I recently judged a taiko competition. Along with David Wells and Mike Hirota, we picked winners in "Blossom Bash", a naname (slant-drum) battle organized by Alex Ito for collegiate taiko players. I was glad to have been a part of the event -- it was well-attended, warm-hearted, and participants had a good time -- but I left wondering about taiko competition generally, and how it might help or hurt the U.S. taiko community. Here is my attempt to explore the risks and benefits to taiko, and brainstorm how we might best approach competition.
Is competition healthy?
Outside the U.S., taiko competition has been around for decades. Japan and Brazil have long had regular ensemble and soloist competitions, with some groups existing solely for that purpose. The four founders of Sukeroku Taiko, the inventors of naname style, were winning festival competitors. U.S. professionals, Tiffany Tamaribuchi and Isaku Kageyama, are respected for having won odaiko competitions in Japan.
Until recently, however, taiko competitions have been rare in the U.S., and the few that have occurred have met gentle resistance. Organizers of the 2023 and 2024 Taiko Taikai odaiko competitions in Los Angeles, for example, were rejected for grant funding from North American taiko's main granting organization, citing reluctance to support competition. When I started the Matsuri Crashers battles about 10 years ago, a number of taiko leaders reached out to me to share their concerns. To paraphrase them as I best I remember; "Our community needs collaborative concepts instead of competition's combative analogies," "Art shouldn't be judged," "The world's best players don't need competition, so battles will only feature low- to mid-level players," "True art won't fit in competition's boxes, so battles are unlikely to produce ground-breaking work."
Then, and now, I'm sympathetic to these arguments. They all seem potentially true. But I also see how competition serves a critical role in art forms as diverse as classical music and hip-hop dance. Hip hop dance is staggeringly creative and utilized competition to grow from Bronx battles to transforming dance around the world. In classical music, competition's role is no less significant. I frequently attend performances by LA Phil and the program lists awards at every level: the award-winning soloist is backed by award-winning orchestral musicians led by an award-winning conductor to perform music by an award-winning composer. Wikipedia lists over 400 competitions worldwide for various classical music categories.
One might argue that classical music and hip hop are more vibrant artforms than taiko, with more participants, greater musical output and artistic variety, and superior commercial impact. If indeed competition is benefitting other thriving art forms, might taiko benefit from competition too?
Having returned to the topic recently has given me a new way to view it. I realized that by thinking of the risks in two categories -- the "artistic" and the "social" risks -- I can better see that competition appears to threaten one and not the other.
First, the social risks.
Resilient community
The U.S. taiko community is uniquely loving and cooperative, so it's natural to worry about introducing competition. Might we tear our social fabric by pitting players and groups against each other?
Thus far, I think the answer is "no". It appears that goodwill and social awareness are steering competitions' design, implementation, and reception. In the planning and marketing of the few U.S. taiko competitions that have occurred, organizers have strongly emphasized inclusivity and good sportsmanship, and the participants have lived up to these ideals. I spoke with six of the 2023 Taikai participants, and all of them expressed appreciation for the comradery of their fellow competitors. To paraphrase a few; "Even though we were competing, it felt like we were all on the same team." "We all agreed she should have won." "I liked the pressure to practice and be my best." At the recent "Blossom Bash" battle, both inexperienced and advanced players enthusiastically played against and alongside each other, with everyone rooting for the underdog. Competitors gave each other high-fives. The 2024 Taikai seemed similarly good natured. And in the battles I organized, I never saw cut-throat competitiveness. Losing participants were gracious, even with inconsistent judging. The competitions appear to have brought participants closer.
This could change, of course. If the stakes of competition were to increase, for example, or if our community make-up changes, or if competitions come to be run by organizers outside our community, negative pressures might overwhelm our good nature. It's also possible that negative effects already exist and I am missing them. But from my viewpoint, the U.S. taiko community's initial experiments with competition appear socially positive.
Is competition artistically productive?
Competition is meant to inspire, and there are early signs that U.S. taiko competitions are successful in motivating players. Speaking with participants of both the Blossm Bash and Taikai competitions, almost everyone had overcome some barrier in order to practice. Some had made their own instruments and stands, others re-arranged their homes, and some coordinated with their groups to allow for individual practice time. These are significant accomplishments in an artform where the majority of players lack individual access to instruments and space. Some of these participants had played for years but it was only the competition that finally inspired them to find a solution for their own practice. This alone should ask us to take competition seriously. Ultimately, U.S. taiko is built on inspiration, and competition appears to be uniquely inspiring for certain players. Well then, more competition!
