And ANOTHER thing!

I just forced myself to watch Mokuyobi--you know, the song where I thought I had stepped all over Carolyn's solo and just felt so bad about--and guess what? I didn't step on her solo!!! Everyone else just missed her ending cue! I was right! I was right!

Phew!

OMG I just saw the video of the concert

Or DVD, to be exact. Steve made a wonderful DVD of the concert with bonus features and slick cover and all that. Super professional. But OMG I watched it and realized that what I experienced and what I remember first-hand is completely different from what it looked like on the DVD. I thought I was more genki. On the DVD I look dorky. And the worst thing of all is that in watching the DVD I realize that it was MEEEEEEEEEeee who messed up the Kai to Ryu sequence! MEEEEEee! I just want to crawl under a rock and stay there. Aw, man! I thought it was someone else. But it was MEeee.

Sniff, sniff. I'm gonna cry.

But the DVD will be made available on line and maybe in a few local stores in 2006. You too can experience the power! The drama! The heart pounding rhythm that is EMERYVILLE TAIKO!

Or not.

If I can stand to look at it again maybe I'll decide that I need to work on my kata. And projecting. And anything else I discover--if I can bear to watch. Sigh.

Pics? You Want em? You got em!

Ok, so I have nothing I feel like posting to the world about at the moment. I do however, have some great pics that I can take absolutely no credit for. Pics in rehearsal (think, street clothes and tennis shoes) were taken by the fabulous e-taiko beginning II master, Matthew Kertesz. The pictures of us in full Aiko regalia (think, tabi and nicer t-shirts) were taken by Wadaiko Newark photographer John O'Halloran, who I have yet to meet, but sure do appreciate. Props to both of you.

OK, now to the pics



Photo by Matthew Kertesz
The blue-light of setting up and lighting and testing and whatnot. It's all about the dramatic effect, yeah?


Photo by Matthew Kertesz
Heiya run-through. This is right before we get airborne and fly and swoop over the heads of the audience and then--eh, you had to be there.



Photo by John O'Halloran
John Foster and his Handsome Band.



Photo by John O'Halloran
This is me during Laban. I seriously don't know what the heck I'm smiling about, but I'm so into it! Yah!! Watch out!


Photo by John O'Halloran
Carolyn during Laban. She is SO in the groove.



Photo by John O'Halloran
Steve providing groove in Kanki no Wa. Groovalicious.



Photo by John O'Halloran
Steve grooving for Susan during her Kanki solo.



Photo by John O'Halloran
Plenty of shots of bachi-wielding hands on John O'Halloran's website. I don't want to brag or anything, but those are MY HANDS! WOO-HOO! MY HANDS! Not that anyone would know or care.



Photo by Matthew Kertesz

And this is my most favorite picture of them all. It's of me and Janet during the Heiya run-through. I think I'm soloing. And I just love the fact that Janet is back there, behind my back where I can't see her, and she's just laughing at me while I'm wearing this strange, humorous expression on my face. That's totally my whole attitude toward this is all. That she can laugh, and I can laugh and we're all having tremendous fun while being challenged (by solos, among other things, my god) by everything, to make this great show, with great people, on a night that can never be re-lived. You just had to have been there.

The Show! The Big Show!

I can safely say I did not drop a bachi (I have never dropped a bachi on stage. Knock on wood). We did, however, royally mess up Kaito Ryu. Heiya was about as much fun I've ever had on stage. My Kanki no Wa solo was awesome, if I do say so myself. We made it through Timbuktu and Laban, and even though the sax guy missed his cue in Timbuktu, we taiko players, being the pros we are, managed to save it without a hitch--I don't think so anyway. I couldn't see anyone but Janet. Mokuyobi went fine except for the fact that I think I may have stepped all over Carolyn's solo and then was like a deer in the headlights when I realized I was totally in the groove of my own solo and was doing just fine until I looked up to see everyone else playing my solo CUE-IN, and there was that terrifying moment of WTF because everyone was just looking at me like what the freakin-frack is she doing? I don't know if I saved my solo or what, but I managed to play the second half of my set solo kinda-sorta ok. I knew before going into this show that I was going to have a short and sweet solo because the only one soloing after me was Janet, and this would be her last solo of the show and her last real moment on stage, so just give her the spotlight already and be done with it. I know that Mokuyobi is a strong solo song for her because she's been playing it for so long and teaching it to people all over the country. I've heard two versions of it on CDs of her group, and have memorized them down to the kiai's (that's not always a good thing, cause you're kiaing the exact same thing the composer is, and I have to admit, that's kind of embarrasing, because, like, you want to be all original and spontaneous but it's hard because the composer is standing next to you and saying the exact same thing). Anyway.

This concert was all about trying to give all that I could give, and I totally got into it. After the concert people were saying how it was all about my facial expressions, and I have to admit I was trying to put some effort into that. I am absolutely sure that when I see the video I am going to DIE of embarrasment. Oh well. I gave 110%. No, that's so inaccurate. There's no percentage to explain the effort I put in. I gave this concert my soul, and that means more than any percentage could. A soul is so much more than any word or any analogy or any mathematical equation. It's one thing to just beat the crap out of a drum and say that that was 110% because now your arms ache and your hachimaki is soaked in sweat, but it's another thing to play with all your soul so that when you're done you just want to cry because you just left a bit of your self out there in the music.

After the concert, in the quiet of a backstage dressing room, Janet said, "You break my heart when I see you play." I was a little confused; I wasn't sure what to make of that. She must have seen it on my face because then she said, "It's because when I see you play I know that you love this more than all of us." I wanted to ask more, so much more. But I think in my heart, I knew exactly what she meant.

And so I said, quietly, because it was all I could say, and all that there was to say, "Yes, I think I do." And then I walked away, because my heart was a little broken too, because my heart was broken before I even walked into that theater. Over a year ago, when she first came up with the idea for the ensemble, I was elated because the thought of being able to make music with someone like her was so exciting. I tried so hard, worked so hard to learn the music and the kata and the solos and the timing and the sequence and how to put more of myself into the kiai's and how to put more of myself into the performances and the solos. Everything was going so well. I had the music, the encouragement and the inspiration. It was in me.

And then, just weeks before the concert, I had to suddenly go back home, home-home, back to the one who first brought me rhythm, my first heartbeat. There was the blur of days and nights and cold rooms and the news that the first heartbeat I ever heard would eventually fade away, like something stolen in the night, a decrescendo. Not yet, but. The music left me then. This performance would have been the first time my mother saw me play taiko, but since she wasn't there I had to play with my soul so that the music could transcend the 400 miles that separate us. Around my neck I wore a heart-shaped ring she had given me.

I couldn't have done this if it weren't for the passion and confidence to play taiko that Janet gave me such a long time ago, and still continues to give. I remember once when we were learning something new and hard and instead of her saying that we weren't playing something right, she suggested that what we did was good but that we should try it again, and this time let's try it this way and see how it sounds. It's her spirit of "I know we can do this" that is so heartening. This concert was hard and so emotionally difficult but I think I got through it because I knew I could do it. Janet taught me that.

I really think we made something I can be proud to give to my mother.

tomorrow

Rehearsal last night and again today, pads off, drums naked, loud and uh, loud. I finally got to really hear what my shime sounds like in action and it's beautiful. My solos went ok when we played them. I've worked so hard on my Kanki no Wa solo and I'm proud of it. Kaito Ryu was a disaster. The others stopped playing, and it threw me off, so now I know that if I really know what I'm doing, then I MUST KEEP PLAYING. I was doing ok too.

When Echo sings her song, it makes me cry. Today, literally, I was crying. Even through Timbuktu. So beautiful. I just want to make something beautiful for Mom. I'm glad that my friends will be there in the audience, and my other friends will be on stage all around me, and we'll all be there making this wonderful music composed by wonderful people and that I can give something to her that comes from my heart, from the place that is really at my center of who I am and what I love to do and am passionate about. Tomorrow will be all about her. I hope that I have the strength and spirit to play with everything I have so that I can do this for her.

I'm doing all of this for Mom.

ack

I'm working on an ulcer, but hopefully after Sunday I'll get my stomach lining back into shape. Last night we had rehearsal at a very nice church in Berkeley that let us practice there. Did I mention yet that we're semi-homeless? Yeah, the week before the big show and we have no space. Stupid landlord man got what he wanted and we had to move out, but I think karma is going to come down hard on all those involved. Doesn't matter anyway because we've got a bigger better space that just needs some things taken care of for zoning and permits and stuff and all that isn't done yet. It'll be ok in the future.

