• Top
• Profile
• Performances
• Photos
• Japanese

Yuzuriha

Yuzuriha is a four-member taiko group from Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture.  Their performances include traditional pieces, original arrangements, and original works.  The main instruments include three types of taiko (nagado, big and medium oke-taiko, and shime-taiko).  Additional instruments include flute (shinobue) and shamisen (tsugaru shamisen). Ｉn spring 2008, we conducted the first US tour in Indiana and Ohio, which was a big success, thanks to many people's help and advice.

Performance Video

Kochi (Composed by Kimura Shunsuke)

Takeda-no-Komoriuta....Sunayama (Arranged by Kimura Shunsuke)

Hanamichi (Composed by Yuzuriha)

Kizashi (Composed by Hayashida Hiroyuki)

The pieces above were all performed at Kanazawa Institute of Technology, on July 11, 2009,
and videotaped and edited by Karisan Eizo.

Shingetsu at Ishikawa no Taiko by Kimura Shunsuke, May 10, 2009.

Scott and Yuzuriha's Dream US Tour 2008 (slide show, 5 minutes)

What's New

Taiko as a musical instrument

Yuzuriha uses several instruments--maily taiko, shamisen and shinobue. Shamisen and shinobue are not very beginner-friendly. Usually it takes months or even years for beginners to produce decent sounds using these instruments, and many people give up on them before they achieve that. Compared to those instruments, taiko is a very bebinner-friendly instrument. You can produce nice sound even when you first try it, and that makes you very happy. Yet it is not that easy to produce very good sound with taiko. You need a lot of patience and special skills to improve your taiko skills.

In winter, we don't have many chances to perform as a group, so we practice our own instruments by ourselves every day. We need to practice individually to listen to our own sound and struggle to produce a little nicer sound every time, then practice together once a week to see if we have made any progress as individual musicians. Although taiko looks very beginner-friendly, it is a hard instrument to produce very nice sound with. You really need to face your skills and techniques, and try to learn something from yourself and the instrument every time you play it.

Performances

Back to the top of the page