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okinawa association of america - a real mensore

noreply@blogger.com (Paul Durant) — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 05:29:00 +0000

The Okinawa Association of America is housed in a series of old storefronts along Western Avenue in Gardena, California. There’s a tiny sign on one of the buildings—-the building painted adobe brown from top to bottom with not so much as a single detail painted to stand out. In Short, chances are you’ll miss he place if finding it is not your goal. Inside the storefronts have been hollowed out to form meeting halls, practice rooms, offices and even a library of Okinawan and Okinawan American history.

Despite it’s humble home, the OAA is a vibrant community of multi-generational Okinawans, Okinawan Americans, and people fascinated with Okinawan culture. The third category describes my wife and I. We joined the group nearly a year ago to further an interest in Okinawan music and the traditional instrument, the shamisen. We didn’t know a lot about the instrument, but we owned one—bought a few months prior on craigslist—and we wondered what happens next. We’d heard about a new group sponsored by the OAA called the Uta Sanshin Circle, so we signed up. That’s how we became friends of the OAA.

The OAA is not unique in the United States, or even in Los Angeles. There are numerous social groups dedicated to regions and prefectures of Japan. None require its members to be from the area, per se; just an interest is good enough. But the OAA is different in several ways, the most apparent of which are keenly illustrated yearly at their New Years Party. 2009’s event was no exception as membership came out in full force—more than 700 souls—to support the organization. Sure there were the usual speeches and passing of this or that torch to this or that new committee chairmen. Two well-produced videos outlined the past and future of the organization, and the food was pretty tasty!

And that is where the OAA meeting began to differ from most. Just as most groups would be winding down the festivities, the OAA was just getting started. What followed over the next couple hours was a rousing journey through the traditional performing arts of the isolated archipelago.

The Ryuku Matsuri Taiko group led the charge performing a couple more modern Okinawan songs, spreading the group's vast numbers across and around the stage in a clear effort to give everyone a chance to play. The Taiko is not what we’ve come to expect from famous Japanese groups like Kodo, it is far more based on dance and movement, using the drum strapped to the players body merely as an accent—both visual and, obviously, audible. The group’s bright red drums are also traditionally Okinawan but rarely seen on the mainland of Japan.

Following the rousing send-off the show didn’t slow down for a second featuring traditional dance and music, peppered with an occasional borrowed art from Hawaii, Tahiti and mainland Japan. However, unlike most groups of tradition performers who must rely on recording of the music as their accompaniment, at the OAA someone always knows how to play every piece the performers want to use. The result? Real musicians, backing up real dancers, for an overall much more authentic and exciting experience. I don’t mean to knock those groups that use records as accompaniment. In the modern world it’s usually unavoidable. Fortunately the Okinawan Association, in some very real ways, has rejected the “modern world” in favor of a place where they feel comfortable.

Some of that comfort was evident when after all the performers had turned in their best performances, and the crowds had gotten increasingly excited. Traditionally in Okinawa a party ends with folk song by the name of Kacthashi. More than a song, Katchashi is a freestyle dance with all the attendees taking part. No less was the case for the 700 OAA members when the Sanshin players plucked out the familiar tones. Everyone got to their feet and danced throughout the room. I have seen few such groups so engrossed and interested in the performances and art of their fellow members. OAA is unique in this regard, too, but more than all of that, the members will never let anyone feel unwelcome. This is a place where everyone may not know you name, but they’ll treat you like their best friend anyway.

Okinawa Association of America, Inc.
16500 South Western Avenue, Suite #203
Gardena, CA 90247

tel: (310) 532-1929

San Francisco Taiko Dojo and Kinnara Taiko Reluctantly share the Stage and Bury the Hachet

noreply@blogger.com (Paul Durant) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 01:17:00 +0000

A Continuation of the Taiko Series From April 2008

Seiji Tanaka, fresh off a year of studying Taiko with Osuwa Taiko’s Oguchi Sensei, arrived in San Francisco in 1968. His goal was to reunite the Japanese community with their roots through Taiko. It was a community anxious to make some noise. The late ‘60’s in America was a time of racial and ethnic awareness. Ushered by African American demands for equal rights, other ethnic communities in the U.S. were feeling increasingly empowered to express their identities. The Japanese American community was still recovering from internment less than 25 years prior. The hysteria and yellow peril that permeated America during wartime still affected what had become known as the “model minority”. It was time to make noise.