Saturday we get to take the pads off the drums and play for real. It's gonna be loud. Hope everybody studied their transitions!! Including me.

Concert is the day after tomorrow. Susan is starting rumors that it might sell out, but I don't and won't believe her, but it does get the stomach angry when I think about it. AAACCCK! That's what I want to do. I want to yell AAACKKKK!!!

sigh

I don't know what else to title this blog entry.

Last night we had our tech run-through at the theater. I'm annoyed that I'm a perfectionist and I'm annoyed with myself because I get impatient when other people aren't perfectionists (for some things anyway). We had specific instructions on what goes where and who moves what, but last night people were still running around not knowing what they were doing or what song was next. Too much talking. Come on people, we worked on this on Saturday. We've all got notes. Everyone should have studied them before this tech run-through, which was only 3 hours long. We should have spent our time messing with the lights and sound levels and all the stuff you can only mess with at the theater, and then maybe we could have had a little more time actually playing the drums instead of only doing the beginnings and endings of the songs.

But then I think it's bad that I'm so impatient about it. Gotta be more composed and understanding. This is probably the first show for a lot of people. Ok there. That's about as much composure as I've got.

I'm too high strung, huh?

I'm also kind of sad because I don't know what's going to happen with Aiko once the concert is over. There are no promises. Aiko is such a good thing in my life. Sigh. I shouldn't think about it. And then there is stuff I have to begin to deal with after the concert, and I know things will just get harder before they get any better.

But I should concentrate on the concert for now. Yeah?

I Take it Back! I Take it ALL back!

Remember that time we debuted a new song at the Marin Arts festival and Janet said all I needed was another year on stage, and then I was all like (insert slightly defensive tone here) "What is she talking about? I'm not nervous! I love to perform! Blah blah blah." OMG. I totally take that all back. Janet is totally right. She may even be wrong about that one year part. Maybe I need two.

Tonight we did a run-through of all the songs with transitions, and although the sequence of songs went ok, it was my solo sections that needed work. Ok (to go off on a tangent here), so I really like deer, because I think they're cool and they're messengers to the gods (in Japanese folklore) and I like the idea that drums are also a way to speak to the gods or the heavens or whatever. Deers are kind of like my theme-animal. Like if you had to choose an animal to represent yourself, then for me, it would be a deer. But you all know that when deers are suddenly faced with the blinding headlights of a Ford F150 on a dark country road, it's not uncommon for the deer to suddenly freeze in its tracks and either react and jump the @$*# out of the way, or get run over. Tonight I got run over. Or maybe partially run over. It was like I knew what my solos were supposed to be, but my hands were not clued in on it. It was the pressure. All the other E'ville members were there, so it was like we had a mini-audience, but I cracked. I'm so frustrated and actually, I'm frightened. If I can't perform in front of our own members, how am I going to perform in front of a whole crowd of strangers?

I think my plan of action is to just go through my set solos and just drill and drill and drill until my hands get the clue on what the @$*# I'm supposed to be playing. So it becomes automatic and actually, part of the song--for me anyway.

Oh, and another song we've been working hard and long on, Kaito Ryu, is in peril. I can play it 90% of the time, meaning I can play the song with 90% accuracy. Like maybe I'll forget to play 8 beats instead of 6, but if everyone else is ok, then overall we do ok. But there are other people who are like maybe 75%, or who get thrown off when someone else messes up, and then it just goes into train-wreck mode and we stop. I keep begging them not to stop when they mess up, but it just becomes apparent that it's time to stop. I stand behind Janet who I know has her spots of mistakes, and she knows when I have my mess-up points, and she plays next to Susan who has her moments of mistakes, and it's like we all feed off each other--making mistakes until we get derailed. But we've fought so hard to get that song to sound right and to sound good, and we just keep getting butts kicked. It may get cut.

Sigh. OMG. Sigh. Ok, I thought I wasn't going to do this, but let's check the calendar.

9 days.

That's do-able, right? If all I need to do is polish my solos for say, (realistically) 5 hours a day (in between working on applications for you know, my real job), times 9 days, is 45 hours, 45 hours of solo honing. I have 3 solos I am realistically going to work on, so that comes out to 15 hours a solo, so that's a long time, and I can do that. Right? 15 hours? I'm not going to ask who am I kidding, because that would be a waste of time, so hey--I'm going to give it my best.

And just to reiterate. Janet was right. I was wrong. So I'm going to work on my solos.

For a year.

Top Secret

I'm probably not supposed to be posting this for all the world to see, but since you are my devoted, caring, loyal fan(s), I'm giving you the sneak preview of what the new Aiko shirts look like. Isn't it pretty? We've all got different styles of shirts, but they've all got the basic concept of the katabami mon on the side there. My shirt is manufactured by American Apparel which I am very happy to say is sweat shop free and made in my great hometown of El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de la Porciúncula, or L.A. as I like to call it.

Concert is in 12 days. OMG. I shouldn't have just counted the days. But 12 days it is.

I've been working frantically on solos. I've been playing solos on my desk a lot lately, and I've decided that desk solos sound fantastically, wonderfully groovy. Oh and thank goodness I have the best office-mate in the world. She has never once yelled or even looked over at me annoyingly as I'm composing these fantastically, wonderfully groovy solos. She must be immune to my constant tapping, or just really forgiving. But anyway. I've discovered that desk solos sound great, but they don't always translate to fantastically, wonderfully groovy solos on taiko. I'd say maybe 50% of the time they sound good. I've been composing a solo on my desk and I really liked it, but when I finally got to play it on taiko, it just kind of sounded blah. Now I have to figure out how to unblah the solo--oh, and I have to do it in 12 freakin' days.

But didn't I say I wasn't going to stress so much? Here's a secret to living stress free: don't count the days until the big ol thing that's causing you stress in the first place. One day at a time.

No Puppets Here

What IS IT with all these hits on my site counter from Europe???? Not that there's anything wrong with Europe, or hits on my site meter, but you guys are getting me all excited like maybe you think I'm interesting, but really you folks are just interested in that pic of that drumming puppet I put up a long time ago. I'm sorry, but that puppet must go. I gotta remove him from my blog. You'll all know who I'm talking about anyway without a pic of that bad boy.

Better

Last night I went in to practice early and Carolyn and Janet came early too and we worked on stuff and now I feel SOOO MUCH BETTER. It's not like we had any big breakthroughs or anything, but we just got through a bunch of songs and dusted off some cobwebs and I feel better about things. I know that one of my solos is polished and I don't need to worry about it. Another solo is progressing. A third solo is in the crock pot right now and you can smell it, but no tasting yet--still needs to cook. I'm still debating on what the heck I'm going to do about that 4th solo in six time. I'm either going to not work on it till the very end, or just fake my way through it. I don't like the second option very well, but we'll see what I can do. I just know that I don't have that feeling of despair and feeling overwhelmed.

Did I mention we were there for 4 hours last night? Put in a full day of work and run to the dojo without dinner and play drums for 4 hours till your arms fall out. I had to send J and C an email with extra thanks because I realized what a long day it must have been for them. I hope they get double reward points for their karma.

So until the concert, I'm just going to try to relax and work extra hard. Is that a contradiction? Maybe. But how else am I going to do it?

Things you can't get on ebay

I need a couple of solos and some sleep.

Concert is 3 weeks away and I 've been having to spend some time away from taiko and I feel so overwhelmed I just want to cry. If there is one thing I need to work on in the future it's how to not be so hard and self-critical on myself. That's holding me back.

Carolyn and Janet volunteered to come early to practice tonight just to help me out. Can you believe that? That's one of the nicest things to happen to me all year. I so appreciate it.

Oh, but those solos. Stress. Ack. Help . . .

Busy!

I had to take an unplanned break from blogging, but I am back and busier than ever!

Only weeks away from the big concert and we're still finalizing songs and changing things around and polishing/composing solos. I feel so overwhelmed and I wish I could go to the dojo instead of work every morning.

