The Japanese edition of the Huffington Post reports on attempts by the Suigei Brewery to increase the enjoyment of drinking sake by creating a complete environment in which it can be experienced, which they call a “scene” – interesting seen a recent conversation with someone in the coffee world about the influence of environment, visuals, showmanship etc. on the experience of drinking and tasting.
Writer Makoto Myojin recaps on a background we’ve seen before, commenting that these are tough times for the sake industry, even though parts of it are regaining popularity. Consumption in terms of volume continues to fall and has now reached a third of peak levels. It may be called Japan’s national drink, but accounts for only 6% of the alcohol consumed in Japan.
However, the number of Japanese restaurants abroad are increasing, and sake exports have doubled or more for the last 10 years. Exports still account for a mere 3% of sake produced, but there’s no question that the number of drinkers are growing.
To ensure that sake-making doesn’t die out as a tradition, and that consumers can fully enjoy it, Suigei (“drunken whale”) held a cruise event with 200-person capacity ship in Tokyo Bay, which included announcements of new products. So far nothing so new, but their next venture will be to team up with the TDME (Tokyo Dance Music Event) in order to introduce sake to people in a new area, namely dance music and club culture. They describe “dance music x sake” as a completely new concept, but I suspect Richie Hawtin might have something to say about that.
They aim to appeal not only to Japanese attendees but also overseas ones, on the basis that both music and food/drink need no words. They also hope that the two different worlds of music and sake production will come together through their approach to creation, and their ability to bring people together.
Links
- Original article (Japanese, Huffington Post Japanese edition, 5 December 2017)
- Suigei brewery (Japanese) Beware the autoplay video background.
- Suigei brewery (English)
- TDME (Tokyo Dance Music Event) (English)
- Enter Sake (English) DJ Richie Hawtin’s line of sake which he promotes as part of club culture