Report: 2008 Western Japan Stick Seminar
Monday 26 May 2008 by ramuji- Performance Schedule:
No performances scheduled at this time
The idea to hold a Stick seminar in Hiroshima was born during a series of email and telephone conversations with Derek Dallenger quite some time ago (beginning in 2006, I believe). Actually, I had tried to hold a seminar once before, when Bob Culbertson visited Hiroshima in 2005, but due to several organizational faux pas on my part, that seminar was never held.
Following the failure and, quite frankly, embarrassment of that first aborted attempt at a seminar in Hiroshima, I was more than a bit reluctant to make a second go at it. There was even a time at the mid-point of the organizational process (not quite the “point-of-no-return”, but nearly) when I seriously began to question why I was doing this and if I shouldn’t just pull the plug. In the end, however, the seminar proceeded as scheduled, and more smoothly than I had dared hope. To top it all off, the many wonderful comments I received from all participants, both students and instructors, helped resolve my questions about the meaning and value of organizing a Stick seminar.
I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the following people who helped make this seminar possible: Chicaco Ramsey; Derek Dallenger; Toshiaki Kanamaru; Shingo Shimizu, Jun Nunota, and Gakushi Yamanobe of Musicians Institute Japan (Hiroshima); Mr and Mrs Ryoichi Ishizawa of Rakuza; Goto Izumi and the staff at Organ-za; Emmett and Yuta Chapman; Koji Hayashi; Hiroshima FM; TSS Television.
2008 Western Japan Stick Seminar participants:
Derek Dallenger (Miyazaki): instructor
Toshiaki Kanamaru (Tokyo): instructor
ramuji (Hiroshima): organizer
Hiroshi Ito (Kanagawa): student
Toru Osada (Yamaguchi): student
Takanao Tarui (Yamaguchi): student
Mari Tarui (Yamaguchi): observer
Sakura (Kyoto): student
Shinya Tsuji (Kobe): student
Takeshi Yamane (Tokyo): student
Day 1: Thursday 15 May
Derek’s short flight from Kagoshima arrived in Hiroshima at noon, and he easily navigated the bus route to Hiroshima Station where I met him just shortly after 1pm for a quick taxi ride home. We rested at the apartment for the remainder of the afternoon, catching up a bit and unpacking gear, and then in the evening I took him around to first Rakuza and then Organ-za so he could see the venues for the first time before actually playing there. We had dinner at Organ-za, and then enjoyed the nice weather during the walk back home (about 30-minutes one way). We did a lot of walking while Derek was here, made possible by the nearly perfect weather. Back home, we chatted over (one of many) coffee, and finally called it a night 
at about 2am, which set the standard as bedtime for the rest of the weekend. (However, I was usually up a bit later, especially on Thursday and Friday nights, doing last-minute seminar preparations and translation work for the wonderful scale workbook that Derek prepared for the students.)
Day 2: Friday 16 May
Derek is an early riser. He was usually awake shortly after 6am (or so I am told) and was left to fend for himself in the kitchen until I crawled out of bed, usually around 9:30. I had every intention of fixing coffee and breakfast for us in the mornings, but that was before I learned he was perfectly capable of 
functioning on less than 5 hours of sleep each night. I’m afraid I failed miserably as a host, but the least I could do was to make sure the kitchen was stocked with morning essentials (eggs, milk, cheese, bread, clean utensils etc. to cook with, instant coffee since I wouldn’t be awake to grind fresh beans at 7am).
After a day of preparation, rehearsing, discussion, and a quick trip to Hiroshima’s best tobacconist, we packed up our gear in the evening and grabbed a taxi to the local branch of MI Japan. The staff of MI was kind enough to let us in the night before our seminar started, so we could set up our equipment, do a simple sound check, and make sure everything was in generally good working order for the next 
morning.