Our newest song is so complicated! Just look at the notes I took for it:



I've got to work on a solo for that song too, but luckily it's a short one. I'm finding that composing solos is a little easier. I learned a trick that works for me: I record the basic beat that you put the solo over and then I play it all day long on my headphones. I think there is something seriously wrong with my attention span. I think I have the opposite of an attention deficit disorder. It's like I have an attention surplus disorder. I can listen to the same thing for hours and hours and not get bored. In my last job, I did major data entry and would type in names and addresses and stuff all day long--7 1/2 hours a day--and not get bored. I just put the headphones on and got into a zone and was able to focus on boring stuff for long periods of time. So for solos, I just put on the basic beat and just listen and let the music get into me. You know how it is when you know a song so well that it just seeps into your bones and muscles and playing it doesn't even involve your brain anymore? That's what I'm trying to do with the beat and then I'll just kind of throw a riff out there in between typing up stuff for work. I think it's because I'm not trying so hard to force things to come out. Things get subliminal and I go from there.

Oh, and I have to work on my spins. For some reason, I am really horrible at spinning. I just do everything I can to not fall over. I would like to incorporate a spin into my solo, but I know that's asking for trouble. And I hate practicing spins because the bottoms of my feet get all worn out and rug-burned. I'll have to get some advice on that.

In the meantime, I'll be busy. And if you haven't heard already, Emeryville Taiko will be in concert with Aiko Taiko and guests from Zanzylum.

Hope to see you there!

Who, me? Shy?

On Monday night we were working on Mokuyobi, and for some reason, I was totally overcome with shyness. I don't know what it was, really. I mean, I'm a shy person in general, but with this group I've opened up and relaxed a little, and with taiko, that's my one point where I really let go and have fun and whatnot. But when we were playing, Janet was kiai-ing and jumping around and being super genki and then I got really shy. It felt like the first day of school all of a sudden--you know, when there are cool kids orbiting all around you, but you're nervous and shy and you just kind of peek out from behind your mom's legs. It kind of annoys me because I LOVE Mokuyobi. That was the first song that I really struggled with. There is a basic beat, and then there are patterns that you play over the basic beat and when you play it correctly things just lock together and it sounds really cool. Mokuyobi was the first taiko song I learned where I was like: Wow! I didn't know taiko could do that!!! And then of course I was hooked.

Right now I'm listening to the recording I made of the song and hearing all the kia-ing is making me shy again right now! What is wrong with me?? I think what I need to do is get over this weird bout of shyness and polish up my kiai power skills.

Oh, and if you're at all interested in seeing Mokuyobi live and loud, come to the Solano Stroll this Sunday September 11. We'll be playing at 3pm at the top of the hill.

And since I'm in the promoting mood, Emeryville Taiko will be holding a major full length concert on Sunday November 6 at 7:30pm at The Julia Morgan Center for the Arts in Berkeley, California. It's actually what I've been working toward all this time, and it's gonna be a big deal, believe me.

And here is the lovely flyer yours truly designed for the event:


And if you're interested in being added to the Emeryville Taiko mailing list, please send me your name and address and we'll be sure to get a postcard out to you. Believe me, we only mail things out once or twice a year, if that. And we would never think of selling or trading your name because we have a hard enough time trying to figure out where the *(@#% we put it on the dinky computer anyway.

Open Source: It's the future

Ok, I'm not going to start preaching about the whole concept of open source here, but I just want to say that I am beginning to admire its concept. In the good old days of Kazaa and Napster, and I'm talking about the good old days, when you could download, say, the entire $9,000 Adobe Font Folio for free while exponentially doubling your music library in a single night, you could find anything and everything you wanted. But then it got ugly and people started getting their nasty viruses all over the place, and then, yeah, the music industry got their lawyers all mixed up in it, and then it was just all gone. We could blog for hours about this. The point is, is that sharing as we know it is over and done with, and now there is a new kind of sharing, and that's called open source. For a taiko-related story about the greatness of open source, go here and read about what ON Ensemble are doing.

What I just wanted to say, was that open source is coming up with some fabulous innovations. And today, the fabulous innovation du jour is Audacity. Audacity is a free audio editing software program. The reason why I think it's just the greatest thing ever to happen ever, is that I was using, ahem, let's just say, a borrowed version of an unnamed audio editing software program. This borrowed version of the software has bugs and inconsistencies and didn't come with all the add-ons which would make it useful to me. But Audacity has everything an amateur like me needs to get going with turning my minidisc recordings into works of art. It has online help, tutorials and documentation, and the ability to run on almost any operating system--that's right mac and pc and linux! And did I mention? It's FREE! If you have any interest in this sort of geeky thing, then get Audacity.

Now I just need to figure out how to use it.

I did it! I did it!

I tied my own shime--and it sounds great!



Of course last Saturday was the day the digi-cam decided to go MIA. I actually wanted to take pics so I could get a look at the before shots in case I got stuck and needed to figure out what it looked like before I made a mess of things. Oh well.

First off I need to say that I wouldn't have even dreamed of buying my own shime, much less tying/tightening it if it weren't for Kris Bergstrom's excellent TIASOU method instructions. They used to be online at tiasou.org, but have mysteriously vanished off the face of the internet. I personally wouldn't have attempted this just by the written directions alone. Not that they're bad directions, but I'm one of those people who needs to see and do (under strict adult supervision) before I venture off and try to do things on my own--well something as seemingly complicated as tying my own shime anyway. So I took his workshop at the Taiko Conference, and with that experience under my belt I decided to just dive in and do one of the scariest things I could do to the drum: take all the rope off and put it back together again.

Before I started, I did something geeky, which was to make recordings of both sides of the drum so I could have an audible "snapshot" of my progress. I figured if the drum sounded higher than when I started, then I would count it as a success. I'm not sure how tight Asano tied the shime when they sold it to me, but I assumed it wasn't really super tight.

Anyhow. The TIASOU method suggests specific lacing directions and my drum was laced in the opposite direction, and since I wanted to follow the TIASOU's suggestions, the first thing I had to do was completely take all the rope off. It was both scary and liberating to have the drum in 3 pieces on the living room floor. I got to see the beautiful inside of the drum and Asano's markings on the drum heads. That's not something you get to see every day. Plus it smells fabulous in there. Ahh, wood.

"Stage 1" of the tightening process begins with getting the rope on the drum, removing the slack, and making sure the heads are centered on the body of the drum. Easy enough if you just follow the diagrams. Plus my drum heads are perfectly suited to the size of my drum body, eliminating most of the worry of off-centering the heads--that's what 400 years of craftsmanship will get you! Tightening the rope with my hands alone was one thing, but when I had to apply the agebatchi, that was something else. An Agebatchi is similar to an ax-handle, and it looks like what your Odaiko bachi would look like if you stuck the tip of it on the train tracks. Flat. You take the flat side and use it to pry up the rope to create the tension that pulls the heads together to make that beautiful shime sound.

Now, I know that Kris' philosophy with the TIASOU method is to create a painless, efficient and even aesthetically pleasing process of shime tightening, but if you saw me on the living room floor Saturday you would say that I looked the complete opposite of that. I know I was making mistakes, and I even started over a couple times--sometimes because I thought I was doing something wrong, or could do it better, or both. I even lost all of the precious tension I created because of a sloppy temporary knot, and I felt like those kids you see who get ice cream cones and lick the ice cream part off and start crying when they realize they're holding the cone but the ice cream is in a puddle at their feet. Live and learn. After several attempts, I finally figured out how to handle the agebatchi better and how to hold the tension effectively, but you should have seen the sweat pouring off of me. I don't even sweat that much when I run! I think part of it was just being a little nervous. I also got some serious rug burn on my knees and actually wore two holes in my knees--nothing a little Neosporin and a band-aid can't fix.

"Stage 2" tightening was way funner than Stage 1. In Stage 2, you bind the zig zag laces of the drum in pairs, and for this part you get to actually stand on top of the drum while pulling the rope. Kris put a lot of emphasis on how to do the pull safely and effectively, and I tried to follow his instructions as close as I could. Stage 2 is when your shime really gets tight, and I think I did a pretty decent job. After binding all the pairs together and tying off the rope, I did my geeky testing again, and it sounded way different than before. Now my baby has nice high pitch--higher than what the shimes at the dojo sound like right now.

