Instead of a video post, I will be writing about one exceptional movie that was highly important for the emergence of Taiko as a modern performance art today. It had a lasting effect on Tajiri Kōzō (better known as Den Tagayasu) and was one his main motivations to found the taiko performance group Ondekoza, which is widely credited as “one of the groups to have set the groundwork for taiko as a performance art”, as they describe themselves on their homepage. The name of this special movie is “Muhōmatsu no Isshō 無法松の一生” (“The Life of Matsu the Lawless”). It features star actor Toshirō Mifune taking on the role of a poor rickshaw driver who finds himself taking care of a young woman and her difficult son after the woman’s husband dies rather suddenly. The story is thus summarized in the New York Times Movie database: Continue reading
Registration for the North American Taiko Conference (NATC) 2015 has been opened
The homepage for the North American Taiko Conference (NATC) 2015 has been opened and is now ready for registrations. The event will take place from June 11 to June 14, 2015 on the campus of the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. A preliminary schedule is already available; however, that schedule is not …