The Yamato Drummers of Japan
Thursday, 17. April 2008, 13:58:10
On Tuesday night the Music Hall in Aberdeen’s city centre reverberated to the rhythmic hammering of stick upon skin as Japan’s Yamato Drummers lit up the stage with a festival of music, choreography, humour and theatrics.
For such a simple object, the Yamato troupe revealed a surprising complexity in the way a drum/gong/cymbal could be used. Drums of all sizes, beats of all strengths, and presentation ranging from brooding to melodic, from displays of sheer poetry to crowd-pleasing interactive ribaldries.
It was all in the timing.
Mainstream drumming, in the Western sense, portrays drummers as stool-bound components in a much larger group of instruments, solid backbones of the musical body. But Western drummers are rarely heard discussed in the same tones of reverence as guitarists are; my music-teaching friend likes to tell the following joke, no doubt referring to the many prospective rock drummers he’s had the pleasure of sending out into the world:
Q) What has three legs and a cunt*?
A) A drum stool!
Japanese drumming, as you might have guessed from the nation that brought us Karate, is a much more lively affair. Even raising and lowering the drumstick affords the opportunity for the drummer to dance, to pose, to spin, and to generally use their whole posture as an artistic accroutrement to his or her music. As such, in the first half the 9 or 10 drummers presented were dressed very much as they would to any acrobatic display: perhaps in Imperial Japan drummers needed the freedom of movement to defend themselves from attacking Samurai at a moment’s notice. And by the prominence of the well-honed shoulder and arm muscles on display, each person on stage, wether male or female, could be relied upon to defend Imperial honour to the Emperor’s full satisfaction.
In drumming, rhythm is everything: it may as well be called ‘hitting’ otherwise. But more than in just their fantastic musical performances, the Yamato group succeeded in creating a rhythm between their members. Even when portraying a clash of styles – Men vs Women, Master Vs Student – the participants were supremely choreographed. As one arm fell, another raised in perfect counterpoint. Rarely do Aberdonians get to see bodily movement as precisely calibrated as this (Particularly not at weekends
).
But perhaps the true genius of the Yamato performance was to keep the audience interested; after a time even the best drumming performances can blend together – akin to painting in only the colour orange. There are only so many tricks you can play before people naturally succumb to boredom and want to see blue, or green. Therefore, fully cognizant of this, a slow track would precede a vibrant, energetic tour-de-force, and strategic use was made of crowd-pleasing hanging drums as large across the diameter as the person hitting it. And solemn musical displays – endlessly impressive - would give way to jokey little skits requiring audience participation.
In the first memorable instance, one of the troupe – the ‘cheeky’ one (following templates clearly laid out for characters in Japanese Animation) – set up a simple Simon Says game for the audience, testing us to repeat an increasingly complicated series of beats, with the obligatory attempts to deceive us. We clapped, we laughed, we were surprisingly good, managing feats of co-ordination that would have made our school music teachers beam with pride. However, in the second half, after a half hour break and a costume change into some gorgeous, full-length, red silk outfits, they went one better. This time around, with the co-operation of the full troupe in accompaniment, the same cheeky chap turned us into part of the orchestra.
After again teaching us a few simple rhythms – and how long he wanted each beat to be, via the comedy device of an ‘inept’ member of the band – he then integrated us into a full-length performance, conducting between three groups of drummers...and the thrilled audience. Again, we rose magnificently to the occasion. 400 people not only clapped in near-perfect synchronicity, we even kept up when our conductor mischievously changed the rhythm on us - a blindingly quick change from four beats down to two!
After that, a standing ovation was the very least we could offer by way of gratitude, and we did, although after all that sustained clapping our hands were really warm with throbbing and were turning red in a few cases!
There’s so much to tell, so much I sadly haven’t got room for here – you absolutely have to experience this for yourselves if you ever get the chance. For an hour and a half we were transported wholesale into another culture, and welcomed into it like Kings. Being live, the drumming was felt in our bones and stomachs, as well as in our hearts and souls (Late on there was some singing that brought emotional lumps to throats all round the theatre). If you fancy something different from the endless obsession with cinema or concert-going, you could do far worse than see this show.
