We finished warming up and stretching. Then they played the simple piece that they would, in the three hours, teach us to play. I was a bit skeptical, but hey, aim high.

Pardon my sentimental blubbering. A few days ago in a shinnenkai celebration, with cheers, laughter and more than a few damp eyes, we welcomed two new members to Odaiko New England: Greg and Shane. It was with enormous pride in their efforts, accomplishments and promise that we bestowed on them in our welcome ceremony the [...]

Yesterday morning I swam 10,000 yards (5.68 miles/9.14 km)  in about 2 hours 38 minutes–the longest swimming workout of my life. I was participating in a special New Year’s event for Cambridge Masters Swim Club.  The swim was broken up into units of 100 yards swum on timed intervals.  I chose 1 minute 35 second [...]

I cannot believe the amazing taiko opportunities that 2009 has brought me. I was lucky enough to have played in at least 33 shows. Each one taught me something about taiko, performance or myself. I decided to write down a thought about each one as way to summarize my year. My snow driving skills put [...]

“We’re gathering our extended taiko family for the holidays,” I wrote on our website to promote ONE’s 2nd annual Winter Extravaganza.   It was an ironic statement for me, since my own family would not be coming. And so it was that I left my taiko widower and orphans at home to take part in our [...]

If you are a taiko player in North America striving to be the best player you can be (whatever that might mean personally to you), then at some point you have probably thought to yourself: I should really go study in Japan. Then you say to yourself…”Self, what kind of crazy idea is that? You [...]

Saturday night we performed for Zenshinkan Dojo, an Aikido Dojo in Worcester, to celebrate their 20th anniversary. Close to 100 members were gathered to recognize two decades of hard work. People got up and told passionate stories of commitment, personal transformation, friendships, and people working tirelessly on behalf of the group.  And they talked about [...]

A handful of ONE’ers met at Charles River Canoe and Kayak in Newton for an afternoon of grueling paddling — just for fun.  Taiko players are like that. I was nominated to write our blog post because I took the pictures.  This puts me in an awkward position — it seems indelicate to boast about [...]

With festival pieces like “Matsuri” and “Shin-en” in our repertoire, it was only natural that Odaiko New England would be invited to perform for the Allston Village Street Fair. Dubbed an “urban Mardi Gras”, this event featured many different bands and performers, and we were thrilled to be adding taiko to the musical stew for [...]

I came home from Taiko Conference energized and wanting to practice all the time.  Husband Matt and I both decided to follow along with 30 Days to Better Shime: Round 3, which would mean that we’d need appropriate equipment.  We either needed to continue borrowing shime from the Odaiko New England drum closet, or get [...]