Etchu-Yatsuo

**Owara is 1–3 September, and it is nocturnal.** Dancing runs into the small hours and the atmosphere is entirely different after dark under the lanterns. Day visits during the festival miss most of it. **Book months out or plan not to sleep.** There is very little accommodation in Yatsuo and Toyama fills too. Many people ride the last train in, stay out all night, and take the first train back — which is an established way to do it rather than a failure of planning. **Listen for the kokyu.** The bowed fiddle in the ensemble is the sound that makes Owara unmistakable and it is played in almost no other Japanese folk tradition. If you only take one thing away, take that. **Go in October instead if you want the town.** Suwamachi Hondori, the stone slopes and the lattice fronts are all there year-round with nobody on them, and there is a smaller pre-festival practice period in late August when you may hear the music without the crowd. **Faces are hidden on purpose.** The deep straw hats are part of the form. Do not expect portrait photographs, and be careful about flash — this is a rite, not a performance staged for cameras.