Sachiyo Ito’s Memoir: Chapter 13
Since January 2024 renowned dancer, dance educator, and choreographer Sachiyo Ito has been serializing her memoir on JapanCulture•NYC with monthly installments, each chapter revealing a different aspect of her early life in Tokyo and career in New York City.
Ito offers of a profound exploration of the experience of dedicating herself to traditional Japanese dance at an early age, arriving in New York City during the tumultuous ‘70s, and making a successful career in the arts. Each chapter offers a glimpse into the complexities that shaped her journey. It is a literary examination of not only Ito Sensei’s life, but of how New York City’s culture evolved over the decades and what sacrifices one must make to achieve a thriving career in the arts.
The memoir is an invitation to delve into the layers of a creative life and career that has spanned more than 50 years. As a work in progress, it is also an invitation for you to offer your feedback. Your insights will contribute to the evolution of this extraordinary work.
To read all the chapters, please click here. For more information about Sachiyo Ito, please visit her website, dancejapan.com.
St Louis Post-Dispatch August 29, 2014 - September 4, 2014
“NIHON BUYO – DANCE IS A MIRROR INTO JAPANESE CULTURE: Japanese Dance: Looking into Japanese Culture . . . In addition to viewing Japanese culture through the lens of dance, observers and dancers also learn about themselves and apply the valuable lessons learned on the dance floor to their own everyday, modern lives.”
New Year’s Greeting
Happy New Year!
May your 2025 be beautiful, creative, and healthy!
The 12th Chapter was about reflections and mirrors, and now in this chapter I would like to continue exploring the theme of “mirroring.”
Also, being the beginning of the year, let me also talk about our so-to-speak “New Year Greeting,” the Odori-zome, and about the significance of the greeting gesture, bowing in dance.
The phrase “dance is a mirror” has been the backbone of the philosophy behind my teaching and performance for the past fifty-five years in Japan and the world outside of it.
Dance reflects the culture that has nurtured the dance form. For all facets of the culture and arts such as history, literature, social life, geography, climate, and racial components are what has created the dance form, the art that is born in the particular culture and has been inherited for centuries. It is one of the best ways to communicate between peoples beyond barriers of culture, language, ethnicity, and races.
Over the years, this idea developed into a program, and I called it “Japanese Culture through Dance,” designed for schools and cultural institutions. I hoped to help students understand the culture of Japan through learning traditional dance forms. I have always believed that dance is an important tool to help young students broaden their horizons and learn to understand new and different cultures by learning their traditional dance forms, styles, and techniques. Ultimately, my goal is for students to reflect on the meanings of their own culture’s art forms compared to what they learn in our workshops and classes. Ideally, these educational experiences will act as a source of inspiration in their future creative lives.
Dance/NYC stated the role of dance eloquently in its August 2024 post: “Dance is not just an art form; it is a powerful means of expression, connection, and transformation. It bridges cultural divides, fosters empathy, and brings people together in a shared experience of joy and creativity…Dance has the unique ability to tell stories that words cannot fully capture.”
“Japanese Culture through Dance” has come to be called the “Free Children’s Workshop,” offered at libraries, schools, and cultural institutions. I originally thought this idea was only for youngsters, to open up their horizons, to allow them to get to know different parts of the world, and to better understand others in their local communities that come from different backgrounds. However, after giving workshops in senior centers and geriatric centers more and more in recent years, I began to realize that speaking about cultures through dance is important for the elderly too. Not only can they share their life experiences through watching and learning dance, but they share their own life stories, also. Those who attended our workshops at the senior centers happily told me stories that stirred up from their memories by dancing, which in turn evoked thoughts about their own culture, associated with Japanese experiences.
Considering that New York City is a melting pot of culture, my dancers and I were so happy to be part of the special concert series bringing various cultural traditions together to showcase in 2008. The occasion was Waves of Traditions held at Brookfield Place, the former World Financial Center building. The program honored the diverse ethnicities and cultures in New York. Our two showings on the day we performed were wonderful opportunities for us to display our repertoire of Japanese dance right by the Hudson River, appreciated by people who came to join us during their lunch break, while shopping, or after work. What a beautiful opportunity was it to dance in front of the Hudson River from the second rotunda! I will never forget watching the sunset over the Hudson through the windows while we tidied up and packed away our costumes and props. This led me to recall my performance at Windows on the World, the famed exclusive club and dining room at the top of the World Trade Center, a few years before 9/11. The view from there was one of the grandest sights I have ever seen, its memory made all the more poignant after the devastation and loss of 9/11.
As I consider my dance students, I think about the changes I have seen over the years, the different populations coming and going like waves. I remember my surprise when emergent Japanese hip-hop dancers began to receive awards in competitions such as the one at the Apollo Theater in the late ‘90s. From hip-hop young dancers in their 20s and 30s, to aspiring Broadway stars, to Japanese dancers traveling all the way from home in hopes of becoming professional performers, many people of all backgrounds have walked through my studio door. Their passion reminded me when I was young, though survival in New York, in both carrying out their mission and living, is tough.
Broadway shows were also becoming more and more attractive to aspiring Japanese artists, but they also realized how important it was to know their own cultural and traditional roots. I was so pleased with their decision to study Japanese dance, and I hoped it would inspire their own creative activities. Further, several of them were so dedicated to Japanese dance that they went on to become core members of my dance company.
Over the years, there has been a clear transition in the age of my studio’s students. In the early 2000s, boys and girls as young as three years old, whose parents felt it was necessary for their children to know their own traditions, came to study with me. Now, there are more seniors than children in my classes and at the workshops.
