Exotic Dancing!

I had a remarkably relaxing Sunday. For the first time I can remember, I saw exotic dancing! And by that I mean foreign cultural dancers, not pole-grinders. I'm not sure why that kind of thing is considered 'exotic' dancing, since the only kind of dancing more mundane to Americans is freaking LINE dancing. But I digress.

It was beautiful weather, and I went and saw the Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month Celebration. I'm not sure when China, Vietnam, and India became ISLANDS, but, hey, I'm not complaining. There were some neat classical and not-so-classical dances regularly interrupted by Asian people doing very American things - they even imported a Vietnam break dancer. And an exceptionally preachy, boring jazz sax.

The best DANCE was definitely the classical Indian dances. They were very impressive - really hypnotic. The break dancers were actually astonishingly entertaining as well, teaching audience members (liberally seeded with trained dancers) how to do some basic moves.

But, of course, I was totally blown away by one particular event.

The schedule carefully lists what troup is performing and what they are performing, such as 'Classical Dance of India (Odissi) Ratna Roy', or 'Massive Monkees, Breakdancers'. But the entry at 3:45 said simply 'Tsunami Taiko'. I knew it was Japanese, but what was it? Was it a J-pop band? Noh dancers? Who could tell?

No, it was Japanese Drummers, without flute.

There are only two kinds of music which will move me powerfully. One of those, for reasons unknown to me, is Japanese drums. Just the drums. I can't stand the flute.

Even recorded, I LOVE these drummers, but the real strength is in the live performance. It was AWESOME.

I am very happy. And a little sunburned.