San Francisco Taiko Dojo grew quickly and soon gave birth to Taiko groups throughout the Wet Coast and the nation. Tanaka brought his Martial Arts background to the form and began teaching young Japanese Americans not only how to make noise, but how to make the correct noise. His teaching was infamously strict and based on the philosophies he’d learned in the Martial Arts. His focus was to teach Taiko as though it were a traditional art form, and to experience within it the spirit of being Japanese.

Meanwhile a few hours drive to the south another Taiko was being born. In 1971 after Senshin Buddhist temple in Los Angeles celebrated Obon, The Reverend Mas Kodani and George Abe didn’t put away the Taiko. In fact they played the Taiko all night, and when they were done they realized they had just begun. “Buddhist Taiko” began that night, and with that was born the first American Taiko philosophy. True it’s odd to say that Buddhist Taiko is an American philosophy. After all Buddhism, as practiced by Senshin Temple, comes from Japan, and so do those giant drums. But, the fact that there is no such thing as Buddhist Taiko in Japan, along with the application of Kodani’s modern Buddhist ideals makes Kinnara Taiko 100% American.

But it was the issue of purveying Taikos for the members of Kinnara that really began to make Taiko possible in America. Drums are expensive – even in Japan. The cost of importing them was absolutely prohibitive for small community and Buddhist groups. So the members of Kinnara Taiko invented a way to make a “Taiko” out of an oak wine barrel. There were problems along the way. Most notable how to stretch the skin tightly over the mouth of the barrel. How to effectively stretch a skin is still a well guarded secret of Asano and Miyamoto Taiko in Japan. But gradually, through trial and error, Kinnara and others came up with ways to get close enough. In ddition to the problem of the skins, Kinnara faced a serious problem with the bodies of these Taiko. Wine barrels are made of wood slats held together by two metal rings. Metal tends to rattle and vibrate when hit. So Kinnara needed to hold these barrels together some other way. Wood glue! Each barrel had to be disassembled and each slat individually glued together. The whole process was labour intensive, but the cost was a fraction of the cost of importing. Now, with a little elbow grease, anyone could be a Taiko drummer. Or at least that was what Tanaka Sensei was afraid of.

So what is the difference between the Martial Art influenced Japanese Heart Samurai Taiko of the San Francisco Taiko Dojo, and the Everyman’s come if you want, play if you want, leave when your satisfied Taiko of Kinnara? Well, enough to set these two pioneers at odds with each other for decades. Enough to spur Tanaka Sensei to ask the Rev. Kodani not to call what Kinnara does “Taiko”. If you play Taiko in the U.S. you probably are aware of the feud and you’ve probably made up you mind as to what exactly it is that separates the two philosophies, but here is a brief comparison:

SFTJ believes in the hierarchy of the Sensei, the Sempai and the kohai. At the beginning and end of class all members line up in order of “rank” and bow toward the sensei and those of higher rank.

Kinnara has no sensei. No one is considered sempai. Kodani sensei says since we all starte together no one is above anyone else. He believes that in Buddhism social hierarchy does not exist. Therefore at the beginning and end of class everyone bows to each other in a circle.

SFTJ believes in the strict training of a Taiko player. Taiko drumming is seen as a traditional art form with a prescribed “way”. The successful player subjugates self will to adhere to the way of playing. Deviations from the way are only acceptable after the way is mastered. In this manner the art form can grow.

Kinnara believes that hitting the drum is more less an expression of individuality within a group. While certain techniques and styles can be transmitted, there is not specific “way” of Taiko. Not playing Taiko is as acceptable as playing Taiko.

SFTJ has a strict code of laws by which all members must conform. The laws are for the benefit of the group and the form and do not encourage individualism. However, within these laws one can find ones true self.

Kinnara has no rules. While members may be compelled to act based on obligations, there are no strict outlines as to how one should behave within the group. The hope is that all will behave fairly as equals

There are no doubt many other differences but there is also one distinct similarity:

Both groups believe that through Taiko one can enrich oneself.

