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On Ensemble friend and fellow taiko player, Carrie Carter, is organizing a retreat to Bali to study kecak. Shoji, Maz, and I have been practicing kecak-inspired rhythms recently as we re-work Recycled Beats. This retreat would be the perfect thing!

From Carrie…

Anyone interested in learning rhythms in a new way to help inform your taiko skills? I’m working with Yeeman Mui to organize a retreat to Bali in May 2012 at the Bona Alit Art Space specifically for taiko players. While we hope to incorporate taiko more directly in the future, the 2012 retreat will focus on the art of kecak and developing the ability to layer multiple-part rhythms.

I Gusti Rai popularized kecak as an art form with the 1992 film, Baraka. His son, Bona Alit, runs the Bona Alit Art Space (www.bona-alit.com) and welcomes anyone who wants to learn the music of Bali into his home. We’ll spend 7-10 days at the resort in Bona amongst the rice paddies, eat and take lessons together in kecak with plenty of time for enjoying the vibrant local culture.

Are you interested in joining us? Send me a message (allthingstaiko -at- gmail -dot- com) if you’d like more information!

If you’ve never seen kecak before, check out this video of Bona Alit’s crew:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ECvnZWLN-m4

Some photos of the art space:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150353008050872.351993.702325871&type=1&l=d96c251cc8

For those of you considering dumping your commercial bank today, here is a quick overview of my experience with Wescom Credit Union.

Frustrated by the commercial banking industry’s home loan fiasco, I cancelled my Wells Fargo account and switched to Wescom Credit Union. Wescom membership is available to anyone who lives, works, or goes to school in Southern California. Having used the credit union for about two years now, I’m glad I made the switch. The in-person and phone service is good and I appreciate having my money at a local institution versus an international bank. All credit unions are part of an ATM network, allowing withdrawals across institutions. Imagine that!… financial institutions working together! Compared to a mega-bank like Chase, there are still fewer total ATMs, but once I learned a few key ATM locations, this has not been a burden for me. My debit card works through the Visa system so there was no change in making purchases by card. I lost my card once and Wescom quickly sent me a replacement. It was surprisingly hassle-free.

The switch was frustrating initially because checks I had deposited took longer than expected to clear and I overdrafted the account. And even now with the transition complete, I’m not sure that a credit union is the perfect solution to my fundamental concerns about capitalism and consumerism. Credit unions are still fractional-reserve institutions and make interest-bearing loans. But while it’s not as revolutionary as I might want, Wescom has been a good step up from Wells Fargo.

Thanks to Ze Sen and the members of Kazan Taiko for a lot of bon-taiko fun on Thursday. We did a bit of basics, learned Helio, and then individuals arranged short solos. Thank you everyone!

Winnepeg taiko player, Margaret McKenty, came to LA for three days of lessons. We spent Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday working on shime technique, upright basics, and slant form and movement. Thank you for all the fun, Margaret!

My shamisen friend, Yasoyo Sensei, helped to organize a fundraiser to raise money for repairs to the tea room at Koyasan Temple. I played a very short excerpt from a shamisen piece I’m preparing for my teacher’s next visit in March, and my recent solo slant-drum stuff. Thank you to all the enthusiastic audience members who made the event a success!

My sister’s family is so inspiring! Check out this article about Dan’s work as elementary-school principal. After switching the entire school to computers running free software (gnu/linux), he made the school solar-powered and instituted healthy, local, home-made foods in the lunch program. Go Dan Go!

http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20111023/GREEN01/110230305/-Vermont-sort-independence-?odyssey=nav|head

Hello taiko friends! Our next slant-drum event has been set! Join me to prepare for it!

I’m arranging a battle at JCI Gardens (Gardena) on March 11 at approximately 1pm. It will be similar in form to what we did at Taiko Conference but with “Singles” and “Doubles” categories. The event will be outside and will precede an On Ensemble / shamisen concert Hiro and I are producing. I imagine we’ll get together in pairs and small groups between now and then to practice and I’ll assign battle partners once we get closer. Each player will have about 90 seconds to play.

Let me know if you’re interested (email kris at On Ensemble dot org) and I’ll send available dates for getting together to practice. If you know of others who might be interested, please pass this info along.

Let the slant-nanigans begin!

The KUSC radio program “Spotlight on the Arts” interviewed me regarding our upcoming performance at Armstrong Theater. Here is the blurb they created.

http://www.kusc.org/Episodes.aspx?PID=2146