Umbrellas, Images and moving to the Firehall

We've been working for two weeks at the Japanese United Church. Music is fantastic, dance is ...well...getting there! We are trying not to kill each other with the large white umbrellas. I had originally planned for 5 dancers in the space...What was I thinking!?! Three plus those props is more than enough. Should get even more interesting with the weight of the projectors.

We have HUNDREDS of pictures. SO many great ones. The puzzle is now how to put the pieces together properly. Here's one shot by Steven Mayes of the sky behind the Firehall Arts Centre. The colour is some oddity of the digital camera, but gorgeous.

Still waiting for some technology to arrive by post (hate the back-to-work legislation, but hoping it will mean the stuff will arrive soon). The piece is truly still in the rough but as Matt says "It's a thing" - and it is. And a pretty interesting thing too...

EN: a raincity street dance - the work has begun

We are working on a new piece for the Dancing on the Edge Festival – which is an extension of EN (circle/fate) the piece we did for the Procession of Performing Circles (LIVE Biennale) in March 2010. Composer and taiko master Eien Hunter-Ishikawa and TomoeArts director Colleen Lanki have been working on creating the music and shape of the piece…meeting and improvising movements and music.

And we are featuring projections using photos of people and places in Vancouver's downtown eastside, commissioned from five community photographers connected to Hope in Shadows. We met over a week ago and they are busy taking photos now...The Pivot Legal Society wrote about our first meeting: http://pivotlegal.org/node/307

We're going to post updates as the process continues - about the music, the movement, the text, the photos...and the rain (the show is about rain after all...)

Goodbye to an amazing artist: KAMA Mitsuo

A few days ago the world lost a wonderful and generous noh musician KAMA Mitsuo. Kama-sensei played the otsuzumi (hip drum) as well as the kotsuzumi (shoulder drum) for a number of Thetare Nohgaku performances including Crazy Jane, Pine Barrens, and Pagoda.

He also taught noh music at the Noh Training Project every summer in Bloomsburg Pennsylvania, reveling in the craziness of all his summer noh aficionados!

Personally he played for me when I danced Tomoe at the National Noh Theatre, and performed the Takasago-ya at my wedding party.

I will remember his wry humour, his love of good beer, his patience as a teacher, and his passion for the art of noh. I will miss him terribly.

Nengajo and 2011

Happy New Year! We have decided to send a New Years greetings rather than Christmas or holiday greetings for a few reasons: (1) People get tons of messages and greetings before Christmas, but this is one they can enjoy after the holidays when they have to dig themselves out of their relaxed mode and get back into a regular pace, and (2) There is usually such a panic to get stuff done before Christmas that it is nicer to relax and write/send greetings between Christmas and New Years.

We sent some nengajō (年賀状) or New Years postcards, and an email message to our whole mailing list. This year we featured photos from our production Odori: The World of Kabuki Dance. Clockwise from the upper left corner is IZUMI Tokuho in Yashikimusume, FUJIMA Shôgo in Tomoyakko, FUJIMA Sayû in Shiki no Yamamba, and FUJIMA Monyo in Matsu.

2011 is the Year of the Rabbit - which is supposed to be calmer than last year (Year of the Tiger) with an "unhurried pace...without too many annoyances" http://www.theholidayspot.com/chinese_new_year/more_zodiacs/rabbit.htm We will be pretty busy this year as well - though not as crazy as 2010 - and we are certainly hoping for the "lack of annoyances" for everyone!

Shin-buyoh & Koten-buyoh

I went to see a happyôkai (recital) of the Otowa-ryû Japanese Dance Group on Sunday.  Otowa Hinaaki has been teaching in the Lower Mainland for 40 years and was celebrating with a fabulous concert featuring her students and two guest teachers from Japan.  Hinaaki-sensei is a fabulous force for Japanese dance and culture in BC, and her students are a fabulous team.  TomoeArts collaborated with her on the All Over the Map presentation “Summer Odori” last July, and two of her students performed in with us in the Procession of Performing Circles last March.

Most of the pieces were shin-buyoh 新舞踊 or “new dance” which is a more contemporary style of Japanese dance that uses many of the same movements as kabuki dance, but the pieces are shorter, and the music combines western and Japanese rhythms and instruments.  The repertoire is quite different thought the fundamentals of body position gender and energy is the same as koten buyoh 古典舞踊 or “Classical Dance.” The many categories of this form we cal nihon buyoh! 

Jiuta Mai

a tenbei fan often used in jiuta mai

Last Sunday I performed at the "In the House Festival." They did a themed event called "The Joys of Japan" and had a dinner made by the fabulous Kikuchi Shozo.  It was delicious!!! and he (and his wife) worked miracles in a small kitchen. Other performers included Alcvin Ramos and Uzume Taiko.  It was a pretty interesting evening.

I decided to dance two pieces that were created to be danced in a small concert situation.  One of them was a jiuta-mai called Kurokami. Jiuta is a kind of music from the Kansai region of Japan (Kyoto and Osaka area) and mai indicates that the dance is slow and circular rather than the lively odori of the kabuki theatre. More info on these styles of nihon buyoh are at an earlier post: http://tomoearts.blogspot.com/2010/03/odori-vs-mai-and-how-it-can-all-be.html

I am not sure whether everyone in the audience appreciated the slooooowwwwneeeessss of the piece, but I know a few did.  It was great to get a chance to perform one of these pieces - and I may need to create some more opportunities to dance jiuta-mai pieces!

Noh in Bloomsburg Pennsylvania

I am rehearsing an English language noh play in Bloomsburg PA at the moment.  The play is called "Crazy Jane" - a gorgeous piece written by David Crandall about a madwoman.  I am playing Jane. No typecasting there!

I have never posted about noh (Medieval Japanese theatre) - only kabuki and nihon buyoh - but noh is something I studied before I started my training in nihon buyoh.  Very different, but there are connections in some of the stories and texts.  I study in the Kita School, with noh expert Richrd Emmert and master noh performer OMURA Sadamu.

I am part of Theatre Nohgaku, a group dedicated to bringing noh to North America. Every year the group meets in Bloomsburg to rehearse, train etc, and I am lucky to be able to be here this year.

For more on noh in general see www.theatrenohgaku.org

Crazy Jane performances are on Friday August 13 and Saturday August 14 - if you happen to be in Bloomsburg ... or in Philidelphia or New York City if you don't mind a 3 hour drive!
Details on the show on the Bloomsburg Theatre Ensemble's website:

http://www.bte.org/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=92&cntnt01origid=140&cntnt01returnid=234