Yesterday we had the biggest annual event that we have each year: my wife’s dance show. I’m going to post some pictures later, but first I thought I’d write a little background to the shows, and my relationship to them.
It’s amazing, really. They’ve been doing it in November every year for the last 26 years, making this year’s show the 27th one. The first show was when Kika started Primary School, and she has only missed one—when she was in 3rd Year at Junior High School, and was supposed to be studying hard for High School entrance exams. It’s hard for me to imagine now, but she says that when she was little she was far from the best dancer, and she didn’t even really want to dance.
These days Kika is of course the lead dancer, and she choreographs about a third of the dances too—usually Hip Hop numbers. The rest of the choreography is by her mum, Chiwako, and a guest dancer from Tokyo, Mori-sensei, usually does two dances too. I’m not sure when Kika started choreographing, but her dances seem to get better and better every year; this year was no exception.
The first dance show I went to was back in 2002. I didn’t really know Kika at that point, but my friend Josh had joined Status (which is the name of the dance studio—don’t ask me why) so I went to see him dance. I didn’t take any pictures—at that point I wouldn’t have been allowed to anyway—but I remember it was very cool, and Josh tap danced to Fever.
In 2003, Josh’s last show, I had a bad cold and ended up not going (and he’s never let me hear the end of it). So the next one I saw was in 2004—having started seeing Kika in April of the same year. I actually forgot to take my camera, so the only pictures I have are from my keitai, whose screen they graced as wallpaper for at least the next year.
For 2005’s show, by which time we were married, I remembered my camera, but at that time all I had was a Canon PowerShot A40—great for snaps, but useless for the harsh lighting conditions and fast movement of a dance show. So it wasn’t until 2006, when dad gave us a nice new Nikon D50, that I began to really take pictures of the show itself.
I got my first practice with the D50 in September, when Status had its Petit Debut in Akita. To my knowledge they hadn’t had a show in Akita City before, nor have they since—much to the dismay of my adult Eikaiwa students who can’t make it down to Honjo for the main show. It took place in the smaller hall of the Akita City Bunka Kaikan, and I sat very close to the stage, and slightly off to the side. So it was relatively easy to shoot. Sitting close up means you get a little more light on your sensor, allowing you to get higher shutter speeds at lower ISO numbers, which means your pictures come out clearer, more often in focus, and cleaner. It’s also very helpful when all you have is an 18-55mm f / 3.5-5.6 lens.
This experience came in handy for the 2006 show in Honjo. And I got an even greater opportunity when Chiwako asked me to come to the full dress rehearsal which they do in the afternoon before the evening show. (In Japanese, they call this the ゲネプロ genepro, which apparently comes from the German Generalprobe, meaning rehearsal.) Before that I wasn’t even aware that they did a dress rehearsal, and of course the photo opportunities are great: in contrast to the show itself when I am stuck in my seat (admittedly the best seat in the house, but I’m still stuck in it), in the dress rehearsal I’m largely free to move around, so I can get up close, and I can mentally note the timing of the difficult shots (such as jumps and quick actions) that I want to take my second time through.
There was just one problem in 2006: I didn’t have a spare battery, and I forgot to bring my charger. So shortly after the rehearsal finished I found myself with a dead camera, and no way to bring it back to life. I ended up borrowing a Canon EOS Kiss Digital and using it, but the lens really wasn’t up to much—especially at the distance I was sitting. It came in handy for the finale and pictures after the show had finished, but not much else.
For 2007’s show I was much better prepared, with a spare battery, as well as the 18-70mm f / 3.5-4.5 lens my brother Magnus gave me in the summer. I went to the dress rehearsal, and got most of the shots I wanted there, leaving me free to aim for the more difficult shots in the show itself, as I had planned the year before. But the results were slightly less than I had hoped, and I began to realise that perhaps my equipment was to blame.