From the beginning, I had been rather stubborn about using a single mixer and PA for all Sticks, both instructors and students, so we could all hear what each other are doing. Of course, the disadvantage of this approach would be keeping control and letting the students no when it is ok to play and when we want them to stop playing and just listen, in order to prevent a cacophony. Derek had been more inclined to have a headphone amp for each student (which has its own disadvantages), but in the end my stubbornness won out. However, Derek did bring along several of his own headphone amps “just in case”, and that turned out to be a very good 
idea because we put them to good use on day two of the seminar.
Day 3: Saturday 17 May, 1st day of the seminar
I wanted to be at MI by 9am, since the students were expected to start showing up at 9:30. However, I was a bit behind schedule, running a few last-minute errands. While still near home, I received a call from one of the participants who was already in town, and thought he was near MI, but was having trouble finding it. Somehow I was able to give him directions to MI over the phone while at the same time working on one of the errands I was frantically finishing before rushing to MI.
Derek and I finally arrived at MI just before 9:30. At about the same time, I received another phone call from Sakura, a participant coming from Kyoto. Sakura had been in Hiroshima from the night before, but then received a call from his company telling him that he had to work on Saturday. So, he had to leave Hiroshima Saturday morning, but would do his best to get back for as much as the seminar as possible. Unfortunately, he was unable to get back until Saturday night, 
and therefore only participated in the second day of the seminar.
The first day of the seminar started roughly on time, with Derek and I and four students and one observer. (In addition to Sakura’s sudden absence, one other participant, Toru Osada, had to work Saturday morning and wouldn’t arrive until 3pm.) We started with brief introductions (name, where from, years playing Stick and/or other instruments, musical influences and goals), followed by a 
quick inspection of and minor adjustments to instruments. Derek then finished the morning with very basic instructions on how to wear/hold the Stick, position relative to your body, position and correct form of hands and fingers, and finally some basic chords on the bass side, before breaking for lunch.
The afternoon session continued with more bass side chords and chord progressions, an intense section devoted to scales (both in 
one hand and together in both hands), and a few examples of different bass patterns, bluesy bass lines, and two-handed bass parts. I also performed my single instructional role on Saturday afternoon (for the most part, I acted only as interpreter) by discussing and demonstrating Emmett’s wonderful bass motor technique that he presents in Free Hands. I was basically just following along with the examples Emmett provides in Free Hands, along with a 
handful of embellishments of my own that I had prepared, and expected that to get me through 50 - 60 minutes. However, these students were really on the ball and able to grasp and perform these basic techniques almost immediately, so that I had used up all of my prepared material in only about 25 minutes. So, rather than try to improvise too much, I passed the baton back to Derek.
Derek continued with a few melody chord patterns, some which 
require a huge stretch in the right hand. At that point, we were approaching our last hour of the day, set aside as rehearsal time for the Beatles’ “Yesterday”, which we would be performing as a group later than night. Actually, we had surreptitiously been working on this tune all day, since all of the chords and chord progressions the students had been learning were lifted straight from Derek’s arrangement of the song.
At the end of the seminar, we quickly packed 
up and then caught a streetcar to move together as a group from MI to Organ-za. Since Peace Memorial Park is near Organ-za, we made a short detour for a group photo in front of the Atomic Bomb Dome. Unfortunately, Sakura and Toshiaki Kanamaru, both participating in only the second day of the seminar, were not present for this photo.
At Organ-za, we made a noble struggle through “Yesterday” (7 Sticks on a narrow stage!), relying mostly on Derek to lead us through it. Not too bad, considering we had spent only one hour on it as a group, and I applaud everyone for having the courage to take the stage. This was followed by Takanao Tarui’s solo rendition of “Amazing Grace” and “My Grandfather’s Clock”.
To end things off, both Derek and I played a solo set of 3 songs each, and I plugged Hiroshima Stick Night (resulting in 2 ticket sales!), and then all of us enjoyed a nice meal and several drinks before calling it a night.