But here's the rub... In my opinion, competition also includes significant risks to our artistry. The risks look dire enough that I can't fully support any competition that doesn't include creative attempts to address them. In fact, I stopped hosting naname battles myself because I ran out of ideas for guiding the events toward the kind of art I believe in.
How can we keep the inspiration and address these risks? The remainder of this essay will focus here.
The artistic risks of competition
How does competition threaten the art of taiko? In order of increasing scariness (and subjectivity), I see three potential risks.
- threats to the development of players
- threats to our creative culture
- threats to our community's "taste"
Risk 1: Threats to the Developing Player
Although competitors themselves report positive experiences, especially with regards to technical development, I see subtle risks that can undermine players' long-term growth. These include the fetishisizing technique, a reliance on extrinsic motivation, and low-artistic-potential music.
Fetishizing technique
Do our competitions inadvertantly teach that technique is the end-goal?
The recent 2024 Taiko Taikai advanced division featured pieces written by the participants themselves. This was a wonderful addition! This composition requirement created the opportunity for creative growth, and addresses what I see as a lack of new music in U.S. taiko. I was disappointed, however, that the compositional element wasn't particularly celebrated. The emcee didn't engage deeply with the challenge of composition and the performers' explanations touched only on motivations rather than musical considerations. The compositions themselves were relatively safe. No one played with mallets, for example, or "prepared" the odaiko to offer an original sound palette. Most solos emphasized power and stage-presence. To be fair, the winner started and ended his solo by touching the drum, a refreshingly gentle gesture, and there were hints of a musical storyline here and there, but for me, the overwhelming theme was "standard odaiko technique".
A competition values what is measurable, and uses the most quantitative aspects of music -- accuracy, physical form, etc -- to build a rubric with which to grade musicians. It under-values "originality", "poignancy", "self-truth" and all the other vague, non-rivalrous qualities of music, even though they are much more important. Technique without musical meaning is like vocabulary without ideas. The 2024 Taikai composition requirement was a great step toward including the search for meaning. We need more to resist competition's pressure to focus everyone's attention on technique. Organizers, competitors, and the audience alike need to celebrate the non-quantitative aspects of music that competition discourages.
Extrinsic motivation
Might a player raised in competitions lack the grit required to create?
At recent events, I asked a handful of competitors, including some of the winners, whether the experience left them wanting to create. I was disappointed they were only considering whether they'd participate in the next competition, and not whether they'd go deeper or write their own music. Not knowing the details of their experiences, I can't say whether their fortitude was improved or diminished, but it left me thinking that competition can harm a player by dangling a carrot, then abruptly pulling it away. We should be helping competition participants transition to self-motivation. I can imagine a healthy community offers competitions with varying levels of support and rewards to help bridge the gap from extrinsic to internal motivation, from complete hand-holding plus public praise to little more than a due-date for show-and-tell. How does classical music help young players graduate from competition into the individual search for musical meaning? Every hip-hop dance competitor is also a choreographer. How did that community get there?
Low-artistic-potential challenges
Is the music of competitions fostering musicality and sensitivity?
When the music of competition is compulsory, it should contain more than technical challenges. It should be full of musical meaning and focus students' attention there. This is a high bar. It means we should be using the strongest pieces of the taiko repertoire as compulsory pieces. We need compositions that truly move people. We shouldn't "write down" for competition. For example, imagine how beneficial it would be for Taikai participants if instead of learning a shortened, simplified composition by Yoshikazu Fujimoto, they were challenged to interpret the 13-minute piece with which he wowed international audiences while touring with Kodo? In such a challenge, technique is guided by an artful end-result. Participants would be faced with a meaning-filled model to compare themselves against, and to discover all the details that make Fujimoto's playing so moving. Imagine how beneficial learning Monochrome would be for competitors' shime skills and artistic sensitivity. That piece rewards incredible dynamic range with breath-stealing beauty. On the less-technical side, Kinnara Taiko's Ashura is rich with philosophical meaning, as is LATI's improvised Hachijo Daiko. These pieces immediately say, "technique isn't enough". Competition organizers' goal should be to utilize compositions so full of artistic value that participants' mastery of them proves more empowering than the prize money.
