By Lydia Gidwitz
Contributing Writer
"When it gets that intense, you get into a zone which has never happened before. There is a raw energy that Taiko has," Raiki Machida '07 recently told The Herald.
Machida and Joshua Goldner '05 first brought the ancient form of Japanese drumming, Taiko, to the University by creating a group, Brown Taiko, in the fall of 2004. Not only is the group performing Taiko, but Machida and Goldner also brought Japanese teachers to teach the group how to make the drums.
Taiko was initially used in battle but has been incorporated in religious and spiritual ceremonies. Now, Taiko, which is the name of the art form as well as the drums themselves, is a popular musical genre in Japan.
Though he first became interested in Taiko as a high school student in Singapore, Machida realized his passion for the genre while visiting Taiko teachers in the northern Japanese town of Miyagi the summer before he came to Brown.
His teachers, Takao Harida and Satoko Nambu, showed Machida how to build drums and also taught him about the unique culture surrounding Taiko.
At Brown, Machida decided he wanted to "teach any interested kid how to make drums and how to play drums." So he started the Teach/Build Project, which shows students how to create Taiko drums.
Machida raised enough money to bring his Taiko teachers to Providence, with financial support coming from the Office of the Provost, the dean of the College, the Undergraduate Finance Board, the Japanese Cultural Association, the Department of East Asian Studies and the Program in Visual Arts, alums and others,
Since arriving on Aug. 22, his teachers have been "building drums nonstop," Machida said.
With support from Richard Fishman, professor of visual art, Brown Taiko moved into a studio space at Tockwotten Street to make drums with Machida's Japanese Taiko teachers. In two weeks, they had made five drums: four 3-to-4-foot drums and one 4.5-by-4.5-foot drum that weighs 250 pounds.
Machida described the difficult process of making the drums, which will continue all semester. First, the group forms barrels out of two-by-fours. They then take raw cowhide from slaughterhouses and use carjacks to stretch it over the barrels.
"I want to make a drum group that is well known throughout the East Coast," Machida said.
With performances at WaterFire downtown, Cornell University, Tufts University and Sayles Hall, that goal is becoming a reality.
"We sold out at Sayles - at least 400 people came. We had such an amazing response," Machida said.
"I started off a jazz drummer. But, there is an intensity level with these drums that you don't see with any other instrument," Machida said.