So you're supposed to tighten the shime only for when you play it, and release the tension when you're done. Most people don't do that. But Kris was talking about how the heads can only sound good for a certain amount of time before they wear out, and he even loses sleep if he has to tighten the heads the night before a gig he wouldn't otherwise have time to tighten the shime for beforehand. I don't know if I would necessarily have the time to tighten the shime between the time I get home from work and have to go to class. But I think I would like to get to that point. He says it can be done in 20 minutes. I took 4 hours. But that included restarting and thinking and do-overs and whipping the ends of the rope (I tied twine around the ends of the rope so the rope doesn't unravel). Maybe I could tighten on Thursdays and play on Fridays and Mondays and release after class on Mondays? I should try that.

Anyhow. This whole shime-tightening thing was a good experience, and I would recommend it to anyone who plays a shime. I feel more connected to mine after this! Now I just need to whip those other shime into shape . . .

Songs in 6

You know, when I was looking for this image, I could have sworn it was called "I Saw the Figure 9 in Gold." And then I was going to be clever and flip the image upside-down. Du-oh! I spent about half an hour searching my bookshelves and the internet just trying to remember the name of this freakin' painting, and more time trying to find a picture of it, so it's going to stay in this post. You'll just have to pretend it's a 6, because that would have been so artistic and deep and meaningful. I guess my memory is going. Did I mention I celebrated my 30th birthday a few days ago? Yeah. Old.

Now, what was I going to blog about?

So we've been working on a song in 6. What does that mean? Well, it means that it's in 6 time. And what does that mean? There are six quarter beats in a bar. What's a bar? How do you know there are only 6 beats? How do you know they're quarter beats if there are 6 of them? Wouldn't that make them 1/6 beats?Are you seeing what I'm getting at? I have no musical background, and here we are working on a song in 6. I could live in blissful ignorance, playing my way through this song in 6, never knowing that I was playing a song in 6, if only if it weren't for the solo section. Once you start trying to put a solo on a 6 time backbeat, then you definetely know something is wrong when your regular little riffs and ratamacues or whatever just aren't working anymore. People who are more musically inclined than me kept saying that they were trying to figure out where the 1 was, and of course I had no idea what they were talking about. It starts to make sense that you need to know where the beginning of the 6 beat bar begins when you're waving your arms around like you're finished with a line in your solo only to discover that there is something profoundly wrong with everyone else still grooving in the backbeat. It's very peculiar and hard to describe. I guess you can say everyone is counting out loud from 1-6 but you are only counting to 4 and starting all over. Things don't match up.

I asked my teacher if she could tell me what song there is out there in 6 so I could try to listen to it and maybe get a feel for what 6 time sounds like. She said African music is in 6. And I was thinking, Ok, that narrows it down a bit. But then she said she'd bring me in something I could listen to, and true to her word, she did. It's a cd of djembe music and she let me know which songs were in 6. Wow. Djembe music is fast. Djembe players are like superstar shime players--on speed. But it was good to hear and know a song that was in 6. Only problem was, was that the notes are played so fast, I couldn't really hear what was going on. So what I did was that I played the songs at half speed (it's a little trick Windows Media player is capable of. I hate that player, but I think it redeemed itself with that innovation). Djembe songs at half speed are COOL! You have to tweak the sound settings to try to fix the distortion you get from playing a song at half speed, but it's so worth it. I guess in that kind of music you have someone playing a base beat on a deeper sounding drum and it's amazing to hear the complexity of what they are playing--rhythms and patterns at different pitches all going on at the same time. I was blown away. It could totally be translated into taiko music. You should try it. Now I just need to hear something that will inspire another fabulous taiko solo--a solo in 6--and I'll be all set. For now, I'm all ears.

I need to learn how to tie my own laces

Seriously. I have great plans to unlace and retighten my shime this weekend. I took the TIASOU class from Kris Berstrom, I've got his fabulous handouts, and I'm semi-confident.

Actually, I'm terrified. We're talking about my baby here. But if I never try, then I'll never be able to get good at it. And if I never mess up, then I'll never know how to undo the mess I made. So I guess you can say that we should hope for mistakes! But really. I'd also like to be able to tighten the dojo's shimes because I was looking at them last night and they seemed a little floppy. One of them looks like they used that cheap rope they give you at home depot to tie down lumber to your car--that white rope that is actually kind of stretchy. It wouldn't even hold enough tension to keep my shime stand opened at a specific width, so you can imagine what the shime sounds like. So there's that larger goal to kind of keep in mind when I'm doing this. But also what makes me feel a little better is that Janet said she knew how to tie them, so if something really really horrible happens, I have someone who I can shamefully beg and plead to bail me out if I clamshell the heads. I really hope it doesn't come down to that.

So that's the plan, stan. Wish me luck.

How to make a shime stand for under $50

This past weekend I made a stand for the shime. It was WAY easier to make than I thought it would be. I found the instructions on how to make the stand on the internet. I find everything on the internet. These instructions were clear and unintimidating. They included a list of everything you need and even included a couple of diagrams. I completed this project in an afternoon, in between cleaning the house and watching Whale Rider on KQED. You could spend hours and hours sanding it if that's your thing. Or you can make plans to sand later, like I will, maybe, someday.

I went to Home Depot for the materials, and wound up spending a little under fifty bucks for it all. A shime stand for under fifty bucks is not bad. I already had a saw (for making bachi!) and a power drill, and those were all the tools I needed, unless you call sandpaper a tool, in which case you would need some of that too. I could have spent less money if I had: a) not bought 10 feet of extra wood, which I only got because I wouldn't put it past myself to accidentally cut some important piece in half--with a handsaw. Yep. It would take me 5 minutes to cut and another 10 to realize that du-oh!, I wasn't supposed to cut the main part in half! (not that I did. Not this time anyway) b) I had measured the bolts I bought so that I bought two 2" bolts instead of one 2" bolt and one 3" bolt. That was just dumb. I even had a tape measure on me and everything. c) Home Depot only sells drywall screws by the pound. I had to get a pound of screws when I only needed 16. If you make this stand and want 16 drywall screws, let me know and I'll send em to you for FREE!

Anyhow. Making the stand was all about cutting the wood accurately and screwing everything into its correct place. The instructions make it really easy for you. My only additional suggestion would be to drill a pilot hole ahead of time where you want the screws to go. I learned this by watching the New Yankee Workshop on PBS. That guy is a genius with wood, and he has all the carpentry tools ever created. I know nothing about wood working but I love to watch the show because he'll start off by showing you some old antique sideboard, and then he'll go step by step cutting and drilling and dovetailing away and half an hour later he'll have completely re-created the whole thing. Amazing. But anyway, for a pilot hole you just find a drill bit a little smaller than the diameter of your screw and drill down. That way when you're actually drilling the screw into the wood, the wood is less likely to split. In which case you're screwed. Ha! Ha! Ha! Get it? Screwed? Ha! Ha! Ha! No seriously. We have a shime stand at the dojo that's practically worthless because it's all split from people trying to repair the thing only to split the wood. Now a whole leg will have to be replaced and that's out of the realm of my carpentry skills. The New Yankee guy could fix it easy.

The stand turned out beautiful, don't you think? Or as beautiful as a person who only has a saw and a drill gun could make. Maybe I'll stain it, or maybe just paint it black. But that requires me to get dirty and spill stuff that doesn't come out of the carpet. Did I mention that I built this shime on the living room floor? So easy. You should try it yourself.



The only problem I'm having with it right now is that I need to do a little tweaking to get it just right. As it is now, I have to open the stand wide in order to get the shime to sit at the right height. But this means that it's barely sitting on the stand and it seems a little more precarious than I would like. I may have to move the cross bars or cut off part of the legs. It's kind of complicated because when you change one thing, something else changes. The rope on the bottom controls how wide the top opens, but also the height. Do you see how this could get complicated? If I adjusted the rope so that the top opened only just wide enough so the drum fits good, will cutting off the legs change something else? I dunno. And then there's angles to deal with too. I'd like the legs to stand flat on the ground. Right now they're kind of poking down at an angle. Ack. That's more thinking than I want to do. Less thinking, more playing. That's what I say.

It's a girl. Definitely a girl.

So the one thing I didn't blog about in my last post was the adoption of my new baby girl. Here she is:


She's a little shy, like me.



And here she is coming out of her shell a bit.


Look at that big beautiful smile!

I adopted her from the Asano Taiko Orphanage. I just had to pay the adoption fees and she was all mine. But boy o boy was it a hard decision. First I went in to the taiko marketplace and looked around at the other vendors. Miyamoto. Remo. Miyoshi. Great drums, really, but none of them were my baby. At the Asano booth I just stood there and stared at the drums. The lady must have thought I was crazy. They were all beautiful. They had really small ones and medium ones and bigger ones. As soon as I saw them I knew: one of those is my baby.