Risk 2: Threats to our creative culture
Might competition worsen a creative hierarchy in U.S. taiko?
From my perspective, not everyone in our community is sufficiently encouraged to be creative. Many group leaders serve as artistic czars and most players raised in this environment have stunted creative opinion. Too often, composition is assumed to be the realm of experts, where pieces are "handed down", from masters, from tradition, and from professionals.
The cause of hierarchy in the U.S. is not usually self-aggrandizing teachers ("Bow to your Sensei!"). More often, the hierarchy is granted by the enthusiastic followers themselves who believe passive acceptance of their teacher's "authentic" training equals respect. Even the more artistically democratic groups tend to assume composition is only for the most experienced players. I have not yet met a group, for example, where beginners compose at a basic level commensurate with their learning of basic technique. Why should the development of taiko composition wait until someone has played for decades? Children learn to write the letters of the alphabet as they learn to read them, and as they graduate through each level of literature, they're simultaneously challenged with appropriate writing exercises. This makes us better readers, and better lovers of literature.
I worry that competition might further engender a view of "right and wrong" taiko. Compulsory pieces and the rubric of judging them might be taken as scripture. Winning players might be seen as the singular "ideal", limiting artistic diversity. How do we keep competition from delaying the pursuit of personal meaning? If Kenny Endo is judge, are our U.S. players ready to disagree with his assessments? Are we free to say we don't like the master's compulsory piece? Are we free to disagree with Japan?
Risk 3: Threats to our community's taste
How do we prevent competition from encouraging superficiality?
Discussing "taste" is delicate. I myself have been offended hearing others talk about how one musician is "better" than another, as if everyone should agree about art. But I'm going to risk sounding like one of those conceited aesthetes to assert that I think competition pushes art in a superficial direction. In order to make competition work for us, we need to actively push against this bias.
Naname competition superficiality
In the battles I hosted from 2016 to 2021, and at the more recent Blossom Bash, the playing gravitated toward the flashiest elements of naname. Bachi flips and dramatic poses took precedence over rhythic feel and musical arrangement. Surprising costumes, one-armed pushups, and confident posturing stole the show. Groove was rare. Musical storytelling was rare. In my battles, the participants could pick their song structures and those that required practice and preparation were dramatically less popular than the immediately recognizable base-beats.
Now, I want to be careful not to denegrate flips and poses, or to say that "musicality" is a higher form of expression than "costuming". Anything can be used artfully, and different people are moved by different things. I myself am a passionate researcher of flashy choreography. But the similarity of performances in competition suggests that competition encourages some forms of expression over others.
Specifically, I see naname competition encouraging:
- Confident players
- Showy stage presence
- Large choreography
- Bachi flips
- Loud playing
- Gags and non-musical surprises
- Copy-paste use of existing work
and discouraging
- Shy players
- Vulnerability
- Choreographic development
- Rhythmic precision
- Subtlety
- Musical expression
- Refinement
Competition organizers need to find ways to emphasize these discouraged elements of music. Competition participants need to recognize this pressure and be brave to push against it. Audiences need to be able to recognize an artistic success even when it's subtle, or hidden beneath shaky technique.
As it is, it feels to me like artistry in naname competition is caught in a superficial eddy, circling repeatedly. Because competition favors the measurable and concise, flashiness wins. Audiences respond to the most easily digestible elements and this feeds back to the next competitor and the next competition. The music stays bobbing at the surface. We need to find creative ways to allow for the deep dive of musical exploration, individualism, and rule-breaking in competition. We need the system to encourage and appreciate vulnerability, originality, subtlety, and the discomfort of being challenged by art.
Odaiko competition superficiality
With the 2023 and 2024 Taiko Taikai odaiko competitions, the "live competition" structure seems to present hurdles for everyone involved. The competitions were held live, with the judges and audience together seeing the works for the first time. I might be underestimating the value of "live" for inspiring participants or marketing to the public, but I see the requirements of live judging at odds with artistic freedom, participation, and performance quality. For the judges, it's a high-pressure, exhausting day. They have to concentrate and maintain their criteria for hours, and the time for deliberation must be as short as possible to keep the performance flowing. The audience is waiting. For the participants, time is also limited -- 4 min 30 sec in 2024 -- short by odaiko standards, but still long for an audience when there are more than 20 participants. The performance is repetitive and of potentially mixed-quality. The "live" structure is also more expensive for out-of-town participants and for the organizers paying for judges' travel.
