STAR-BULLETIN / 2000 Kenny Endo brings his taiko drumming to Blaisdell. Endo is the first non-Japanese national to receive a natori (stage name) in hogaku hayashi (Japanese classical drumming). He is also the founder and director of the Taiko Center of the Pacific in Honolulu.

Endo taps into
pulse of his roots

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By Tim Ryan
tryan@starbulletin.com

A traditional Japanese folk tale tells of a woman named Ameterasu who was so angered by the teasing of her brother that she locked herself in a cave, rolled a huge stone across the entrance and vowed never to come out again. The world lay in darkness as the other gods tried pleas, threats and even force to roll back the stone and open the cave, but to no avail.

At last, Uzume, a wild and wily goddess, came along and announced that she could force Ameterasu from the cave. Uzume simply smiled as she opened a sake barrel, dispensed its contents and turned it upside down. Then she began the most boisterous and frenetic dancing upon the head. All around her laughed and sang as she danced and pounded on the barrel. Ameterasu, hearing the commotion outside the cave, rolled away the stone and emerged from the cave.

That's how sunlight returned to the world and the first taiko drum was made.

"A taiko performance is very moving, both emotionally and physically because you can feel that sound in your ears and reverberate through your whole body," said taiko drummer Kenny Endo, who performs with the Honolulu Symphony tonight and Sunday. "Perhaps that's because of the drums are made from natural materials, a solid piece of wood and cowhide."

Endo, who last performed with the Symphony in 1999, is known for synthesizing traditional taiko drum techniques with modern jazz and percussion styles. This weekend, he will perform composer Takeo Kudo's concerto "Let Freedom Ring!" a piece specially written for Endo. Endo has played with Kudo several times before.

The concerto was inspired, in part, by those Japanese Americans interned during WWII. Throughout the work, motives and phrases of this song, along with those of the Japanese national anthem, "Kimigayo," are embedded in the musical texture to express the divided feelings of the Japanese Americans for their adopted country and the land of their roots, Endo said.

But it's no easy task combining taiko with a symphony. "It's two very different forms of music," he said.

"The success of this collaboration includes the composition itself, but (Kudo) did a lot of research and has a strong background in Japanese music and consulted with me a lot," Endo said. "A lot of credit has to go to symphony conductor Sam Wong, who made my job easier in letting me be a soloist, so they had to follow me."

There are also practical reasons why taiko and classical music can clash.

"I can't hit the drums as hard as I normally might, or it would drown out the orchestra," Endo said. "In the first performance, I used a huge drum which was probably too loud, but this time, I'm just bringing a big drum."

"Let Freedom Ring!" was specifically designed for Endo and three instruments.

Endo will use a kotsuzumi, a small, hourglass-shaped hand drum about a foot long and 10 inches in diameter; a shime-daiko, a small, lashed stick drum with two skins tied with ropes and hit with bachi, or drumsticks; and an odaiko, the largest of the drums, made from a solid piece of wood coming from a 250-year-old tree.

Some of Endo's odaikos weigh 350 pounds, are 7 feet long and require eight people to lift it onto its stand. He purchases all his performance drums from Miyamoto Taiko in Tokyo, drum maker to the emperor of Japan.

BORN AND raised in Los Angeles, Endo began early training in drums and percussion for performance with jazz, fusion and classical artists. He then discovered his roots through the Japanese taiko and in 1975 began working first with Kinnara Taiko of Los Angeles and then with the San Francisco Taiko Dojo.

Endo is the first non-Japanese national to receive a natori (stage name) in hogaku hayashi (Japanese classical drumming). He's known as Mochizuki Tajiro in the classical hogaku world. Endo is also founder and director of the Taiko Center of the Pacific in Honolulu.

At 26, he pondered whether to move from San Francisco to New York and concentrate on the drum set, or Japan to study taiko. He chose taiko.

"Taiko really is a synthesis of rhythm, movement and spirit embedded in Japanese culture," Endo said.

In olden days, Japanese village boundaries were set by the distance you could hear the taiko from the village temple. Taikos were used in peasant festivals to mimic the sounds of animals, wind, ocean, thunder or fire in attempts to please or appease the gods. In kabuki, taiko play a central role in the orchestra to create soundscapes that place the actors in the mountains, at a seashore or in a lonely castle garden.

"It is ingrained," Endo said. "Whether dancing at a festival, praying in a temple, watching a theater performance or fighting a battle, the sound of the taiko was part of everyday Japanese life for hundreds, maybe even thousands, of years."

A combination of beats Featuring taiko drummer Kenny Endo and the Honolulu Symphony, Samuel Wong conducting Where: Blaisdell Concert Hall When: 8 p.m. today and 4 p.m. Sunday Tickets: $15 to $57 Call: 792-2000

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