I went away and then I came back. And stared. The lady was really nice. She let me go behind the table and actually touch them and play them a little. And then I asked if they took credit cards and she said "no." Can you believe that? They don't take credit? And can you believe how stupid I felt when I realized that I hadn't even thought of bringing my checkbook to the conference. What was I thinking? Or rather, what was I not thinking?? I swear I would have kicked myself it that didn't require coordination and acrobatics. I was all set to buy a medium drum and everything. I had to walk around all day thinking about all the people who were going to adopt my baby. But I guess it worked out in the end because the next day I brought my checkbook, and even though all the medium drums were gone, there were still some beautiful larger ones available. With the larger shime, you can tighten harder and they can produce a higher tone.

After settling all the paperwork, ie filling out the check, writing in some numbers, signing 2 weeks of salary away just as fast as it got direct deposited, the baby was mine. A genuine Asano original. 400 years of fine craftsmanship. Direct from Japan--smelling of Japan. My car smelled great the whole drive back. They should make "New Drum" air fresheners.


Check out the finish on this. Such a pretty shade of red. And those knots. I can tie those knots now! I haven't tried tightening this shime though. It came this way. That will be the subject of another blog.

I still need to name her. I haven't figured out a good one yet. Maybe when we actually get to play without the stupid muffles her true personality will come out. But for now, I couldn't be happier!

Taiko Conference!!

What a week!! I don't even know where to begin! Hope everyone made it home safe and sound from Los Angeles to all the points around the country (and the world) from whence we came. My dad developed a plan to get from LA to the SF Bay Area seamlessly. You leave at 4 in the morning and drive out of LA before the traffic starts up, and you get to the Bay Area just as the morning traffic is abating, and before the inland area gets a chance to really heat up. It was only 6:45 and my car thermometer was reading 80 degrees already. Driving back is one of the few times when I actually get to see the sun rise. There's this really beautiful place just after you get through the Grapevine and over the mountains and come into the flatflatflat interior. It's a broad plain bordered by mountains that is always beautiful no matter what season it is. In the spring it's a sea of green grass. Right now at the height of summer it's a golden yellow. By the time I got there, the sun had just peaked over the distant mountains, casting raisin-like shadows over the twisting face of the foothills. Lovely.

But that's not taiko at all! So on Monday (the 11th,--I've lost all sense of time right now), I started out the Summer Taiko Institute with a workshop by Shoji Kameda of the On Ensemble. Yeah, Shoji, sitting right there. He taught us to really listen to time. He is such a geek--the kind of geek that I can only aspire to be. He had his shiny silverMac Powerbook and his microphones and amplifiers and they were all hooked up to taiko. Then he recorded one of us playing and we sat there and analyzed how close the beats were to the metronome. I loved it!

Then for the afternoon session it was an Odaiko workshop with Tiffany Sensei of Sacramento Taiko. Man, can she play the odaiko. She showed us very basic techniques that I was so sorely lacking in. Just holding the bachi correctly and effectively is so important. She is funny and goofy in a similar way that I'm goofy. She'll just start jumping around playfully as she is explaining something. I really like that idea of playfulness. I think we sometimes take ourselves way too seriously when it comes to taiko.

Then the next day I had workshops with Michelle Fujii and Ann Ishimaru and Teresa Enrico of Portland Taiko. I so want to BE Michelle. She's graceful yet powerful. It's like she floats in mid air, yet she can still play the drums. Her background is in Japanese folk dance and she's doing some really innovative things with incorporating movement and dance with taiko. I have several pairs of left feet that I use when I'm trying to do movement or anything dancelike, but Michelle introduced some movements that I'd like to try out--maybe in a solo or something. Ann and Teresa showed us how we can all play together as a group without necessarily using verbal cues. They called the class "Taiko Telepathy" and I was pretty amazed at how well we all played together--beginners and old timers alike. They are excellent workshop leaders, and maybe I can try to incorporate some of the excercises and drills they used with us into some workshops with the beginners.

And on Wednesday I took the afternoon workshop with Tosha Sensei. He was a performing member of Oedo Sukeroku, the group that developed the slant stand style of playing taiko. I actually thought that the stands that we play that style on were called Sukeroku stands, but I found out that they're really called naname stands, although at E'ville we usually call them slant stands. I wonder if I can get people to call them naname? Anyhow, Tosha Sensei is really nice, but he has a slightly gruff Japanese-guy style that I know intimidated some people. I was intimidated too but I could just tell that he was a nice guy deep down. And funny too. Everything he taught us was exactly opposite of how we play at Emeryville so it was kind of awkward playing what he wanted me to do, but I think I got the idea. It's always good to learn things from different people.

On Friday, it was time for the Taiko Conference, where I met up with a few of my Emeryville Taiko classmates:



Then it was time to get down to business. The conference was set up so we took 2 workshops each on Friday and Saturday with time for concerts and shopping at the taiko marketplace. On Friday I took a workshop on shime tightening and a workshop on Hawaii Obon Taiko, both of which were really great. Now I have the courage to tighten my own shime (more on that later) and I'm going to teach the Obon rhythms to Emeryville. On Friday night they had a free taiko concert in the plaza that featured 10 groups! It was great to see so many different groups playing.



We were constantly surrounded by drums. Can you imagine spending a whole week just immersed in drums? It was like being in heaven!

On Saturday I started off with Elaine Fong's TaKeTiNa workshop, which incorporates movement, voice and rhythm--all at the same time! And then it was off to a discussion session. It was really hard to decide which session to sit in on since they all sounded good. I decided on a session on composition since I think that's what I would like to do in the future. Janet was one of the panelists, and I thought it would be interesting to see where she was coming from on that front. Later, it was off to a percussion workshop with Rachel Ebora of Portland Taiko. She was so hilarious! But she also really inspired me to try to incorporate more percussion into E'ville's reperatoire (spelling, I know).

After that I rushed back to the plaza to meet up with my family, since the plan was to meet up with them and have dinner before the big Taiko Jam concert. We went to nearby Olvera Street for dinner at La Luz del Dia, a restaurant my parents have been eating at since before they were even married. My mom says it hasn't changed a bit, except for a larger eating area. We even all of us took a picture atop and around the famous Olvera Street Burro. There's a long story about that burro--you'll have to look it up yourself sometime.

Then it was Taiko Jam! There were 4 groups and they were all amazing, but the kids of Zenshin Taiko totally stole the show. They have more genki in their tiniest tips of their little fingers than any one in that theater. They even stole the thunder of the infamous Taiko Project, which consists of all the major stars in the taiko world today. But everyone was impressed, including me and my family.

The next morning, it was time for the early morning taiko jam.

That's me and Keith jamming it up on the plaza. I don't know what the neighbors thought about all those taiko drummers making all that noise so early on a Sunday morning. But it was fun!

After the jam, it was time for a closing session and your last chance to buy good stuff from the taiko marketplace.

I know this blog entry was rushed, but if I don't get it all down now, I may never get this entry done. Taiko Conference was fun and totally worth it. Next conference is in 2007 in Seattle!

Hi Ho, Hi Ho,

it's off to Taiko Conference I go!

Tomorrow while everyone is at work, dreading the fact that it's not even Friday yet, I'll be driving down California's favorite highway, a.k.a "The 5," blasting my music, collecting on my windshield a cross-section of the heartland's finest insect specimens, and trying to squeeze every last bit of freon out of my barely-working air conditioner. One of my guilty pleasures of making the drive to LA is a stop at the McDonald's in that stinky section of the 5, you know, where the cows are. I don't know why I always stop there--I guess at that point I'm starving. Anyhow, I always order a Happy Meal (for the toy--I know, I'm just a big kid inside) and top off the gas tank at the Shell station.

If you are going to the conference, I will see you there!

Okinawa

It's almost been a year since I was in Okinawa, so I figured now was as good a time as any to get that film developed. I love these shots of my sandal-tanned feet. Thank goodness they don't look all striped like that anymore. Our feet are actually underwater, in the ocean. I'm telling you, I can't wait to go back. When I was there there was a typhoon and although it didn't rain, the wind was blowing sand into places you didn't even know you had.

Let me know . . .

