The 9th Kendo World Keiko-kai
- kendo-world
- Jul 8
- 3 min read
Ladies and Gentleman,
The Kendo World Team is pleased to announce that the Kendo World Keiko-kai is back!
After a break of six years, we will be holding the 9th keiko-kai on Saturday October 25, 2025, in Chiba prefecture. The details are being finalized at the moment, but for now, please put October 25 in your diary! Once the final schedule has been decided, we’ll post the details so please keep checking back!
The 1st Kendo World Tokyo Keiko-kai was held on June 30, 2012, in the small dojo of the Nippon Budokan. We were lucky to have been joined by seven 8-dan sensei, including such luminaries as the late H8-dan Inoue Yoshihiko-sensei, author of Kendo Kata – Essence and Application, and K8-dan Ozawa Hiroshi-sensei, author of Kendo – The Definitive Guide. There was a fantastic Nihon Kendo Kata demonstration by two of Inoue-sensei’s students, an instruction session, and then keiko with the sensei. A buffet and liquid refreshments followed in the Budokan cafeteria with many prizes that were kindly donated by various kendo-gu shops.
The 2nd keiko-kai was held at Meiji University’s Izumi Campus on July 20, 2013, and then the 3rd to the 8th events were held at Meiji University’s Nakano Campus, with the most recent event being held on July 27, 2019. COVID-19 put the brakes on the keiko-kai for a few years but we’re so glad to be back now!
Each keiko-kai was attended by several 8-dan sensei and around 50 participants, most of whom were non-Japanese. At each event there was always instruction, practice with the sensei and each other, and then a party with fantastic food and drinks, and plenty of prizes given away in raffle! After the party, most people kept on waxing lyrical about kendo in a nearby bar until the last train home.
Some of the keiko-kai featured demonstrations of jukendo - rifle with attached bayonet - and participants could have a go at doing kendo against the jukendo sensei. There were also some naginata practitioners in attendance.
The 9th Kendo World Keiko-kai will be in a different format from previous years, but will include all the activities that made the first eight events such a great success.
So for the time being, please keep Saturday October 25, 2025, free, and keep checking the Kendo World homepage and social media for updates on this fantastic event!!
Alex, Kan, and MIP
The KW Team
**The details are still being finalized so there may be a change in date and/or venue. Once everything is confirmed we'll post again. We hope to see you there!