In my opinion, these two styles are hardly opposites. In fact these differences have existed in Japanese and Western cultures since the very earliest times. They groups imply reflect the societal differences between the ancient lords and the peasants. Tanaka’s group attempts to recapture the strict code of behaviour expected of the ancient Samurai class, while Kodani’s group embraces the cooperative group structure of the townspeople. Both are capable of enabling self-enrichment. Both are rich with wisdom and depth. Both are essential for society.

So why fight? Maybe that’s how Kodani and Tanaka feel too. The fact is that while the feud was strong through the 80’s and 90’s, it seems to have nearly disappeared in recent years. Both men give each other just recognition in developing and enhancing Taiko in America. Both men accept members from each others groups and styles and there has been great mutual development among the youngest generation of Taiko players. But has the hatchet really been buried? Not likely. The feud between expression through form and form through expression has existed as long as man has formed societies. I guess our little Taiko world is really just another reflection of the society in which we live.

A Year In Japan (Nihon no Ichi Nen)

noreply@blogger.com (Paul Durant) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 19:18:00 +0000

By Kate T. Williamson (Author's Name)
Princeton Architectural Press
2006

Rare, it seems comes a book simply celebrating culture. It is all too common in the literature or memoirs of Americans returning from abroad to portray their host culture through an often unfavorable screen of comparison or judgment. However, culture, as many know who make it their passion, is not definable within the constructs of another culture. When subject to comparison, all cultures suffer from apparent absurdity or, worse, irrelevance within foreign constructs. It is this unintentional but naïve perspective that I despair of when reading most “foreigner in Japan” accounts.

And that is precisely why “A Year in Japan” is so refreshing. The author, or more aptly illustrator, of the memoir is Kate Williamson. Like thousands of other young Americans, Williamson spent a year teaching English in a rural prefecture in Japan. Through the course of her trip she kept a journal and sketchbook, sketching various images of her new life, along with a few sentences to sum up her observations. The sketches illustrate whatever caught her attention that day, or perhaps even that moment. She draws everything – from the most mundane, an electric blanket or 2 pages of socks, to elaborate color illustrations of Geisha, street scenes, or images of nature. Each drawing emphasizes something that Williamson found enduring, surprising, or even irritating about her foster culture and her relationship to it.

In the book she neither sings the praises of Japan nor dismisses it’s irrelevancy. She merely observes as unjudgmentally as possible. The subjects of her drawings will be familiar to most who’ve spent some time in Japan, but she never draws to mock or diminish her mundane subjects, nor to glorify those subjects for which she has an appreciation.

I don’t mean to say she is writing without opinion or purpose. Indeed she has a clear purpose in sharing with us her vision. She wishes for us the same sort of discovery she experienced upon her first encounter with each subject. She does not necessarily intend to write free of all cultural bias either, and, on occasion it is inevitable, but the pureness and genuine wish to share her fascination and curiosity with the not yet understood makes this book almost like visiting Japan again for the first time.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a book of this nature on the subject of Japan. It seems that most of us like to outdo each other with our own astute understanding and interpretations of the culture. Yet cultures are indefinable even by anthropologists, and our ability to see into foreign cultures is hampered by an interpretation of our own. This book does nothing lofty, offers no solutions for business interaction or theories of behavior. However, after spending a few minutes in Kate T. Williamson’s world you may learn a little something you never knew about Japan, or about yourself.

Taiko: Traditional Japanese Art? Maybe not...

noreply@blogger.com (Paul Durant) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 03:51:00 +0000

Taiko, as we think of it, is not a traditional Japanese art form. This statement may surprise you as, in the minds of many, it is quintessentially that. For many Japanese Americans it has been a path to connecting with the culture of their ancestors, yet their ancestors would not recognize groups of drummers on a stage as something Japanese.

That is not to say that the use of the Taiko drum has not been prevalent in Japanese culture since its prehistory. The drum has played a central role in at Buddhist temples, Shinto shrines, battlefields and village festivals since recorded history began; probably centuries before. For centuries the drum has scared away or attracted spirits, inspired emotion and drive in armies, accompanied actors in noh and kabuki drama, accompanied solemn Buddhist sutras or Shinto prayer, or been the centerpiece behind which to show off at the village dance. But the Taiko was most often accompaniment, and the player, usually solo.

