Concert

Our Sunday performance was more or less a success. I was pretty exhausted afterwards, though. Not from the playing. I only played for 3 numbers and they were spread out through the concert. It was more the release of all the pre-concert stress, I suppose. It was a lot of work (mentally) for the three of us to prepare for this recital, not only the music, but putting together all of the clothes for our costumes (it probably cost me over $100 to get everything I needed), organizing car pools to get to the venue and so on. Needless to say, on Monday, I was able to finally exhale, and my exhaustion finally caught up with me. In spite of the exhaustion, you can bet that we were at our taiko practices the next two days after the concert. (they were a bit lighter than usual, though.)

I hope to eventually get some video up of our performances, but in the meantime, several audience members gave us some nice pictures from the performance (and some of the practices) which I will post here for your enjoyment.

Here's my daughter ready to practice


More practicing...


... and the performance ...


My wife at Matto Bayashi practice...


Me at Matto Bayashi practice...


Here is the Matto Bayashi group before the concert...


Me (in the back) peforming with Matto Bayashi...


My wife (on the left) performing with Matto Bayashi...


Wow, there are a lot of pictures to post
Here is the Yume Mitai group picture before the concert...


Me at Yume Mitai practice...


Yume Mitai performance...


and a close up during the performance...


Oh yeah, I got interviewed again after our Matto Bayashi performance...


That is Kinoshita san of Hono Taiko interviewing me.

And the finale...


So, that's it for the photo essay of our performance. Be patient for videos. It will likely be a couple weeks before I have a chance to get them up. In the meantime, enjoy the pictures.

Dress Rehearsal

We just returned from our dress rehearsal for tomorrow's concert. I think everything went well enough and I feel ready for tomorrow's performance. I had one little thing go wrong for me today, though. I was playing a different drum than what I am used to and it turns out that the head is much tighter than my usual drum. When I hit the first couple notes, the rebound was so strong that my stick flew out of my hand. Although embarassing and I had to walk part way across the stage to pick it up, I recovered well and finished the song without any more mistakes. No one even mentioned it.

It was interesting to watch all the groups go through their rehearsal as well. One thing I noticed is that the instructors gave very few criticisms, if any. They only said things like "Play a little louder tomorrow." "Let's have even more energy tomorrow!" "Use more voice tomorrow." No individuals were pointed out or picked. No particular sections of the music were critized either. I know everything was not perfrect, but still, only very general comments were given. Even the practices the last couple weeks have been fairly relaxed, and non-critical. In my opinion, I think the instructors are thinking that at this point, it is too late to be making big changes. It will only put pressure on people and make them even more nervous. I think that their hope is that we will all relax and enjoy playing, and if we can do that, our best performance will come out by itself. I agree with this 100%. If the performers are enjoying themselves, the audience will too.

Lastly, I got two big encouragments as I was getting ready to leave. Our bags and coats were close to where Jige-san (of Hono Taiko) and Asano-san (the owner of Asano Taiko) were sitting. Both of them told me they thought I was doing a good job. I know not to put too much worth on this, but still, Jige-san is one of my original taiko inspirations and Asano-san, the owner of the company that makes the best taiko in the world, well, he's seen so many different taiko groups at so many levels, it's just an honor that he would give me encouragement. I was pleased.

Taiko Performance on Sunday

It's our last week before the Sunday performance. All three of us have completed our final practices. All that remains is the dress rehearsal on Saturday afternoon/evening. All we really have a chance to do there is run through our piece one time. Although our final practices were not all that intense, there have been more than usual. Sunday morning was my daughter's final practice, then Sunday afternoon I had an extra 3 hour practice for Yume Mitai, Monday evening was the regular Yume Mitai practice, and yesterday we had Matto Bayashi practice. That was three days of taiko practice in a row for me. I can't say that it exhausted me, but it has taken a bit of a toll on my hands. I am developing a few new blisters that weren't there before and my fingers are a bit achey. I think it is from the continuous jarring when the stick hits the drum, especially the Odaiko (big drum) which uses big and heavy sticks. I imagine that if one is consistently practicing every day, this ache eventually goes away. For now, I have a few days to let my hands recover.

