns:

Right now we don't have any place to store it so Asano is holding it for us until we can clean out our closet. (Oh yes, and until we pay for it, also). So I guess we were lucky enough this weekend. I'm sure I'll write more about the various events and workshops in the days to come. (but first I have to finish my taxes.)

Shipping your taiko around the world

This past Tuesday, we had our Matto Bayashi practice as usual. Our practice area is called Asano-EX and it is a mile or two down the road from the main Asano Taiko buildings. It is also not available as a practice space to the general public, like the practice area (新響館）at the main building is. So it is where most of the Asano sponsored groups practice, like Matto Bayashi, Sasuke and even Hono Taiko. When we came in, there were many taiko near the doorway in cases and wrapped up as if they would be shipped off somewhere. I asked Yamada san (our teacher, and member of Hono Taiko) if Hono Taiko was going anywhere for a concert. She looked slightly confused and asked what I meant. I pointed towards the taiko in the doorway and she said, "Oh yes, we're going to Spain and Russia in July and August." July and August are quite a ways away. It is only the middle of May right now, but I realized that sending taiko, which are extremely heavy, by air would be outrageously expensive and sea and surface mail would be the only affordable option.

In fact, we had a similar conversation just last week with some other taiko friends of ours, Wadaiko Yamato, of Nara. Last week we had some business to take care of in Osaka, and since Nara is not that far from Osaka, we stopped by to visit them. It was one of the rare times when they were all present in Japan, instead of touring all over the world. (Last year, they were on tour for almost 11 months and I think they played something like 200 concerts) Anyway, I was also asking some of the members of Yamato how they moved their drums all around the world and coordinated between concerts in Europe, N. America and Japan. They, as well use sea and surface mail, sending their drums out two months ahead of them. But they also said they have about three sets of drums, because sometimes the times between tours is too short to get the drums from Europe to the US, for example. This amazed me when I thought of the cost involved. I recently researched the cost of Asano drums for the 12 - 15 drums that we would ideally like to have and the cost was over $100,000! Yamato certainly has more drums than 12 - 15 and what's more, they have 2 or 3 sets of them! Amazing.

At least this year's schedule is a little more relaxed in comparison with last years. They are based in Nara for the next 3 months or so, before they head back to Europe (?) for the fall. They have quite a nice facility, with a large practice area in the basement in their hometown of Asukamura, which is in the southern part of Nara Prefecture. It is surrounded by hills and rice fields and they even have a nice keyaki tree in front of the buidling. A keyaki tree is known as a Japanese Zelkova tree in English. Why is this significant? Because most taiko are made from keyaki wood. They said, maybe in 200 years or so, it will be big enough to make a taiko from it. I will write a little more about keyaki trees and Asano taiko another time. In the meantime, here are a couple pictures from our visit to Nara.

Here is a view of the hills surrounding their house.



and the keyaki (zelkova) tree in front.