However, ancient Taiko did occasionally break free from its “accompaniment” status. Like the Lion Dance from China, Gojinjyo Taiko became a festival performance of its own. Gojinjyo Taiko is Taiko with masks. The players would don masks of local gods or demons, foxes, damsels in distress, dimwitted locals, or whatever and perform a story centering around a drum. The stories were simple – influenced by folk tales or legends – but often improvised by the locals behind the masks. This was festival play – not serious performance – so the idea was to be larger than life, comical, and exaggerated.

Perhaps Gojinjyo was a predecessor of Kumi (Group) Daiko. It did indeed involve a group of performers working together in rhythm and centering around a drum. But Kumi Daiko would be centuries away still; the product of a culture in distress, and a war to end all wars.

It was after World War II that a defeated Japan began its earnest search to redefine itself. It had been a nation rudely awakened one hundred years prior, by black warships anchored outside the capitol city of Edo. The American Captain insisted the island nation open its doors to trade, to progress, and to modernization. Realizing its weakness the nation reluctantly agreed. Civil insurgency marked the nation for decades before the Meiji emperor regained control and demanded rapid modernization. Watching the occupation of China, Vietnam and Korea, he could see the writing on the wall. Japan had to get strong fast.

The latter half of the 19th and 1st half of the 20th centuries were strictly dedicated with westernization. Old traditions were tossed away, old laws broken and ethical codes trashed in favor of the ways, knowledge and strength of Europe. Finally all of this preparation led to war, and the Japanese fought with the spirit of their Gods and ancestors. But the war ended in devastating ruin and loss. It was from that loss that Kumi Daiko was born.

Why drums? It wasn’t only drums, it was Kabuki, farmer’s co-ops, and the tea ceremony. It was time for a nation that had for so long devalued their culture, to re-access it. They needed it. Without that dusty old culture they could not be Japanese. But it didn’t quite fir anymore. That old culture was a bit tight around the waste now for these new international, sophisticated Japanese. They needed to make their own size.

Kumi Taiko
Daihachi Oguchi is often credited with making the first Taiko group in Japan in about 1951. Oguchi was a jazz drummer, and he saw the potential of different players playing different drums to create one rhythm – like feet and hands on a jazz drum kit. The group was called Osuwa Taiko and it played for the glory of Osuwa shrine in the northern Hokuriku region of Japan.

Following Oguchi’s lead Taiko exploded in the Hokuriku region of Japan, an area of Japan that remains well known for it’s Taiko even today. The form spread East across Japan to Tokyo. In 1959 Tokyo’s Sukeroku Taiko was founded by four young musicians. The name came from founder Seido Kobayashi’s brother’s noodle shop, Sukeroku Siemen. The group added choreography and flashy to the art form. Sukeroku was designed to show off, but their style was far from loose. They incorporated aspects of martial arts training into their practices and routines. They viewed their style as at once modern and ancient.

The group disbanded in the early 60’s but regrouped under the name Oedo Sukeroku Taiko, with the original members, shortly thereafter. After regrouping they “went pro” making Oedo Sukeroku Taiko the first professional taiko group in Japan. The group went on to notoriety in Japan and introduced Taiko to the rest of the world. Unfortunately, their success was not enough to keep the members together and rifts broke out among them. Eventually this led to the disbanding of the professional group. Seido Kobayashi still maintains the name, a touring group, and a school in Tokyo. Founder Yoshihisa Ishikura formed Kanto Abare Daiko shortly after the split. Several years later Kiyonari Tosha, another founding member, formed Nihon Taiko Dojo in conjunction with Taiko maker Miyamoto Taiko. The fourth and final member, Saburo Mochiziki, continued to perform in Japanese classical music.

