Apr 15 (Wed), 2020 / Last updated : May 13 (Wed), 2020 melanie Posts by Members

“A Humble Request for Support” by Kodo Ensemble Leader Yuichiro Funabashi

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April 13, 2020

I am deeply grateful for everyone’s support in recent times.
I am sure you’re feeling anxious about the spread of COVID-19 and the range of issues caused by this pandemic. The events that have unfolded since January have had a great impact on our organization, too.
First, ten of our Europe tour performances were canceled, then we had to make the very difficult decision to cancel the upcoming NOVA performances, which we had spent three years preparing to share with the world.

We are still facing further severe changes to our upcoming plans.
To continue our activities well into the future, it’s now time for the Kodo Group to come together, closer than ever, to overcome this crisis situation by any means necessary.

That is why, on behalf of Kodo, I am asking you all for your support and assistance.

Call for Emergency Support

We constantly learn from our daily lives on Sado Island, our creative activities and rehearsals, and by studying performing arts and culture from all over Japan. We travel to share the sound of taiko with people throughout Japan and around the world.

For Kodo, our everyday “normal” has suddenly vanished. We are doing our best to live and train within the various restrictions in place.
What can people like us, whose main line of work is in performing arts, what can we do in times like these?

Our concerts, the main forum for our activities, have been canceled. So what can we do now?
Many Kodo members have been sharing and discussing ideas, and starting work on new initiatives.

From the days of our antecedent group, Sado no Kuni Ondekoza, Kodo’s history spans almost half a century. It’s a history filled with deep, wide-ranging connections. Today, I am surrounded by many Kodo members: my seniors, my juniors, and their family members. Each April, we are joined by a new cohort of apprentices, comprised of individuals who have decided to step outside their comfort zone to chase their dream of performing with Kodo.


Under the “One Earth” banner, a theme that embodies Kodo’s desire to transcend language and cultural boundaries, we travel the world with taiko, reminding our audiences of the common bonds we all share as human beings.

We don’t want our “One Earth Tour” mission to end. When this situation settles and it’s safe to do so, we want to bring the sound and soul-stirring resonance of taiko to you all again in person. We want to be ready and able to uplift you with the good vibrations of live taiko and music. We will do our very best to keep our mission alive.

If you are able to lend us a hand at this challenging time, I sincerely ask for your support.

Yuichiro Funabashi
Leader
Kodo Taiko Performing Arts Ensemble

Canceled/Postponed Performances and Events
(Updated on Apr. 13, 2020)

Performances Outside Japan
  • March 2020 | “Kodo One Earth Tour 2020: Legacy” Europe Tour (10 performances in Italy, Poland, and Germany) 
Performances, Events, and Workshops in Japan
  • March 2020 Tatakokan On Location
  • May 2020 Kodo Sado Island Performances in Shukunegi (2020) (8 performances on Sado Island)
  • May–Sep. 2020 | Kodo x Robert Lepage “NOVA” (9 cities)
  • Kodo Interactive Performances, event appearances
  • School Workshop Performances
  • Exadon Experiences and Live-in Workshops
On Sado Island
  • Mar.–July 2020 Taiko Experiences at Sado Island Taiko Centre (Tatakokan) for groups, individuals, Golden Week events, and school excursions.
  • Mar.–July 2020 Live-in Workshops at Fukaura Schoolhouse for groups from abroad (France, USA)
  • Apr.–June 2020 Kodo Performances and Workshops for International Cruise Ship Tour Groups
  • Apr.–Sep. 2020 Exadon Experiences and Live-in Workshops
Sep 2 (Wed), 2020 / Last updated : Sep 2 (Wed), 2020 melanie Posts by Members, , ,

A Heartfelt Request for Continued Support and Assistance from Kodo Ensemble Leader Yuichiro Funabashi (Sep. 1, 2020)

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Sep. 1, 2020

In April, I made a public appeal on behalf of Kodo for ongoing emergency support. Many people from many places sent us support and words of encouragement. I offer my sincere thanks to each and every one of you.

In light of the current global situation, this year Earth Celebration, the annual festival we host in tandem with Sado Island, was held entirely online for the first time in its 33-year history. We asked for your support by way of crowdfunding and I would like to sincerely thank everyone who answered that call for help. Your kind encouragement is the reason that our group was able to band together to tackle the new challenge of creating a diverse lineup to broadcast online. We reaffirmed the power of Sado Island and how wonderful it is to spend time with you all. It was a truly fruitful experience. I am already looking forward to the next time we are able to welcome you all to Sado Island again.

Since March, when our European tour was interrupted by the pandemic, almost all of our performances were canceled or postponed. However, from September, our School Workshop Performance cast will start touring again. They will be taking extra care with a range of infection prevention measures in place. This year, many school events were also canceled, so we hope the sound of taiko will touch the students’ hearts as it resonates within their school during these live performances.   

Photo: Takashi Okamoto

 

My own first tour with Kodo, twenty years ago, was a School Workshop Performance Tour that visited junior high schools here in Niigata Prefecture. Although junior high school students are full of emotions, they don’t always show their feelings on the outside. So on my first tour, I remember trying to gauge their reaction, which meant I didn’t have the headspace to enjoy our daily performances. But years later, sometimes adults who were junior high students back then come up to me at our concerts in Niigata and say that our school performance was an experience they will never forget. Those words make me feel the legacy of our school tours, and the joy I had trouble sensing in them back then feels doubled this time around.

The months we spent at home this year while our activities were on hold has been filled with new challenges, including holding Earth Celebration online. This period, along with what we have built up to date through our School Tours, are both valuable assets to Kodo. As these difficult times continue, each and every one of us will pool our energy to keep our activities alive. We will work hard every day, hoping that the reverberations of our taiko can offer some comfort and a much-needed energy boost to many people.