If you've reached my blog, then you've reached the end of the internet, and that's got to be new and exciting. If I reached the end of the universe, I might be tempted to leave a little interstellar graffiti. So, if you have anything at all to say about me or my blog, please feel free to COMMENT. Even if you're shy like me, you can comment anonymously. I'm begging you. I'm blogging out into a void. I would totally appreciate any input and I may even respond.

Until then, thank you for visiting!!

-Kathryn

O Shime

I SOOOOOOO want a shime. I'd be such a good mom to it and I'd take really good care of it. I'm even going to a shime-parenting class called TIASOU Method. It's one of the workshops I got into for the taiko conference. It's taught by Kris Bergstrom from On Ensemble, who are, by the way, fast becoming one of my favorite taiko groups (I don't know if anyone can surpass San Jose Taiko as my all-time favorite group. Not yet anyway). But as I was saying, I'm taking the TIASOU class because I've been wanting to get a shime for some time, but I absolutely forbade myself from having my own shime until I knew how to take care of it, which really means, until I knew how to lace and tighten one myself. Shime have a high-pitched sound that rises above the boominess of josuke (the barrel-sized drums), and the shime gets that high pitch from the skins being pulled tight over the body of the drum. Now, I know there are drums that can be tensioned using a bolt system, but personally, I think the bolts are ugly and they make the drum really heavy. There is nothing more beautiful than the rope wrapped around the drum, and it just seems strange that the earthiness of leather and wood should be forced together using something so unfairly strong as metal bolts. I think since I'm the one making the drum speak, then I should be the one to put that tension on the drum, using my own sweat and my own muscles. I think there is a relationship between player and drum whether you're aware of it or not. The TIASOU Method class is going to show us how one person, using more brains than brawn, can tighten a shime on their own. Once I know how to tie my own drum, then I can get my own, and I plan on doing that at the Taiko Conference. There will be a ton of vendors there and I've got a shime burning a hole in my pocket.

DEBUT!!

On Sunday, our performing group debuted for the first time at the Marin Arts Festival. We played that 4-drum song I'd been working so hard on, Madoka. I think it went well. It was fast and genki and I don't think anyone dropped any bachi. The best part was that we got to play on real drums, not those foam and carpet-covered practice drums we've been playing everything on lately. The stage was tiny, and we were all squished together--all five of us, and all 20 of the drums we use to play the song. But it was great.

One of my classmates who was watching us play said that I didn't look as genki as I did the day before at rehearsal. This perplexes me since I was kiai-ing and smiling and doing my on-stage best at bringing all of my energy into the performance. It's possible that I was nervous and that energy didn't show through. It's more likely that at rehearsal I messed up more, and when I mess up, I usually smile. But I have to say, I wasn't that nervous. I was more excited to be playing and making our debut. I think people think that since I'm so shy and quiet, that I have stage fright or stage shyness. I think the exact opposite is true. On stage, I'm the complete polar opposite of the mild-mannered Kathryn that everyone is used to. I scream. I jump. I make tons of noise. After the performance Janet said something like, "You just need another year of being on stage." Well, I totally trust her and I always appreciate what she has to say and I take her advice and everything, but I've been on stage for 4 years! I'm not nervous! I love to perform. But there must be something that isn't coming through. There's a video of us that I'm going to get a hold of and I'm gonna watch it to see what people are talking about. I guess until then, I'll have to work on projecting. Oh, and making my solo longer!

I forgot the BEST part!

In my excitement over Ted and the paddle boats, I forgot to show you one of the most interesting parts of my day! As we pedaled along on the paddle boats, we noticed a log floating in the water. Atop this log were several little turtles and one mean sea gull. The turtles were enjoying the fine day, what with all the sunshine and the calm waters and all. But then this gull, this mean and cranky seagull, comes along and procedes to push each and every turtle off the log into the water. It was methodical and maniacal. Turtle, plop. Turtle, plop. Turtle, plop.

But there was one turtle who wasn't having it at all. The gull pushed and prodded. Pulled and poked. No way. That turtle wasn't going anywhere. We watched in horror as the gull grabbed one of the turtle's legs and visciously (alligator-like if you ask me) shook the poor thing and tried to pull it off the log. But that turtle didn't budge. Heck, some of his turtle friends were using him as a distraction to get back onto the log, but the gull just pushed them back into the water again.

I have to say we really admired that turtle. We were rooting him on (or her--I really think it was a her) . Go turtle! Stick in there!

I don't know what happened in the end because we were chased away by another group of rowdy paddle-boaters.

A Stinkin' Day Off

On Tuesday, me and KB took the day off from work and decided to go to the Conservatory of Flowers in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. It's housed in a beautiful glass building atop a little hill. A few years ago, the building had been shut down because of extensive damage to the windows. I assumed it was earthquake damage, but surprisingly, it was caused by storms. Today the building is as spectacular as ever:


So what was all the stink about, you might ask? (Hee hee hee. Just had to throw that in there.) The reason why we went was to see "Ted," a.k.a. Amorphophallus titanum, a.k.a. Titan Arum, a.k.a. Corpse Flower. Ted is a gigantic, stinky flower that only blooms every few years, but when it does, everyone makes a big stink about it. (oh come on, I'm funny!) Actually, when it blooms, it emits a horrible smell like a rotting corpse that attracts flies, beetles and other insects that are into that kind of thing. And it's gigantic--did I mention that already? You could lose small pets or babies in that thing.

We arrived the morning after it was at its worst stinkiness. They put him in his own gazeebo inside a very hot and humid section of the conservatory. Not only was it muggy and damp, but it stank too! But actually the smell wasn't as bad as I thought it would be--but still. Ted was a little shy at first:


But when you get a little closer, you can't help but be impressed:


It kind of reminds me of that thing from The Little Shop of Horrors. I think Ted is beautiful in his own stinky way, but I don't think I'm going to try growing that thing in my house.

The Conservatory is just one attraction in Golden Gate Park. We drove around a bit until we found Stow Lake. We had a nice little lunch of hot dogs and Icee's, and I insisted on renting a paddle boat:


Are they called "paddle" boats or "pedal" boats? KB insists they're pedal boats--which makes sense because you have to pedal the boats to paddle them along.

A perfect day!

Perfectionist????!!??

Last night Janet was in class and we were working on Cranes solos. She gave us 20 minutes to noodle, but I haven't spent any time on Cranes solos because I never get to solo and well, I've been working on performing group stuff so much that I've kind of neglected Cranes. Anyhow, she went from person to person, helping them on their solos, and when she came to me, I didn't have anything. Nothing really. It's so hard for me to come up with something from nothing in 20 minutes. I was frustrated and I knew we would be going around doing our solos for the whole class. Frustrating! Impossible! She even pulled a drum up and played basic to force me to try to play something, but nothing came.

When we did go around and do solos individually, she asked if I wanted to skip having to do something in front of the whole class, and I said yes. Spared the torture! Hallelujah! Then she said I wasn't ready because I was a perfectionist.

Hold up.

A Perfectionist?

Me?

A perfectionist???!!

I think the reason why it stings so much, is because it's true. I am a perfectionist. She just was the one to point it out. Sigh. But it's true. I mean, just look at this blog. I have trouble sleeping because I can't play a song right. I spend my free time forcing my hands to play those ridiculous rudiments. I spent 12 hours coming up with a solo to play with any base beat of my choice for the P-group audition, and most of those 12 hours were spent crossing out the patterns I had just written down. And it was only 8 bars long! That's like not even 30 seconds!

Is it that I'm not satisfied until I can do something perfectly? Or I won't accept anything less of myself than perfection? What is wrong with me? I know I can play solos. Last weekend at the Sushi Summit, I had to play an odaiko (big, giant drum) solo, and I did fantastically! Susan thought so. Even I thought the solo was really good, and I'm a tough critic of myself. But I didn't set it, I didn't practice it, I didn't even think about playing a solo until I was actually playing it. And it was good! At work I can noodle and doodle and play really neat patterns and riffs or whatnot on my desk all day long. No problem. Sometimes I even surprise myself because of what I play on my desk.

So what is wrong with me?? Why do I have to be so hard on myself? How do I let go of that perfectionist side of me? I know I can play, and I know I'm a halfway decent player, but I hold back. How can I break through that? I mean, it's not even with just my solos, or just the cranes solo, but with everything. There are only moments of abandonment when my superpowers shine through, but I don't quite know how to tap into that. I know it's there, but where? But how? I feel like crying.