Since the pandemic, unfortunately, there has been a big decrease in the migration of young artists from Japan, whereas NYC senior centers’ workshops, during and post-Covid, have become much more prominent, which points to an obvious societal shift.
I miss children’s workshops, now that the schools and libraries where I used to work seem to give less importance to interaction with artists in workshop settings. I believe that hand-to-hand and eye-to-eye contact in teaching and learning are incredibly important. I do understand that educators have had to give more priority to working on tablets and with technology rather than focusing on in-person learning after the pandemic. However, to counterbalance that trend, I feel the arts should be even more important, to offset the isolating work of young ones on tablet screens. The arts can provide a unique sense of one “as an individual” in our AI age, that is uniquely human and humane.
Odori-zome
At the beginning of each year, I hold an Odori-zome, or New Year’s Dance. This event has been held for the past 25 years at Tenri Cultural Institute. The literal translation of the word “Odori-zome” is “to dance for the first time in the New Year,” and with this performance, we vow to study harder in the coming year. A similar word is used in calligraphy also, as in Kaki-zome: “writing for the first time.” This is the time for students to show the fruits of their studies over the previous year, and I find much pleasure in watching their progress and seeing their improvement year by year.
My students strive to demonstrate their best stage presence in this small public performance for friends and families. Some guests find it interesting to see my students’ various nationalities, as it is an international group, composed of people from different ethnic backgrounds who love Japanese culture: Chinese, European, Americans of all colors and creeds, as well as Japanese. I am so pleased that they experience no boundaries in their aspiration and love for Japanese culture and the arts.
As the Odori-zome is a significant event, the students must dress themselves in formal kimono. This poses a special challenge, as they are used to dressing in just a simple yukata. However, this special occasion motivates them to learn, often from video tutorials found online. I only help them a few times through teaching but emphasize that it is important to practice dressing on their own. If we are dependent on someone to help us, like professional kimono dressers, we will never become better at dressing ourselves. This is a valuable lesson for other parts of our lives as well. “You got to do it as you got to do it!” as my neighbor says. And you can do it.
Dressing for the Odori-zome is also a great opportunity to appreciate the beauty of the various types of kimono, such as tomesode and homongi, and the beautiful belts worn with them, such as maru-obi and fukuro-obi. During the post-performance party, as the students mingle with the audience, drinking and eating, the kimono they wear heightens the awareness that acquiring the art of moving gracefully is as important as in life as it is in dance.
In the interview I did for Chopsticks, cited at the beginning of this chapter, the writer talks about the graceful gestures and manners that the students learn during lessons which can then be applied to their day-to-day lives. That is what I stress as a teacher. We can apply graceful moves that we learn through dance training to our daily life activities and special occasions.
The New Year Dance has the significance of being a “greeting” in the New Year, but it has more meaning than simply saying “hello!” It is an acknowledgement of each other, a looking forward to renewal, an expressing of respect for others and all beings, and a showing of reverence to nature, which surrounds and protects us.
At the end of our dancing at the Odori-zome, we take a bow. This expresses gratitude, thanking the audience for watching the dance, as we consider the dance itself to be an offering to the audience, not a showing off of oneself.
Odori-zome 2016
Odori-zome 2016
Odori-zome 2023 - Photo by Tony Sahara
Odori-zome 2025 - Photo by Jon Jung
Odori-zome 2025 - Photo by Jon Jung
The Bow: Entering Sacred Space
“Sacred Traditions Meet Art in Traditional Dancing:
Each class starts with a short bowing ceremony where both teacher and students greet and hope to learn communication from each other.”
We begin dance lessons with a formal bow. How to bow properly is the first lesson I teach in workshops and in the first class for beginners. The bow is essential in learning Japanese traditional arts, including martial arts. We also take a bow at the end, expressing thankfulness of sharing what we learn in the class to classmates and teacher.
After kneeling, we first place a closed dance fan on the floor in front of us. My personal interpretation of this gesture is that the fan symbolizes one line, a line that divides our space into two worlds. The two worlds are the world of illusion—the theater—and the world of the surface—reality. I believe it is important that we are aware that we enter a sacred time and space of creation while learning dance. As a dancer and a teacher, I must say that the bow is far more than a simple greeting. It is “a dance” with form, rhythm, and meaning.
As for the form, we keep our spine nice and straight. And for the rhythm, we take at least one breath, in and out, giving us a moment to pause and reflect on respect. As for meaning, we show respect to the teacher, to dance’s heritage and tradition, to the colleagues with whom you share precious time in class. If a student accomplishes a beautiful bow in a workshop, it can be considered a successful participation. Now that I have more group lessons than private lessons, I find it very meaningful for the students to bow to each other at the beginning and end of lessons because we learn from each other by sharing the class time. I believe those shared moments become valuable lessons, not only in dance, but in many other ways.
Indeed, teaching has led me to discover the worlds of my students; their beautiful eyes, filled with a curiosity that I hope they never lose, will always be reflected within my dancing, and within my own heart.
Wishing you a season of inspiration and new discoveries!
The posting of this chapter to JapanCulture-NYC.com was paid for by Sachiyo Ito and reprinted here with her permission. Susan Miyagi McCormac of JapanCultureNYC, LLC edited this chapter for grammatical purposes only and did not write or fact-check any information. For more information about Sachiyo Ito and Company, please visit dancejapan.com. ©Sachiyo Ito. All rights reserved.
Support JapanCulture•NYC by becoming a member! For $5 a month, you’ll help maintain the high quality of our site while we continue to showcase and promote the activities of our vibrant community. Please click here to begin your membership today!