In the late 1960’s, as Taiko gained popularity in Japan, one student of Oedo Sukeroku Taiko, Seiji Tanaka, visited San Francisco, California, only to discover that Taiko was no longer a part of the Japanese American festival. Forty years prior a taiko drum was commonplace in Buddhist temples or community centers where Japanese Americans gathered. But the war and slowing immigration had caused the Japanese American community to increasingly disassociate themselves with their ancestral heritage. Much of what the Japanese community owned had been lost during internment. What taikos did remain in the basements of Buddhist temples mostly gathered dust.

Tanaka believed this condition needed a remedy. He returned to Japan and studied under Osuwa Taiko’s Oguchi Sensei. He returned to San Francisco in 1968 - this time for good - this time with a mission.

Part 2 Next month: Taiko crosses the water and gets a kick in the pants.

Thoughts on LA's Nisei Week

noreply@blogger.com (Paul Durant) — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 04:28:00 +0000

It's like going back in time. Or, even more like warping and twisting time and space - where pieces of modern and pre-war Japanese culture mix with American and even Latin American culture to come up with this weird cross-culture cross-time mix. It's like eating ceviche at Matsuhisa in Beverly Hills. Tastes every bit as good, and feels every bit as natural.

Why is it like time travel? Simple. Current immigration figures for Japanese in the U.S. are almost nonexistent. Many who come from Japan today only intend to stay the length of their assignment from Toyota or Sony. Very few of these short timers associate with the Japanese American communities. And so J-towns along the West coast have become populated with primarily third, forth and even fifth generation Americans. Many have never been to Japan, and most have no contact with their Japanese relatives. Many families can trace their American roots back 100 or more years - further even than many Irish American and Italian American groups that immigrated to New York in the early 1900's. As a result the Japan in the collective memory more closely resembles the nation of pre -World War II or the impoverished years immediately following the war. They remember the songs, the dances and the arts that their grandparents remember. The ones handed down to them as pieces of the culture from which they descended.

Same with the people back home, right? Of course, back in Japan all the Japanese kids learned the same songs that their parent and grandparents learned. They did Kendo in
school and dressed in kimono for festivals. So what's the difference? Everything else. Culture constantly changes and mutates. Back home the culture of Japan has undergone drastic changes. As in any culture the great-grandparents hardly recognize the culture of their great grandchildren. Yet it is the same culture adjusted by time. What's missing in immigrant communities is that progression. The grandchildren's culture is not modern Japan - it the U.S. - or Brazil, or Peru, or Mexico. That's their everyday culture. As a result that Japanese culture of the previous generations does not mutate or adjust to the times. It freezes as a collective memory.

Many of the Japanese cultural arts performed in the United States are no longer done of the motivation to hold onto one's culture in a foreign land. Now most cultural Arts are practiced as an attempt o reconnect with a culture of a parent or grandparent. It is a form of identifying oneself through one's heritage. It's not about being Japanese, of course - it is about being Japanese American. It is not about connecting with the Japanese culture of today, it is about connecting to a Japan that no longer exists, but that was real when the family was separated from it. Like Leiderhosen clad dancers at Midwest Oktoberfests, Japanese Americans play Taiko drums and dance Odori not out of an attempt to remember home, but as an attempt to re-identify themselves to a home they have never actually known first hand. (Does anyone wear Leiderhosen in Germany anymore?)

So Nisei week might look a little silly and old fashioned to a Japanese just coming over to the U.S. But, it really it's not intended for them anyway.

Still it's not just about history. Nisei week, is also an attempt to identify the current JA's as well. For me that is the most interesting. It can be fun to look at traditional arts and watch cultural shows. I can appreciate the skill of a good odori dance troop or marvel at a well cared for Bonsai. That is culture in a jar - vacuum packed and preserved - but it's no more day to day than the opera or Shakespeare. The modern culture is where everything gets twisted and warped. Amine, cosplay otaku, gearheads and Nisei week queens who dream of broadcasting careers and changing the world someday. That's Nisei week. That's where the culture is going - farther and farther from Modern Japan and veering off the mainstream American culture. It's picking up a little Latin and PanAsian in the mix. It's something all it's own. You might not see it in the Ikebana galleries or in the tea ceremony demonstrations. You'll see it in the faces of the people standing next to you and looking with you. You might see it in your own face. Ironically you don't even have to be Japanese, American or Japanese-American!