Just Humor Me

Humor me for a minute while I be superficial and materialistic. If this were a perfect world, I would have these things. Then I would be happy. Oh, and maybe my own sound-proof space--because then my neighbors would be happy too. Until then, I'll continue to dream.

Sushi Summit/ Kiai Power!

On Saturday a small group of us went to the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco to play a gig at the Sushi Summit. It was a day of sushi competition, sushi preparation, sushi tasting, sushi paraphanalia and sushi accoutremonts. There was sushi to the left, sushi to the right, sushi upstairs, sushi downstairs and beer and sake all over the place. Our job was to play two short sets of taiko between sushi deomonstrations by Sushi Summit sushi chefs--try saying that fast. It was an impressive place to play a gig--we had a nice little stage and when we came on, the sound of our fabulous playing pulled everyone away from their sushi and they watched us instead! Believe me, it's really hard for taiko to compete against food for attention. During the second set, there was a guy sitting in the front row and he had been sucking on a lollipop, but when we started playing, his mouth hung open and he was just sitting there holding the lollipop up next to his face--the whole time. It was funny.

But I also wanted to write about a lesson that Janet taught us in class just two days before this Sushi Summit shindig. As we were working on Cranes solos, she was telling us that we need to kiai more for the other players (kiais are shouts of encouragement--not necessarily words, but just good strong yelps that let the soloist know that their fellow players are rooting them on. It really makes a difference because it gives you extra energy). This wasn't the first time that we've heard this, but I think her explanation really hit home for us, or for me anyway. She was saying that all you need for yourself is enough energy to breathe and play basic, and the rest of your energy should be directed toward the soloist. So then she had us kiai-ing our hearts out to the other players. We went around the room doing kiai solos for the soloists and group kiai. Janet even demonstrated her kiai power, and I have to admit, I was a little afraid after that. Janet is a little tiny woman but if anyone were to mug her in a dark alley, everyone would hear it. She said it was her "stage kiai." I don't think I've ever heard anyone kiai louder than she did (Susan's word was "foghorn" which is actually a more accurate adjective and it makes me snicker, but no, that's wrong of me. Bad Kathryn, bad!...snicker). When I first started playing taiko, we learned a song called "Renshu" which means "practice" in Japanese. It's the song you learn when you are just starting to learn taiko, and part of the song has a "hup!" built in. I was so embarrased and shy to make such a loud noise that I thought, ok, I'll just fake the hup and I won't ever have to hup in taiko--I'll just pretend like I'm hupping. Yeah right. First off, you can't get away with not kiaing. And second, a good kiai makes you and the other players feel good. I mean, why even play taiko if you're not going to put any energy into it? And why would you put all those long nights and the occasional long weekend in to play taiko at all unless it makes you feel good? Kiai then! And that's what we did for the performance on Saturday. I kiai-ed more than I ever have, and louder than I ever have, and I think it added a different sort of dimension and energy to the performance. Some guy came up to me afterward and said he really enjoyed watching us because it seemed like we were really enjoying ourselves! And it's so true. I think I've unleashed my kiai-power, so watch out!

Sleepless

The night before last I got home from taiko after working on a really tough and complicated piece. It's a really nice arrangement of a song by the blind African duo Amadou et Mariam. John is a guest composer for the group, and he hears things in the song that I don't, but I guess that's because he's got a pair of really well trained musician's ears. I'm learning--slowly--but I'm learning. Anyhow, everyone in the group was struggling to try to fit all the different pieces of the song together. It was a challenge. You start to play something and it goes ok, but then you have to switch parts and your hands don't play what you want them to, or your head won't remember what you just got through going over for the tenth time just a minute ago. And the parts don't start in logical, easy places--they start in the middle of a bar, and I barely understand what a bar is and it's in a weird time signature, and I barely even understand what a signature is. But that's kind of the fun part of taiko--the struggle. Every song that I play is really hard at first. I don't know if it's because I'm just inexperienced, or if they're giving us really hard songs to play, or what. Even Janet and Susan were struggling come to think of it, so I feel a little better.

So when I got home that night, my mind was still struggling. Class ran late and my body went straight to bed, but my head didn't. It was up all night long and it kept waking me up. I would be dreaming about playing pieces of the song and I would mess up in my dreams and I would actually wake up. It was pretty horrible. I woke up several times and was frustrated because the I couldn't get the song right and I couldn't sleep. And the thing is, this isn't the first time this has happened. Janet-songs do that to me too at first. I guess I just like to figure stuff out. Hopefully I'll get the song down and sleep better!

Bachi

Today I made three pairs of bachi. Bachi are the sticks you use to hit taiko drums, and they come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. The vast majority of bachi are the simple dowels you see above. I needed a pair that were light enough to hit a shime with (shime have more delicate heads, so it's best to use a lighter pair of bachi on them to avoid premature wearing) as well as a josuke, which are the barrel-sized drums that you saw in my previous posts. We're learning another dual-drum song which also includes a lot of bachi flipping. I have a pair of bachi that are fine for hitting both the shime and josuke, but they're tapered, and are hard to flip around because of their uneven weight. There are bachi out there that you can buy that are very light-weight, and are perfect to hit the more responsive shime with, but they're way harder to flip and don't produce the kind of boom I want to get out of a josuke. So today I went to MacBeath Hardwood, our local lumber company (excellent customer service by the way--I think 3 or 4 guys asked if I needed help!), and picked out a few dowels that I thought were both light and heavy enough for the song. They're skinnier than the bachi I normally use, but I was excited to bring them home.

I like my bachi kind of long because I like the kind of fulcrum action you can get out of them. I feel like I can play faster and more economically with slightly longer bachi. I have a pair of bachi that we call "Miyama-style" that are 16 3/4" long, so I decided to make my bachi the same length. Cutting the bachi is one thing, but getting the ends of the bachi to have that nice smooth edge to them is another. You want a smooth tip to protect the head of the drum. I used a dremel that my dad gave to me years ago to help the process along. I've found that homemade bachi have strange angled ends on them--probably because people try to angle a file or something to get the edge tapered out, but they never look even. All of my homemade bachi are like that. But today I figured out how to use the dremel just right to get that professional look. Instead of bringing the dremel or file in to force an angle of the edge of the bachi, just let the dremel follow the grain of the bachi so that it goes from the side to the top of the bachi. It takes a little longer but it's so worth it when it's even and smooth. After that I sanded everything down with some 220 grit. It's best not to sand your bachi too smoothly because you might end up dropping them, or worse, flinging them at teachers/classmates!

Take a look at the tips! Not bad, eh?

Children's Day!

When I was a kid, on May 5th, my dad used to put up the carp kites on a pole on the roof of our house. I thought that was so cool to see them flying up there, swimming wildly through the sky. On the other hand, back then it was actually called "Boy's Day," so the carp were flying for my brothers. Carp are symbols of strength, perseverance and long life, which are traits that you want in boys--I guess. I mean, it's ok to have weak, short-lived, wishy washy girls--they don't need no stinkin' kites. I think on Girl's Day you actually put out dolls or something boring like that. I never liked dolls. But I LOVE the carp kites, or Koinobori as they're also called. They're beautiful things. There are just some things that are really beautiful in spite of themselves. I think the symbolic power of our flying koinobori rubbed off on me, because I've always been one stubborn girl. I have koinobori of my own, but they're tiny--not meant to really fly. But they will fly today. I'm going to hang them out my window at work.

(I need to put a disclaimer here--I'm not bitter. Growing up, you just know that there are things that you do for boys and things you do for girls. They're called traditions and you should savor every one of them because it's so easy to lose touch with them. As a kid, you don't have this sense of inequality or discontent. You just look up in the sky and see the carp flying beautifully and say to yourself, hey, it must be Boy's Day, and then you enjoy the view. I'm really glad my dad put up the kites because it's something I look fondly back on and treasure. If I have kids I'll do the same--but I'm putting up kites for girls because they need to be strong and perserverant to make it in this world.)

Let's just enjoy some fine examples of koinobori:

Bizarre

You wanna hear something bizarre? Ok, so all day long at work I walk up and down the hallway outside my office. Every once in a while, I'll spread my arms to try to touch both the walls at the same time, but I can never do it. Isn't there some sort of factoid out there that says that the wingspan of your outstretched arms is the same as your height? So I always figured that the width of the hallway was just a tinier bit more than 5'6", which is my height. In fact I've often resisted the urge to lie down across the hallway to test that out. Anyhow, today I was walking down the hall and I spread out my arms and to my absolute amazement, I could touch both walls simultaneously! I've been walking up and down the hall for five years now and I've never touched. Ever.

