Morioka Sansa Odori

The Morioka Sansa Odori is a summer festival held in early August each year in Morioka, Iwate Prefecture, one of the representative festivals coloring summer in the Tōhoku region. Beginning in its current form in 1978, its highlight is a dazzling parade staged along the city's Central Avenue, where drums, flutes, and dancers move as one.

The festival's greatest distinction is, above all, the sheer number of drums. The "drum parade," in which performers dance while beating Japanese taiko, is known for the vast number of participating drums and has been certified by Guinness World Records as the "world's largest taiko drum parade." The deep bass of thousands of drums struck in unison resonates in the pit of the stomach, and the spectacle woven by the sound of flutes and the graceful movements of the dancers is magnificent.

The name "Sansa Odori" derives from a legend handed down in Iwate. Its origin is said to lie in the "Mitsuishi (Three Rocks) Legend," in which a deity vanquished a demon that had tormented the people, and the demon pressed its handprint onto a rock as a pledge never to do harm again—said also to be the origin of the prefecture's name "Iwate" (meaning "rock hand"). The people, rejoicing at the demon's banishment, are said to have danced crying "sansa, sansa," marking the festival's beginning. With the dancers' chant of "sakkora choiwa yasse" echoing through the short Tōhoku summer, this festival reflects the vitality and joy of the people of Morioka.