Banging the drum

Tue 5 Dec 2017

The performers of the Japanese Kodo ensemble will be bringing their superb drumming skills to our theatre in February. We take a look at the company and its history.

Kodo is probably the best-known ambassadors for the Japanese tradition of taiko performance. Taiko is the Japanese for drum, and ensemble drumming of the kind practiced by Kodo is a long-standing Japanese tradition. However, this particular group were originally founded in 1981. Their name has a dual meaning Japanese – it can be read as either ‘heartbeat’  or ‘drum children’. For the founders of Kodo, the heartbeat is the primal source of the human attraction to rhythm. They claim that the pounding of their drums can actually send babies to sleep, because it resembles the noise of a mother’s heartbeat. (We don’t actually recommend you bring small children to the performance to test this out!).

Although based in Japan, on Sado Island – where several generations of Kodo drummers have trained – the company spends at least a third of each year touring overseas. In fact, their very first performance as an ensemble was outside Japan, when they performed as part of the Berlin Festival in 1981.

Kodo strives to both preserve and re-interpret Japanese performing arts. They now collaborate with artists from across the world, and from many genres. The title of their new show, Evolution, refers to this aim of development. However, it is evolution, not revolution – they continue to respect tradition, and are still performing signature pieces which have been part of their repertoire from the beginning.

The man behind the Kodo’s evolution in recent years has been their artistic director, Tamasaburo Bando, who took over the role in 2012, having collaborated with Kodo on several works in the proceeding years. He is a man who is completely immersed in Japanese artistic traditions, as as well as his work with Kodo, he is one of the most celebrated Kabuki theatre performers currently working in Japan. He is an onnagata, meaning he specialises in playing female roles (all Kabuki actors are men). As well as performing, he also frequently directs. In 2012, not long after he took up his role with Kodo, the Japanese government designated him an Important Intangible Cultural Property Holder, or – slightly more informally – a Living National Treasure.

Kodo: Evolution: Sunday 4 February