This leads me to believe one of three scenarios:

Scenario #1) At age 29, I'm having a second growth spurt. This would require that the factoid about your wingspan and your height being equal is true. I don't know if it's wise to believe every factoid you hear. Blowing in someone's face while they make cross-eyes doesn't make them cross-eyed forever. And I haven't tested out the one where if you don't close your eyes when you sneeze, your eyeballs will fall out.

Scenario #2) My arms are growing longer independently from the rest of my body. This somehow seems more plausible than the growth spurt theory, yet it just seems ridiculous that my arms would decide to grow on their own accord. I mean, what's their motivation?
Wouldn't that just make me more proportionately ape-like? Why would my body take such a backward evolutionary step like that?

Scenario #3) My arms are more flexible than they used to be. Ok, this is probably the reason. We've been doing a lot of arm movement stuff for taiko and extention and reach and "big arms" are what we generally strive for. I just had no idea that stretching out your arms made them longer, or rather, made them reach their full potential.

So, following the logic of Scenario #3, wouldn't stretching and extending your legs make them longer, and hence, make you taller? Why don't you work on that theory while I try to sneeze with my eyes open.

Who are you. Who-who? Who-who?

I really wanna know.

So today I was walking into the post office and I held open the door for someone who was walking out of the post office. She was carrying an armful of packages and it was one of those things you just do--you just hold open the door and let them out as you go in. Then this person said to me, looking me right in the eye, "Thank you Kathryn." I was taken aback. You see, I have no idea who this person was. And the way she said it--it wasn't mean or anything. Kind of like when you do a favor for a friend and they don't say thank you, and you say "You're welcome." Not quite scolding. Not angry. More like--you should know better. And now I feel really bad. I stared at her as she walked away because I was thinking, it'll come to me in a second, just let me think, just let me think! But I have no idea. No idea who that was. She was blond, wispy hair. I think she had on a country western style shirt. No idea. She kind of looked like someone I knew in college, but no, I don't think it was her.

I should have chased after her and asked because now it's bothering me. Who was that? Did I know her well, and just completely forgot all about her? Were we friends? Did we work together? Did we have (gasp) a meaningful conversation that I've forgotten all about? Do I owe her money? Did I read her short story in a fiction workshop? Isn't it just awful how you can meet and interact with another person, and then just completly blank out on them when you see them a year or however long, later?

So if you're out there, mystery-thanker-lady, please let me know who you are so I don't go crazy. And if you prefer to remain mysterious, at least give me a titillating hint.

I know it's totally pointless to plead to my blogger audience, seeing how I've only gotten 6 hits on my site , and two of those hits were me, and another one of those hits was a friend testing out the hit meter.

Jeez, this is driving me crazy . . .

Superhero

Last night Janet was at our intermediate class helping us work on Cranes. Her main focus was on Kata, or the form/stance you take while playing the song. A lot of what she was showing us was that we often just hit the drum, but she was really encouraging us to put our energy and our bodies into it. I think it was a liberating experience for all of us. Susan's style is kind of tight and rigid, and it shows in our playing. Janet was trying to get us to let go of all that, and to really use our bodies and our own energy to carry us through the movements. She said that we should show the music that we are playing with our bodies.

My problem is that I don't use my body enough. I don't get down low enough. But I think that there is more to it than that. Janet was telling me that I needed to let my super-powers out. She was saying that she knew it was in me, but I needed to just let it out. And I agree. It's in me somewhere, so why won't it come out? She even asked me if I had seen the Incredibles and I said yes, and that I was Violet. I don't really know where she was going with that, or if she even knew what I meant when I said I was Violet (she's the one who turns invisible). I think Violet is a good analogy for me because I feel like her and I would really love to have the power to turn invisible sometimes. But at the end of the movie when push came to shove, her superpowers came out and she blossomed. Which means if that shrinking violet of a Violet could do it, then I can too. If I were a superhero.

5 years, baby!

Yesterday morning I woke up, had my coffee, got dressed, went to work and realized two things:

1) Today is Administrative Professionals Day. If you've ever unjammed a Xerox machine, filed reams of paper, or entered useless data into a computer all day--then more power to you. You rock. I rock. We deserve doughnuts or something! Bosses here don't recognize this holiday. It's written on the cheap Office Depot desk calendars we all have. They obviously don't consult these calendars. They use (I know for a fact they do) fancy leather-bound day planners.

2) Today was also the day that I got recognized for being at Mills for FIVE YEARS, BABY! They had a reception (with cake and lemonade) for all of us, the old timers. A bunch of us made it to five years, but there were others who were getting recognized for 10, 15, 25 and 35 years! Now those people have stamina. There were times when I thought I wouldn't make it this far, but hey, it's worth having a little party for. The President was there and she said nice things about me in front of everybody (one of my bosses wrote it down for her though). Then she gave me a handshake, a certificate of appreciation, a rose, and a medallion!


Did you hear me people? I said she gave me a medallion! Look:


And the best part is that it is inscribed on the back!!


Isn't that awesome?!! I'm so tempted to punch a hole through it so I can hang that thing around my neck like an Olympic medal and wear it every day. It's pretty big--about the size of a cookie. And if I make it to ten years and get another medallion, I'm gonna punch a hole in that one too and have a matching set of earrings! But seriously. This whole time they've been giving out little lapel pins to the 5-year people. I'm so thrilled by this medallion concept.

Ahhhhh. It's so nice to get recognized every once in a while.

I'm So Torn

Sarah Vowell, my National Public Radio hero, the one who inspired me to get my minidisc recorder, and voice of "Violet," the incredible pre-teen Incredible, is coming to town on Thursday. I was all set to go see her and listen to her speak and buy her new book and hopefully get her autograph, but then Susan said she wasn't coming to class on Thursday and that Janet would be the substitute teacher and that we should all be there to work on Cranes.

I'm truly torn here. Sarah Vowell is legendary to me. I've spent countless hours listening to her stories and commentary on reruns of my favorite radio show, This American Life. I idolize her. She's got a funny high voice, she's opinionated, smart, quirky and most notably, cranky. I love her. But on the other hand, I love taiko. I've committed myself to taiko, and I know, even though it really pains me, that I have to go to class. I need work on Cranes and I've never missed a Janet class and I've already told myself that I'm going to work really really hard on taiko.

Sigh. What lousy timing.

Cupertino Cherry Blossom Festival

Yesterday we performed at the Cupertino Cherry Blossom Festival. It's a nice event with friendly people and a good-energy kind of crowd. It's really great when the crowd is supportive. We've never been booed before, but I remember once playing for a crowd that was eating dinner and they were completely ignoring us even though we were five feet away from them and playing a really loud and energetic song. Have you ever heard taiko? I mean, you can't ignore it even if you were deaf because when you play loud you feel it. Anyway. These people were great, and we did great, and we even invited everyone up for audience participation. They love it when we do that.

They also had really cool giant koinobori that were dancing in the wind all day:


Cupertino marks the end (for me) of the matsuri season. The cherry blossoms have blossomed and spring has sprung. Now it's time for me to really get down and learn new stuff. Janet has us learning a new song with lots of movement. This poses a new challenge for me because I'm clumsy. Or maybe the right term is "lanky." Or maybe it really is "clumsy." Because I'm tall--for taiko players anyway--I have to get lower than everyone else. That doesn't mean I simply bend over and fold myself in half, it means that I have to use my knees and keep my upper body nice and straight, and lower myself using real muscles. Imagine if you were standing and took one step forward with your left foot and kind of sunk down. Keep your weight centered and do this for a minute and you'll feel the burn. Keep your back straight and don't bend at the waist. Now wave your arms around madly and smile. That's taiko for you. Janet showed us a few of the movements and she told me to get lower. "No, go even lower," she said. "Lower. Can you go any lower?" After class Janet asked me if I had any problems with my knees and I told her no and I could tell by the look on her face that she won't show any mercy with me. And here I thought my whole life that being tall was a good thing. And I'm not even that tall. Also throw in the fact that I have to be graceful while holding this kind of squat. And on top of that, I have to look like I'm having fun. Well, that's the easy part, because I live for this.