Photo by Lucienne van der Mijle.
Since 1993, the Yamato Master Drummers of Japan have been mesmerizing audiences worldwide with their inimitable blend of athleticism, symmetry, and subtlety. In preparing for their December 2 Massey Hall concert, I have been watching and re-watching the videos on their website. I urge you to do the same.
Warning: they are addictive. I’m totally hooked.
Precision like this comes at a high physical cost. For four months, they rehearse together in the historic city of Asuka in preparation for a touring schedule than can only be described as relentless. On tour there is little time, if any, to see the sights: they are constantly maintaining both themselves and their instruments. In their own words:
We make it a rule to start a day with a morning run. After running and eating breakfast, it’s time for training until we enter the theatre. We swing thick drum sticks in the air, do sit-ups, train our back, do squat exercise and do any other kind of exercise. The muscles which we train are inevitable to express ourselves on stages. It has already been three months since we began the 2009 Yamato EU Tour. As we repeatedly unpack and repack all of our equipment, wear and tear begins to show. If we don’t perform a little maintenance every day, it becomes overwhelming. Today we are fixing up the cover for our four shaku (121.2 cm) Odaiko. We have to sew up all the little holes and tears. This cover is very important because it has to protect our “guardian angel” Odaiko.
Their commitment to music, instrument, and body put the Yamato Drummers in a category all their own, one in which the disciplines of training, performance, and travel blur effortlessly into devotion. If music was considered a sport and eligible for the Olympics, then the Yamato Master Drummers of Japan would likely be gold-medal favorites.
To the IOC: please don’t get any bright ideas.
Newfoundland jazz trumpeter Patrick Boyle is doctoral student in Performance at the University of Toronto, and a Junior Fellow at Massey College. Patrick can be heard on over forty recordings and two critically acclaimed solo albums: Still No Word (2008) and Hold Out (2005).
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