Cherry Blossoms and Training

Today Japan's meteorologists released their forecast for the 2008 Cherry Blossom season. It will start in Kyushu in a couple weeks, and over a month or so, slowly make its way through Japan, all the way to Hokkaido. Even though I woke up to a couple inches of snow today, I guess the cherry blossom forecast is a good sign that spring is not far. In fact, by mid-day most of the snow had melted and the temperature was fairly mild. Today I was able to come home from work early (around 3) and since the weather was nice, I decided it was a good time to get back into my running schedule. Since August, I was running consistently about 3 times a week, but by the time the end of November came around, it was so dark in the mornings, and the weather was so often rainy, I haven't been doing it for awhile. Recently, however, I've been noticing that the sun is coming up earlier, and the weather has been improving, so I have been mentally preparing myself to start up the training again. I'm happy to say that I have not lost much endurance, in spite of my break. The route I was running in the fall usually took about 35 - 37 minutes and today, I completed the same route in about 35 min. My goal is to run 3 or 4 times a week for 45 min to an hour, but after a nearly 4 month break, I am pretty pleased with 35 minutes.

Anyhow, I thought some of my readers might be interested in seeing the running route I take, so the other day I took my new camera and my bike and took some pictures of interesting spots along the way. So here is my little photo essay on my running route.
Here is the view from my balcony. In the back of the picture, there is a hill (not the snow covered mountains). There is sort of an open area, flanked by trees. That is my goal.



I always start from the same place, in front of my apartment building.



And proceed down this road until it ends...



The road ends at a high school (Izumigaoka High School). One of the top schools in the prefecture. On the left, there is a bakery, and even at 5:15 in the morning, they are already open. I can always smell the bread baking, but unfortunately, I cannot stop for bread...



I turn right here, and run along this street for awhile. This is a spot along the street...



There is nothing particularly special about this spot along the road. But sometimes, when the weather was warmer, there was an elderly man outside (at 5:20 or so) throwing bread up in the air. I would find this very amusing, if he had had no purpose, but he was, in fact, feeding eagles, from the nearby hills. When he threw the bread in the air, the eagles would swoop down, snatching it out of the air.

Anyhow, I follow this road for awhile and eventually turn here, when it turns towards the hills ...



I run parallel to the hills for awhile, passing this shrine on my left. You can't see the shrine, but I love the huge trees...



Finally I come to my Rocky Balboa moment. From here, there are more than 230 steps to the top...



Here is the top of the first set of stairs...



But this is only about halfway. There is still about 100 more steps to climb...



Finally at the top, there is a great view. If I have brought by Odaiko sticks (the big ones) along, I will swing them here about 100 times, before moving on. Air Taiko!





On a clear day you can see the Sea of Japan, even the Japanese Alps, in Toyama are sometimes visible.



On my way down, I pass this interesting looking tree.



My road home takes me through a large temple complex and Kanazawa's largest cemetery. I pass by the main gate of the temple ...



Even at 5:30 in the morning, there are people coming to the temple to say prayers. Sometimes, the quiet of the early morning is absorbed by the deep, rich sound of a temple bell.

This is the steepest part of the road back down the hill. It runs right through the cemetery. There are signs around warning people about the bears that sometimes come out of the hills, but it is also well shaded, and I don't have to work as hard going down hill. It is especially refreshing in the summer, and I haven't had to run from any bears yet.



Looking back from the bottom of the hill. From here, it's a straight shot, slightly downhill, through a couple of neighborhoods and back to my apartment.



As I said, it usually takes around 35 minutes. As soon as I get back into my 3 - 4 times a week schedule, I hope to go further and further up the hill, until I am running for 45 to an hour.

busy busy busy

I can tell it's getting close to recital time. Besides looking at the calendar, I can also tell because of our increased practices. This week, there is a practice nearly every night. Normally I practice Monday and Tuesday evenings. This week, my Monday group, has added practices Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and even a three hour practice on Sunday afternoon again. The following week we will have at least Monday, Wednesday and Saturday (dress rehearsal) practices, if not more. When we cannot practice at Asano (or when I practice on my own) we cannot usually play the drums, so we just use our knees as a substitute. We are practicing so much in this way, I'm actually starting to get bruises or something. This is actually my first concert with Yume Mitai (the Monday night group) so I don't know if they always ratchet up the intensity like this before performances or not. I do know, however, that we are sort of being evaluated by the Asano staff at this recital to decide whether or not we will be able to perform at a May concert, which is a bit of a bigger deal. So the pressure is on to produce a good performance. I'll give more details about the May event once our participation is officially confirmed.
In the meantime, I'll just keep banging away at my bruised knees. And here is a picture of me at the Asano Taiko museum next to a 6 shaku drum (nearly 2 meter diameter) and it costs about 30,000,000 yen. That's about USD 290,000 based on current exchange rates.