Selecting The Wood
The best wood for making taiko is keyaki (zelkova serrata), which is native to Japan. Keyaki has the proper density and hardness, and possesses a beautiful grain pattern. Keyaki is getting scarce, and it is difficult to obtain large enough trees to make odaiko. Most large odaiko are now being made from toboku, which comes from Cameroon in Africa. The raw pieces of wood (called a bole) weigh up to forty tons, and are left to season for several years before work starts. Since all odaiko are made from one solid piece of wood, it would seem that the maximum size limit has been reached. However, Asano Taiko hints that they know of even bigger trees that are protected by inaccessible terrain.
Hand Carving The Body
For many generations the bodies of taiko were hand carved, and the middle portion was wasted as it was chipped out bit by bit. Nowadays, the bodies are rough carved by machine before being finished by hand. This technique allows Asano Taiko to remove a solid core from the body of the taiko, and to make a smaller drum from that core. This allows them to double, and sometimes triple the number of taiko that they can obtain from one tree. In this image, an Asano craftsman painstakingly finishes the inside of an odaiko to precise measurements.
Applying Gold leaf
While it may seem like a extravagant luxury, gold leaf is sometimes applied to the inside of special odaiko, even though no one will ever see it. The gold serves to improve the resonance and clarity of tone of the odaiko. First, the inside is coated with Japanese lacquer (urushi) which provides a tacky ground for the gold leaf to adhere to. Then the fragile gold is individually laid down and burnished sheet by sheet.
Return to the Odaiko page.