Thursday, October 20, 2011

Winding Down for 2011...? Naaah!

Wow, it's already the end of October 2011!  Fall is here and Halloween is right around the corner. 

At the beginning of this year, we announced many exciting events such as the World Festival of Sacred Music concert and the release of our new DVD.  Now, in the later half of the year, we are already planning for 2012 (and we have some BIG plans in the making!).

Our DVD is now on sale! 
We will sell them at select performances as well as have them available at the following location:
Shumei America
2430 E. Colorado Blvd.
Pasadena, CA 91107
Tel: (626) 584-8841
Hrs: Mon-Fri, 9am-5pm

You can call in and purchase a copy over the phone or come directly during business hours to pick one up!  DVDs are $15.00 each (+$3.00 shipping fee if delivery is required). 

For a brief preview of the footage in the DVD (professionally shot and edited by the amazing Kazu Domae), check out the Makoto Taiko trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMWQkmBF6I0


The World Festival of Sacred Music (WSFM) concluded on October 16th.  For this wonderful 16-day event, Makoto Taiko performed a 1-hour concert at CSULA's World Arts Day on October 8th.  We were the only taiko group to present a full solo concert during the festival.  It was a great honor for us to share our taiko music and spirituality with an audience of roughly 800 people.  Marudashi TV, a program that airs on UTB Hollywood 18, came to shoot footage of our concert.  They previously visited one of our practices and interviewed several Japanese-American members for their program.  You can see the complete 27-minute feature that was aired recently on Marudashi TV.
Marudashi TV is also in the process of airing the footage from our WSFM concert this week and next week.  If you can view UTB channel 18, please tune in next Tuesday, October 25 at 7pm or 10:30pm!


This year has been full of great performance events for Makoto Taiko.  It seems that more and more people are hearing about us and our focus on spirituality through "makoto." 

Our next performance will be on October 30th, Sunday in Santa Monica for the 4th Annual Daniel Pearl World Music Days concert, a worldwide event held in honor of the American journalist who had been captured by Al-Qaeda in 2002 and subsequently beheaded. 
Daniel Pearl World Music Days events are held in many cities throughout the world with the aim of using "the power of music to reaffirm our commitment to tolerance and humanity."  If you are near the Santa Monica area, please join us at 2pm for this FREE special event at:
First Presbyterian Church of Santa Monica
1220 2nd Street, Santa Monica, CA


We still have many exciting events coming up~!  Stay tuned!