Day 4: Sunday 18 May, 2nd day of the seminar and Hiroshima Stick Night
Toshiaki Kanamaru arrived in Hiroshima at 8:30am Sunday morning. I met him at the station, shuttled him and his gear to MI by 9, and then went back home to pick up Derek so that all three of us were back at MI by 9:15. We did a quick setup and sound check for Kanamaru, and then the students began showing up at 9:30. On this day, we had our full roster of 6 students and 1 observer from 10am.
This entire seminar was a bit “from the hip”, as I expect most are to a degree when you are meeting students for the first time and don’t have a good idea of their experience with the Stick, but Sunday was even more so since it was the first time that Dallenger, Kanamaru, and I had gotten together in person to arrange the minor last-minute details of “what” and “how”. So, on this day in particular I was doing quite a bit of “improvisational organization”, and it occurred to me that I was very lucky that Derek had had the foresight to bring along his headphone amps.
Sunday would consist of four hours of instruction (2-hour morning, lunch break, 2-hour afternoon, end at 3pm), so I broke it down into one-hour sessions where one instructor would be with the main group while the other instructor would be in the back of the room on a dual-headphone amp with each student individually for a 30-minute private lesson. When we reached the last hour of the day, I asked both Derek and Kanamaru to demonstrate some of their 
favorite performance “tricks” on the Stick, and we were treated to a variety of flashy two-handed bass lines, bass harmonics, right hand thumb on bass strings, switching between crossed and uncrossed playing styles, etc. Then, the last 30 minutes were dedicated to Q&A, with many interesting and insightful questions from each of the 6 students.
We wrapped things up on time at 3pm, because Derek, Kanamaru, 
and I needed to pack up all of our gear and catch two taxis to Rakuza for sound check before Hiroshima Stick Night. Although all three of us were excited about the show, we were also all a bit worn out from the weekend (Kanamaru had performed in a different city on Saturday before traveling to Hiroshima). This caused us to fall behind schedule a bit, so the doors opened at 6:45 (instead of 6:30) and the show started about 10 minutes late.
We played three solo 
sets to a very attentive and appreciative audience of 42, and were called back to the stage for a trio encore at the end. I’m always very proud to invite a musician to Hiroshima for a joint show, because I know the audiences here are good “listening” audiences who enjoy original, inventive music and are always willing to let the performer lead them in a new, unknown direction, whether that be an original composition or a unique interpretation of a familiar song. Thank you so much to everyone who came to support us for Hiroshima Stick Night at Rakuza.
Day 5: Monday 19 May
In the morning, I met Kanamaru at his hotel to 
get him checked out, and then brought him and his gear back to the apartment. My original plan had been for the three of us to take it easy, maybe do a bit of walking and shopping downtown, and just play it by ear. However, this was the one day that the weather turned against us, starting from minor sprinkles in the early morning and gradually increasing to a steady downpour that lasted until well after nightfall. We spent the day sitting on the balcony 
overlooking the garden behind our apartment, chatting away a lazy, relaxing Monday afternoon. Many cigarettes, cigars, and cups of coffee were consumed.
Derek and I saw Kanamaru off at Hiroshima Station for his 7:30ish train back to Tokyo, and then we spent the rest of Monday night beginning to pack his gear and enjoying a delicious meal that Derek prepared for Chicaco and I.
Day 6: Tuesday 20 May
We spent the morning boxing up the last of Derek’s gear, and preparing the paperwork necessary for the shipping service that came later that morning to deliver his parcels back to Miyazaki. (Derek brought a lot of gear!) I then saw Derek off at the airport for his 3pm flight back to Kagoshima, and upon returning home I spent the rest of the day (and a good portion of the following day, as well) eating junk food and playing video games.
The End?
Preparing for this seminar was a lot of work, but the actual execution of it was much more exhausting (and in many more ways) than I had expected. However, it was also extremely rewarding. And, it proved that it is possible to hold a successful Stick seminar in Hiroshima (although I was the sole local representative). I already have ideas for the next seminar, and in fact I was having them before this one even started, but I’ll keep all of that under my hat for now. For those of you interested, keep checking this space in the future.
Thanks for reading!