It truly is a world-beater.
For such a simple object, the Yamato troupe revealed a surprising complexity in the way a drum/gong/cymbal could be used. Drums of all sizes, beats of all strengths, and presentation ranging from brooding to melodic, from displays of sheer poetry to crowd-pleasing interactive ribaldries.
It was all in the timing.
Mainstream drumming, in the Western sense, portrays drummers as stool-bound components in a much larger group of instruments, solid backbones of the musical body. But Western drummers are rarely heard discussed in the same tones of reverence as guitarists are; my music-teaching friend likes to tell the following joke, no doubt referring to the many prospective rock drummers he’s had the pleasure of sending out into the world:
Q) What has three legs and a cunt*?
A) A drum stool!
Japanese drumming, as you might have guessed from the nation that brought us Karate, is a much more lively affair. Even raising and lowering the drumstick affords the opportunity for the drummer to dance, to pose, to spin, and to generally use their whole posture as an artistic accroutrement to his or her music. As such, in the first half the 9 or 10 drummers presented were dressed very much as they would to any acrobatic display: perhaps in Imperial Japan drummers needed the freedom of movement to defend themselves from attacking Samurai at a moment’s notice. And by the prominence of the well-honed shoulder and arm muscles on display, each person on stage, wether male or female, could be relied upon to defend Imperial honour to the Emperor’s full satisfaction.
In drumming, rhythm is everything: it may as well be called ‘hitting’ otherwise. But more than in just their fantastic musical performances, the Yamato group succeeded in creating a rhythm between their members. Even when portraying a clash of styles – Men vs Women, Master Vs Student – the participants were supremely choreographed. As one arm fell, another raised in perfect counterpoint. Rarely do Aberdonians get to see bodily movement as precisely calibrated as this (Particularly not at weekends
).But perhaps the true genius of the Yamato performance was to keep the audience interested; after a time even the best drumming performances can blend together – akin to painting in only the colour orange. There are only so many tricks you can play before people naturally succumb to boredom and want to see blue, or green. Therefore, fully cognizant of this, a slow track would precede a vibrant, energetic tour-de-force, and strategic use was made of crowd-pleasing hanging drums as large across the diameter as the person hitting it. And solemn musical displays – endlessly impressive - would give way to jokey little skits requiring audience participation.
In the first memorable instance, one of the troupe – the ‘cheeky’ one (following templates clearly laid out for characters in Japanese Animation) – set up a simple Simon Says game for the audience, testing us to repeat an increasingly complicated series of beats, with the obligatory attempts to deceive us. We clapped, we laughed, we were surprisingly good, managing feats of co-ordination that would have made our school music teachers beam with pride. However, in the second half, after a half hour break and a costume change into some gorgeous, full-length, red silk outfits, they went one better. This time around, with the co-operation of the full troupe in accompaniment, the same cheeky chap turned us into part of the orchestra.
After again teaching us a few simple rhythms – and how long he wanted each beat to be, via the comedy device of an ‘inept’ member of the band – he then integrated us into a full-length performance, conducting between three groups of drummers...and the thrilled audience. Again, we rose magnificently to the occasion. 400 people not only clapped in near-perfect synchronicity, we even kept up when our conductor mischievously changed the rhythm on us - a blindingly quick change from four beats down to two!
After that, a standing ovation was the very least we could offer by way of gratitude, and we did, although after all that sustained clapping our hands were really warm with throbbing and were turning red in a few cases!
There’s so much to tell, so much I sadly haven’t got room for here – you absolutely have to experience this for yourselves if you ever get the chance. For an hour and a half we were transported wholesale into another culture, and welcomed into it like Kings. Being live, the drumming was felt in our bones and stomachs, as well as in our hearts and souls (Late on there was some singing that brought emotional lumps to throats all round the theatre). If you fancy something different from the endless obsession with cinema or concert-going, you could do far worse than see this show.
It truly is a world-beater.
(67%)
Did you dress up for the event? Do people dress up for such shows like when they go to western concerts?
By solid copper, # 18. April 2008, 23:13:08
By GrantTLC, # 18. April 2008, 23:36:44