Preparing for this year’s show, I first decided to upgrade my camera, so in October I bought a Nikon D90 along with the obligatory spare battery and a whole host of 8GB SDHC memory cards (Now atonishingly cheap at about 1,800 yen each). The latest Nikons are renowned for their low-light performance, which is exactly what I’m looking for. My father has a D700, which he loves, and he advised me to get a D90 since it has a lot of the same technology for a fraction of the price. It would be nice someday to upgrade to a D700, but for now I’m more interested in the other important factor: lenses.
I did some research on lenses, including asking my father, and it seems that what I really need are the f / 2.8 lenses (24-70mm and 70-200mm). Unfortunately these cost around 200,000 yen each, so I won’t be getting them any time soon—maybe I will get the 24-70 in time for next year’s show.
Having given up on that for the time being, a week before the show one of my co-workers suddenly offered to lend me his Sigma 70-200mm f / 2.8 lens! I couldn’t have been happier, as it’s exactly what I wanted to try (even if it’s not Nikkor). Thankfully he also lent me his monopod, because the camera is rather heavy with that lens attached, and holding it up for almost two hours straight would not have been possible. It would also have meant a lot of hand-shaking, and the Sigma lens doesn’t have VR.
So I ended up going to this year’s show with my D90, two lenses, and a total of 42GB of memory cards. Given that I ended up filling every single card to the last image, you will understand why it might take me a while to get the pictures sorted through. But I will try and post some as soon as I can.
Kabuki-za to be latest victim of Tokyo development
Kika and I visited the Kabuki-za theatre (歌舞伎座) on our short trip to Tokyo last summer with Chiwako-san and Dr Maebashi. It’s a beautiful old building—one of very few remaining such buildings in Tokyo other than temples, in fact—and it naturally drew my interest. I ended up taking more pictures of Kabuki-za than anything else during our two days in Tokyo.
It seems our visit was timely, because now I hear that it’s going to be demolished—to be replaced with a 37-storey high-rise building.
Kabuki (歌舞伎) is one of the two major forms of traditional Japanese drama (the other being Noh). It has been popular since the 1600s, and continues to attract audiences today. Located in Ginza (銀座), Tokyo’s famous up-market shopping and entertainment district, Kabuki-za is the most famous venue for Kabuki in Tokyo.
All of the actors are men, including those who play female characters. It’s a very traditional art. Women did in fact act in Kabuki long ago, but they were banned during the Edo period, beginning in the early 17th century. I have suggested to various people that women should be allowed to act in it again, but the reaction is usually just a bemused expression. 400 years is a long time, and Japan is still a bit behind in its gender equality.
According to Wikipedia, Kabuki-za opened in 1889, and it has been rebuilt numerous times since due to earthquakes, fires, bombing during the wars, and so on. The last time was after World War II, when it was rebuilt on the model of the 1924 building.
I read the story about Kabuki-za on the BBC News web site back in November. Ever since then I’ve been wanting to write up my own thoughts on the issue, but I’ve only just now finally got my blog set up properly to present photographs.
Apparently one of the complaints about the current building is that there are not enough toilets, and it’s just not modern enough—no earthquake-proofing, and not comfortable enough for the modern audiences. The new high-rise building will house the theatre on the lower floors, along with all the conveniences of modernity—including presumably lots of toilets.
Kabuki-za is owned by a private company, Shochiku, which is quite famous in Japan. Unlike many western theatres, Kabuki-za does not enjoy government subsidies or grants; Kabuki is in many ways just another business. One of their plans for the new building is to lease office space on the upper floors, to generate some extra income.
It seems clear that without some sort of public funding the plans for demolition are going to continue. I have heard that an American company attempted to make a deal to provide funding, but that Shochiku refused it. Given how iconically Japanese Kabuki-za is, I’m not surprised. If anyone is going to save this beautiful old building, it’s going to have to be the locals.
Kabukiza stands out as a bastion of traditional architecture among the endless drab high-rises that make up most of Tokyo’s vast urban sprawl. By all means the interior should be renovated and modernised, but to demolish it and replace it with another faceless grey concrete box is I believe to destroy one of the last remnants of a lost art. It will be a sad day when that happens. And unfortunately it seems likely that the development plans will go ahead as planned.