Summer of Coney Island 2007

Attractions - 8

by Takeshi Yamada

Live New Orleans-style Jazz on the Boardwalk by Astroland Amusement Park. The music is good (but I think their costumes need serious modifications.) (September 2, 2007)

Several red cedar octagon gazebos like this were installed permanently on the boardwalk to provide nice stages for performers. These multi-functional structures work well for small bands, karaoke sessions, and DJ music sessions for dancing parties.

I was pleasantly surprised to hear such a good, seasoned, professional Mexican Mariachi band play right on the boardwalk.  This alone is surely worth visiting Coney Island!  The stage was set up by the Surf Avenue entrance of Astroland Amusement Park.  See the Wonder Wheel in the background. (September 9, 2007. Sunday)

Live music and dance party by locals. Nothing fancy but it is good, amateur, community fun. This gazebo at the board walk is called “Steeplechase Pavilion” after Steeplechase Park, one of Coney’s original amusement parks. (September 1, 2007)

Free dance parties like this, often with a live band, are held regularly at several pavilions on the boardwalk during the summer in Coney Island. These photos show a big midday dance party at Steeplechase Pavilion on the boardwalk. I shouldn’t be surprised but some of the grandpas and grandmas who were trained at Coney Island ballroom dancing clubs during its heyday can still really dance! (September 2, 2007)

FREE live music and dance parties that start during the day sometimes just keep going until late at night.  Very tropical, dynamic, alive and good! (September 1, 2006) 

“The Cole Bros Circus” visited Coney Island and entertained people this summer. Unfortunately, it was the only traveling attraction visited Coney Island this year unlike previous years.

Coney Island area of Brooklyn New York was the center of the entertainment industry in the United States about 100 years ago. It was bigger than Hollywood, Las Vegas, Walt Disney, Six Flags and Times Square combined then. Unfortunately it is not so any longer. The vary nature of the entertainment industry has changed so dramatically and drastically. Several historians specializing Coney Island including Charles Denson (author of Coney Island Lost and Found) states Coney Island hit the rock bottom in the 1970’s.

Takeshi Yamada and his wild friends at the 2007 Halloween Parade in the Village in Manhattan.

Coney Island is not even a good place to see any good parades, today. Nevertheless, there are still many bigger and better parades all over in downtown Brooklyn and Manhattan. The Halloween Parade in the Village in Manhattan is a huge free art parade and it is also one of the nation’s largest art parades. Brooklyn’s annual West Indian American Day Parade on Labor Day (the 40th anniversary this year) is also another art parade free to participate and it is even bigger than that of the village’s Halloween Parade. In fact, this Caribbean theme art parade is considered the largest parade in the entire five boroughs of New York City.

Spectacularly dressed up locals at the West Indian American Day Parade.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/97/235130103_c4aea6f3ec.jpg

Another sad fact is that there are absolutely no established traditional/modern/contemporary commercial sideshow companies existing anywhere in the Coney Island area or entire five boroughs of New York City today. (Recently, “Ripley’s Believe it or Not” opened at the Times Square in Manhattan. It is basically a “curiosity museum”. It may goes away within a year or so just like the one came and gone in the French Quarter in New Orleans when I lived there. It charges $24.95/adult.)  

I, Takeshi Yamada, am stating these cold facts realistically as one of the resident of Coney Island and a specialized artist who has been working for sideshow businesses and amusement park attraction businesses professionally for over 24 years in America.  “Takeshi Yamada’s Museum of World Wonders” is a private sideshow curiosity museum but it has not been run as a traditional sideshow attraction (“Dime Museum”).

The front main entrance of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, New York

with the banner of “Mythic Creatures” exhibition (photograph by Takeshi Yamada, July 10, 2007)

Besides my own personal museum, I also have been showing some of my sideshow gaffs and attractions at Brooklyn Public Library - Coney Island Branch currently as one of my own community fine art outreach programs. The documentary film featuring my sideshow gaffs, curiosity specimens and myself are on display at “Mythic Creatures: Dragons, Unicorns & Mermaids” exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan now (until January 6, 2008). I had over 400 fine art exhibitions internationally including Spain, The Netherlands, Japan and the United States. I have average 40 art exhibitions across the nation annually. Some of my sideshow banners and sideshow gaffs have been on display at sideshows, dime museums and grind shows on the midways at state fairs across the nation since 1983.

Talkers on the stage outside of the tent of the Ward Hall and Chris Christ’s “World of Wonders”.

New Jersey State Fair (Giant Stadium), 2007

The culture and art of the sideshow moved away from New York to other states such as Florida and California many decades ago. Today, New Yorkers have to visit other states to enjoy the real sideshows, sadly. For example, the World of Wonders sideshow runs the “modern style” Ten-in-One Circus Sideshow today. I know the owners and their performers personally. They are all truly remarkable and professional people. Their world-class traveling sideshows have been seen at state fairs across the nation, and they are regularly featured in numerous major newspapers, TV news, and sideshowworld.com.  ”999 Eyes” is another sideshow company which has been running world-class Seven, Nine, Eleven, and even Eighteen-acts-in-one stage sideshows at multiple states across the nation. 999 Eyes is a traditional vaudeville-style freakshow with modern twists, and they perform in major clubs and theaters. The Bros. Grim Sideshow is another big one with extensive attractions. These wonderful commercial companies’ information is easily accessible on many websites.

Jack Constantine’s Museum of World Oddities with vividly rendered banner line

advertizing curiosities inside. New Jersey State Fair (Giant Stadium), 2007.

In addition, I have to mention that Jack Constantine’s series of traveling attractions are a great example of today’s most successful traveling “grind-show” style sideshows. Florida-based Constantine’s Four C Productions, Inc. runs 60 to 70 world-class traveling attractions nationally and internationally each year. 2007 marks it’s 35th year anniversary. For his company’s nationwide traveling attractions, I have created more than three dozen commissioned sideshow gaffs, props, signs, and sideshow banners for years.

Takeshi Yamada’s breathtakingly hand-painted two banners (each is 9x9 feet)

graced the Snake Girl show of Jack Constantine. New Jersey State Fair (Giant Stadium), 2007.

http://four-c-productions.com/index.html

Fortunately, from the early 2000, the government really started pouring money into the Coney Island to revitalize this sluggish high unemployment community. It is called Coney Island Renaissance. Since I moved to the Coney Island area from Bay Ridge area of Brooklyn, New York in 2002, I have witnessed truly dramatic positive changes of this area with my own eyes. It has been wonderful to see the resuscitation of this once truly magical community. It remains to be seen however, if this rebirth brings us the spectacular Coney Island we once knew.

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