Time to clean some house around here. I’ve got snippets of this and tidbits of that that I need to get rid of, so without further ado, I present: Drew in the Press!
We’re gonna run through these chronologically, with pictures linked at the end of each section. The pictures today are all scans, so if they’re slightly crooked it’s because I scanned them poorly, not because I have no sense of balance…
July – The Great Shamisen Concert Rehearsal!
This one was a classic. Ishikawa-sensei drilled me for two months straight on the same 5 songs which I was to perform at a concert in another city at the close of July. I took this just as seriously as him, playing each day until my hands cramped up and I couldn’t hold the bachi (pick) anymore. On the appointed day all of his students assembled and traveled as a group on a charter bus through the mountains for two hours to a mist-shrouded city way, way south of Beppu. I excitedly changed into my brand new yukata, eagerly assisted by several of my adoptive grandmothers. After a last-minute practice session we hurried out on stage and took our places.
The lights came on, the curtain went up, and there were about 16 people in the “audience.” I might add that I had brought three of them myself… The concert was a bust, there ultimately was no concert, just a dress rehearsal out in the middle of nowhere it seems. The upside though was any apprehension I might have had for sitting on stage and busting out sick shammy riffs was now and forever destroyed by the hilarious anti-climax of the situation.
August – Drew Hot Off the Press
I’m still not sure how or why this one happened… I went to a Friday shamisen group practice and about halfway through it a cute female photographer showed up and started snapping pictures of everyone. (mostly me) At the end of the session she interviewed me briefly and then took leave of us. That was it, no explanation why she was there, who sent her/asked her to come, nothing. A week later I walk into my favorite neighborhood ramen restaurant and my friend, the owner, happily tells me she saw me in the paper that morning! Huh? I was recognized a few more times in public in the coming weeks, the people almost invariably emphatically urging me to continue studying the shamisen. It was nice…
October – Live, at the Beppu Convention Center
This one was legit. Ever year in the fall all the traditional art schools in the area get together for a big performance lasting nearly six hours. Ishikawa and his school were up first, and when the curtain went up inside the philharmonic hall of Beppu’s new convention center we began blowing the minds of well over 1,000 audience members – audience members who had paid to come. Yeah baby! Our school was only onstage for five songs, roughly twenty minutes, but we rocked the house and looked sharp doing it. For this performance I sported an extremely suave black yukata ensemble courtesy of the sensei himself. I actually have a VHS copy of the entire festival, and in the coming days will try and get it transferred to DVD, at which point I can post it here for your enjoyment. In the meantime, these pictures will have to suffice:
