This website is a guide to the intermittently assembled rural Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage that has been handed down through the generations from the late Edo Period in Nishi-Shioko District, Hitachi Omiya City, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan.

Until about 1945, this stage was regularly assembled and was a familiar attraction among the locals and the people in the surrounding areas. After that time, however, it was no longer erected and lay forgotten in its storehouse, just as it had been after its final use in the 1940s.

In 1991 the Omiya Town History and Folk Custom Resource Centre, as it was at the time, carried out a study of the Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage. As a result, there were calls for the stage to be revived, and a Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage Conservation Association was formed in the community. With the cooperation of a large number of people, and after overcoming several difficult hurdles, the stage was revived in 1997, after a gap of half a century. This guide contains a brief history of the stage, including the recent events up to the present day.

Now that you have been fortunate enough to find your way to these pages, we hope that you will enjoy seeing and reading about the revolving stage and its setting, the abundant satoyama [T1]  (natural woodlands interspersed with small-scale farming) which is our hometown.

• What kind of place is Nishi-Shioko?
• The History of Kabuki and its Spread to the Regions
• Regional Kabuki and Rural Stages
• Ningyo Joruri and the Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage
• Size and Structure of the Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage
• Stage Equipment and Village Craftsmen
• Performances of Village Plays as Seen from Old Documents
• Other Assembled Stages Preserved in Hitachi Omiya City
• History of the Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage Preservation Association
• Nishiwaka-za and Children’s Kabuki
• Cooperation from Volunteers
• Assembling the Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage
• See Nishi-Shioko Revolving Stage performances on Youtube!

Photo Credits

Mr. Masanori Namekawa

Hitachi Omiya City Information and Policy Department

Hitachi Omiya City History and Folk Custom Resource Centre

East Japan Railway Culture Foundation