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Domatsuri dance group to perform at LibDay festival
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Posted on Jun 27 2008
Dance performers called the “Domatsuri Dancers” from Japan are set to visit Saipan again to participate in this year’s 2008 Liberation Day Parade, scheduled for July 4, 2008.
The group will march with other marching groups, along with an array of floats. The group will then perform during the festivities later that evening at the Liberation Day grounds.
As part of the group’s visit this year, they will again be extending an invitation for the CNMI to participate in this year’s Domatsuri Dance Festival, which is scheduled to take place in early August in Nagoya, Japan. In addition, the organizing committee has once again asked the CNMI to select a representative to serve as a judge in their dance festival.
The Domatsuri Dance Festival started in 1999 when a group of college students created a dance festival that would communicate the excitement of dance in Nagoya and to express that excitement to the world. The first festival had only 26 dance teams with 1,500 performers. Today the festival welcomes 200 dance teams with 23,000 performers from inside and outside Japan and some 1.85 million viewers. It has become one of the largest such events in Japan.
Five years ago, through Chamolinan Cultural Village Inc., Pacific Development Inc., Marianas Visitors Authority, and the Saipan Mayor’s Office, the performers were introduced to the CNMI by joining the Liberation Day festivities as a part of their way of expressing the importance of fostering relations between people in both countries through Domatsuri. This offers participants an opportunity to look back at their history and cultural heritage and treasure the communities where they are from. Exchanges between people as they participate in Domatsuri encourage communication and stimulate activities in local communities as well as international exchanges.
The Domatsuri group would like to extend its utmost appreciation to the people of the CNMI, the Mayor of Saipan, the MVA, and all the tourism partners for the invitation and support provided each year during the annual Liberation Day Festival. [B][I](MVA)[/I][/B]
