Longview, WA - reGeneration - 3.19.11

This past weekend, the TAIKOPROJECT stormed the Pacific Northwest and visited the small-town of Longview, Washington. Longview is a quaint town about an hour north of Portland, OR, so this show was a special event for me personally, as it was the first show that my parents were able to see. The Suda family originates out of Portland, OR, so it was a relatively short journey to experience taiko a la TAIKOPROJECT.

Team DTK (Darren, Tricia, and Kevin) left LAX in the late afternoon on Thursday, the 17th, in order to land and prepare for the following day's school show. The flight was delayed 30min as we had to wait for a crewmember who was running late. The funny thing is, the stewardess announced their colleague's tardiness over the intercom, instead of making up some excuse for them. Good friend.

Darren, Yumi, and myself entertaining ourselves while we waited to take off.

After running across the Seattle Airport to catch our connecting flight (we actually had to catch a train to get to the other side of the airport), we landed at PDX in the late evening. We were greeted by our driver, Ned Piper, who was a Longview native that had deep roots in the town, dating back to its inception in the early 1900s. We learned all about Longview and the interesting story of the Columbia Theatre, which was saved inadvertently by the Mt. St. Helens eruption in May of 1980. Apparently, the theatre was set to be torn down, but the St. Helens eruption required use of the town's heavy machinery, which gave Longview locals enough time to rally and raise money to keep it open.

After it's extensive renovation, the theatre looks beautiful! So in a way...thanks Mt. St. Helens.

photo courtesy of universetoday.com	photo courtesy of cplinc.com

Friday's school show brought roughly 100 students ranging from middle school up through high school. We performed our shortened school show set and afterwards had the kids come up to learn some taiko basics. After the show, we spiked for Saturday's show and hit the road back to our hotel.

It was on Friday night that we discovered the perfect set of tights for Tomomi. We found them at Target while searching for clear tape. Aren't they perfect?!

The second half of the team (Jen, John, Scott, Liz, and Courtney) arrived later that night and after a short dinner at the local Shari's, we hit the hay.

Showtime. Saturday we were prepping all day for the big show. Right before we went on, we got a message from the Getty cast (the other half of the group was performing at the Getty Museum in LA earlier that same day). They had posted a fun-loving picture after their successful show.

In anticipation of our own performance, we decided to take our own picture. (see if you can match up who's who!)

For this show, I was particularly nervous because I wanted to make sure that the first reGen show my parents saw was a great experience. The show went pretty well, and the crowd was very receptive. We saw many of the students from the school show, which was nice because they got to see the full production.

Mom and Dad loved the show! While it could have been cleaner at points, I'm just glad they finally got to see TP in action. Almost three years of hearing about rehearsals and tours, but now they got to experience the show!

It was so nice to be back in the Pac. NW and to see my parents, but it was also nice to return to LA and SoCal. I'll always love going home to Portland, but my taiko family is here in LA!

Getty Center, Los Angeles

The March 19th weekend was a bustling weekend for TAIKOPROJECT. While half the cast traveled to Longview, Washington to do their reGeneration show (see Kevin's awesome post above), the other half stayed behind to perform at the beautiful Getty Center in Los Angeles as a part of its Family Festival series. There were many performances and shows that day, and we were one of many. We even had the pleasure of watching Chinese acrobats perform on stage just as we were loading in!

Despite FREEZING afternoon weather on a chilly and overcast day, the cast made performing in short sleeved and sleeveless tops look easy! The 1 hour show was great and everyone had a blast. Check out the pics, below (photo credit and special thanks to Hiro)!

The ending of Here We Go Now, which was our opening piece of the afternoon.

The debut of our brand new shishi! It kind of needs a haircut...but Brian did a great job with it nonetheless.

Our fue stars in Island Groove, Yuri and Brian! Plus, some support from the Groovettes: Keiko, Emily and me.

Many Sides was a fun piece (as it always is), and it helped us warm up in the cold!

This was definitely a "har har" candid moment that Hiro so cleverly captured. That's Andrew and Emily standing in matching poses...and I don't think they were doing it intentionally. Who was copying whom? I'll let you decide.

All in all, a really fun gig, especially for those of us who either had never been to the Getty, or had not visited in years. It's such a beautiful venue with great people, and a stunning view. DEF felt the TP love that weekend! (ALSO see Kevin's post for the second picture that came after this one...and the Longview cast's rendition. Haha)

Special thanks and TP love also to Hal and Lisa from Bombu for transporting members and equipment; Dok and Melissa for manning the Merchandise table; Hiro for photos, and Hiroka-san for helping us lug drums around! We couldn't have had a successful performance without you!

The Shishi Restoration Project - Part 1

TP recently acquired a shishi gashira (lion mask) on Ebay for a great price of $150! Normally, shishi gashira can be $2000 - $5000 brand new. It's a little smaller than our current shishi, but still a pretty good size. It was a little dingy too, so I thought it would be a fun project to refurbish it, and it would make it possible for TP to do a two-person shishimai. Also, thought it would be fun to document the process to share with our friends and fans! It isn't quite all finished yet, but we've made a lot of progress so far and wanted to share--so here we go...

Here's the back of the shishi. A small dowel holds the jaw part on the mask.

This shishi also had a tongue attached to the bottom of the mouth. The ears come off too.

In my years of doing shishimai, I have always enjoyed using shishi gashira that has a mouth that can open wide. Unfortunately, this shishi has a small mouth opening, but with a little surgery...we can make the mouth open wider. Here is the jaw as it was before surgery.

Here is the jaw post-surgery. Basically all I did was make an angled cut on the jaw to make more space for the jaw to open up.

Here's the original.

Here's the new mouth opening, increased maybe 1 1/2-2"! Next step...painting--

First coat--Krylon spray paint, fire engine red, with black accent areas taped over. Here's the jaw and the tongue.

With the tape taken off, old black accents exposed.


The whole mask after the paint job.

Tape removed.


After painting black accents and gold teeth.

From the side.

New handle attached on the back of the shishi gashira. Nothing too fancy, but hopefully will allow the shishi person to control the mask well.

Handle taped up with black tape. Next in Part 2, we'll bring in Yuri, who is making a new cape for the shishi, we'll add the hair, and then Shishi #2 will be good to go!