I kindly ask all of you for your continued support and assistance.

 

Yuichiro Funabashi
Kodo Ensemble Leader

 

 

 

 

Call for Emergency Support

 

Mar 20 (Fri), 2020 / Last updated : Mar 31 (Tue), 2020 taro Posts by Staff, , ,

“Home Safe and Sound—a Post-Europe Tour Update” by Mio Teycheney-Takashiro and Ami Akimoto

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The “Kodo OET2020: Legacy” tour members recently arrived home safely after starting their tour around Europe at the end of January.

As many of you would have heard, we were faced with concert cancellations due to the outbreak of COVID-19: four in Italy, one in Poland and five in Germany. This resulted in our tour finishing two weeks earlier than planned.

Knowing that there were audiences waiting for us, we could not help but feel an immense sense of regret—and at times rather emotional—about not able to reach the places where people were looking forward to seeing Kodo perform.

In that situation, we were confronted by a profound realization: the value of each performance. We noticed giving performances as planned is something we almost always took for granted. As we moved forward in this difficult time, we felt a greater significance and weight towards each and every performance that we were about to deliver.

Traveling with the tour group, which consisted of many newcomers to the Kodo Group, some with limited experience abroad, we were faced with many challenges. However, we feel that this experience will become a source of encouragement for us as we remain diligently devoted to bringing Kodo’s unique sound to the rest of the world.

We are deeply touched and grateful for the countless heartfelt words of encouragement and support we have received from within Japan and all over the world. On behalf of the European tour group, we would like to say thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

Our next European tour is scheduled for 2022. We truly look forward to seeing you again then!

Mio Teycheney-Takashiro and Ami Akimoto
“Kodo One Earth Tour 2020: Legacy” Tour Managers

Updated: Kodo Group Response to Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19)

Feb 19 (Wed), 2020 / Last updated : Feb 19 (Wed), 2020 taro Posts by Members, , , ,

“Temperature, Climate, Atmosphere” by Masayasu Maeda

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These are things we experience every moment of our daily lives. Sometimes, the contrast or intensity will sharpen our awareness of the sensations. If there’s a sudden draft, when a door is opened on a cosy space, the felt experience of our surroundings is just as likely to be emotional along with physical. Our surroundings have altered and we register that change.

Having spent January in Sado ,without snow, I arrived in Russia where the relentless coldness of their winter weather threatened to penetrate to my bones. It was quite shocking.

Still, the rooms are warm, especially the air-conditioned hotel rooms. Places that are heated (or cooled) by convection: the moving and mixing of gases, particles and energy. An involuntary event that we harness and then benefit from.

During a Kodo performance, I feel something similar occurs.

 

Each audience member entering and sitting in the auditorium is carrying the energy of their daily life, each theatre building holding the energy of both its own unique history and locality. All things being a reflection of temperature, climate and atmosphere.

Then Kodo enters this space bearing our own dynamism.

On the stage are Taiko drums, made by Japanese craftsmen, performers dressed in traditional costumes. Across the stage is the curtain, a symbol of a boundary, but it will lift, like a door or window opening and then a new and unique atmosphere is created as all these different energies will interact and mingle.

Because, once the curtain rises “convection” occurs.

The various elements of energy within the theater begin to mix, and by the end of the performance, the atmosphere surrounding us all is neither distinctly national to the place of performance nor exclusively Kodo.

 

I witness this over and over, day performances, night performances, rainy days …

It is an experience that can only be felt by people who are present, it cannot be captured with photos and videos. Each sound is fresh and born in that very moment, as it is being felt by both performers and audience.

 

Today, you can enjoy everything on Youtube, Netflix and Spotify.

Even in such times, Kodo visits countries and tours. This involves moving insanely large drums and their stands, preparing each individual stage space with the necessary markings and then a daily tuning of the drums.

Every performance demands sweat. Each night we hand wash our costumes so they can be hung in our air conditioned hotel rooms to dry. Physical convection. This is life on the road. A cycle of preparation and movement and exchange.

Ready for the next performance, theatre or country.

 

Lithuania was Kodo’s 52nd country. Over nearly 40 years, this process has continued with 52 countries.

 

 

 

Where is Kodo performing next? (February 18, 2020)

“Kodo One Earth Tour 2020: Legacy” Europe Tour

 

Schedules

Feb 5 (Wed), 2020 / Last updated : Feb 5 (Wed), 2020 taro Posts by Members, , ,

“My Two-Year Road to Redemption” by Yuta Kimura

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February 1st, Moscow, Russia. The European tour is offically underway. In addition, I have reached a personal milestone. Allow me to elaborate (but not too much).

For the last European tour I was a junior member. I was inexperienced and I discovered that there are some aspects of life on the road, away from the performances, where I was completely clueless. So then, experience became my teacher and it was a very harsh one.

 

In a nutshell: I made mistakes. Small mistakes, big mistakes? (I hear you asking.) How do we judge these things? In this case, the actions were indeed small, yet, in terms of the level of humiliation I felt – it was huge. Therefore, I became determined to redeem myself, my reputation and self image.

I decided that I would focus and work really hard, so that when I next returned to Europe, my ‘errors’ would be behind me, firmly in the context of ‘an understandably naive action’. (It is actually quite funny on reflection, apologies that no details are being offered, at least not by me.)

 

It is strange and interesting how the low points in our lives can become turning points. Today I can look back on my younger self with forgiveness and gratitude.

It is the same voice of experience that can confidently say ‘this tour is going to be a completely joyous experience’.

 

 

 

 

 

Where is Kodo performing next? (February 6, 2020)

 

“Kodo One Earth Tour 2020: Legacy” Europe Tour

 

Schedules

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