UK Tour promoted by Glynis Henderson Productions in association with Van Baasbank and Baggerman

The Times – Yamato review
**** (four stars out of five)
March 2008
Yamato at the Peacock Theatre, London

Clive Davis

It is only a few weeks since the Kodo Drummers passed through town, so it might have seemed a less than auspicious moment for another Japanese ensemble to start a residency. My heart did not exactly skip a beat at the thought of one more evening of unrelenting percussion. But where the Kodo ensemble offered an indifferently staged series of rituals, the Yamato show Shin-on, or “heartbeat”, is a genuinely theatrical experience, delivered with balletic grace and infectious humour.

Formed in 1993, the compact troupe of young and enthusiastic performers combines traditional asceticism with the kind of showbiz virtuosity that liberates the Western listener's inner Cozy Powell. We are so drenched in aimless noise during our daily routines that there is something undeniably cleansing about the precisely drilled torrent of drum beats. As the metronomic sound dies away, we learn to appreciate the true depth and richness of silence. While the performers also deploy flutes and the banjo-like shamisen, the battery of percussion - from hand-cymbals to the 6ft-plus drum that shook the foundations in the set piece after the interval - achieves an almost symphonic grandeur.

The humour is refreshingly broad at times. One sequence, Rekka, turned into a knockabout battle of the sexes between two pairs of musicians who engaged in a contest to see which could retrieve the largest drum from the wings. Later, two performers, glimpsed mainly in silhouette, mimed an exquisite tennis contest, indulging in ever more extravagant leaps and pirouettes.

In contrast to the Kodo display, the evening is elegantly staged, the delicate screens and rich lighting adding to the sense of spectacle. Beware, however: listeners of a delicate disposition would be well advised not to sit too close to the stage. I found a seat well towards the rear but even there the atavistic rumbling of the very largest drums sometimes proved unsettling.

At the end, the audience was drawn into a playful clapping exercise, part Zen, part slapstick. Tradition and modernity are cleverly woven together in the other routines. There are hints of free-flowing jazz drumming, while a frenetic shamisen sequence conjures up the gritty majesty of the blues.

Dazzling. They fill the stage with huge beautiful drums and beat seven bells out of them at an unrelenting decibel level and with phenomenal skill. Simply breathtaking drumming.
The Daily Telegraph


Wonderful.
The Evening Standard, London


A delight. Elegant, gorgeous and a sheer joy.
Metro London

 
A spell binding performance.
Aberdeen Evening News