I'd like to suggest an alternative... and my apologies to Taikai organizers if they've already considered and rejected it. Imagine instead of a live competition, a behind-the-scenes competition and a showcase of the winning artist. The judging would be done with video submissions reviewed at a comfortable pace by the judges. The audience is treated to the winning selection, and a focused performance hopefully made even better by the financial and resource support of the organizers. NPR's Tiny Desk Contest is an example of this model, running an annual competition to select an artist to perform a Tiny Desk Concert. The judges take their time to evaluate and reevaluate as needed. Participants have increased artistic freedom. Neither judges nor entrants need travel to participate. This structure culminates in the organizers supporting the winning artist to create a performance specifically for the audience. To me, this structure presents fewer hurdles and better aligns the organizers, participants, and audience. It also seems better suited to resisting the superficiality of competition.
What we can do
U.S. taiko competition seems to be moving forward. Competition organizers and participants are having fun and hoping for more. Events are popular. From my vantage point, competition's detractors, having said their piece, have retreated. This falling-back-into-camps is to our detriment. The conversations should begin again, because both sides have valid wants and concerns. I think our community's social skills are well suited for the task. We are comparitavely good at asking others what they think, listening, being patient, assuming good faith, and allowing people to change their minds. Like the comradery we show during competition, I am optimistic we can also talk about competition itself.
The ideal path combines ideas from both sides. For me, the great risk is artistic, but if we can talk about those risks directly, I think competition is worth exploring. At a minimum, by encouraging competition, we'd be taking advantage of proponents' passion. I myself am not currently interested in competing, but I am interested in increased discussion of taiko as art.
Toward these ends...
Ideas for competition organizers
- Talk to organizers and competitors in Brazil and Japan. How are things going there?
- Reach out to people with concerns about competition. Get their take on your plans. Where you agree with their concerns, try to find ways to address them. Where you disagree, gather data to test your position.
- Design the competition to encourage participants' creativity, individual expression, and rule-breaking.
- Use only the highest-artistic-quality compositions for compulsory pieces.
- Address the potential after-effects on participants.
- Consider the Tiny Desk Contest structure, to better align your efforts with participants' and audience needs and support the artistry of your winner.
Ideas for supporting institutions
- Don't set a hard-and-fast position on competition. Think granularly. Make your support contingent on the results you seek and direct your funds to the aspect of competition you consider most promising.
- Value participants' enthusiasm as a scarce resource.
- When on the fence, try low-cost, low-risk options: PR, admin support, consulting as "The Competition Watchdog".
- When opposed, propose alternatives.
Ideas for participants
- Use the competition to strengthen your bond with your instrument.
- Be brave to search for and follow your own taste.
- Say it with your instrument, not your song description.
Ideas for audience members
- Applaud growth and risk-taking.
- Be open-hearted and honest in your audience experience. Even if you don't share your opinion with anyone else, let yourself both like and dislike what you see.
- Compare taiko with other art forms / musical forms.
How to talk about art
Why don't more taiko players talk about art?
In my circle of taiko friends, I realize I can only freely share my artistic opinions with those who are also composers. In the larger taiko public, I generally bite my tongue, not wanting to be the only person speaking frankly. I recognize that taiko is not only "art". For some, it's "community-building" and "cultural expression". People are uplifted. They are having a good time.
But I'm going to go out on a limb and say that when we perform taiko, we invite interpretation as "art", and because performance is such an integral part of our culture, we need to be better able to discuss taiko artistically. For this, we need more composers in our community. Composition gives us the tools for discussing art, namely varied musical opinions, personal barriers to creating, and the muscles of criticism: mutual respect, understanding of craft, interest in the creative process. The challenge of creating grants you the vocabulary of creating. If we could get to a point where, say, half of our community has been taught they are free to write taiko music, and of those, a decent percentage were inspired to try, we'd have a significant contingent of informed art-makers in our community, ready to talk about our community's artistic needs and desires.
Therefore, to return to the topic of competition, in my opinion, competition meant to encourage creativity has the most potential for the U.S. taiko community. While the artistic risks of competition seem very real to me, we might have the creativity and open-mindedness necessary to keep those risks in check. We would harness a well of competitive energy in our community. The competition-loving contingent of us should be supported, and those of us with hesitations should help keep us on track.