Check Out Edelweiss’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Edelweiss.

Hi Edelweiss, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
We all met each other at various anime conventions in Southern California in the late 2010s and formed a bond over being fans of the same anime series and same Japanese music groups. 

Originally, the lineup consisted of Cybacle and Mab, and the group expanded to include Clover and Tenshi. We planned to start performing together in 2020, but the pandemic put a pause on our activities, which we resumed in mid-2022. 

We’re all adults in our late 20s-early 30s, either working or in school, and performing at anime conventions together allows us to continuously have a creative outlet for ourselves – it’s never too late to pursue what you love! 

Most of us have some amateur performing arts background prior to this, and this was the perfect way to combine our shared interests. Currently, our repertoire consists solely of cover songs, but we do plan to include original music in the future as well. 

We enjoy being part of the kaigai (overseas) idol community and hope to continue to bring new and fresh ideas to the stage. 

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
The most difficult challenge is coordinating all of our schedules and finding time to rehearse since we’re all busy with full-time day jobs or grad school. Due to this, we’re not as active as many similar acts, but we do strive to put our all into every performance we do! 

Sometimes, there is the temptation to make up for lost time and push ourselves to do more, but we’re past the age of youthful recklessness and unlimited energy – it’s better to be realistic and focus on polishing a smaller repertoire instead of spreading ourselves thin and not being able to deliver a quality performance that we would be proud of. 

Our group’s motto is “blooming in adversity,” and we hope to embody that. 

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Our group performs vocal and dance covers of songs from Japanese animation and video games, primarily focused on routines from the rhythm game Ensemble Stars. Most similar acts tend to emulate female pop idols, but we also draw inspiration from male pop idol acts. This started off purely incidental since the franchise we were most emotionally invested in happened to be about male idols, but we truly fell in love with the Ensemble Stars’ discography and wanted to bring it to life onstage, even if it’s not as mainstream in the US yet. We also couldn’t decide whether to be a vocal or dance-focused group, so we went ahead and did both. 

In the overseas idol community, we feel that male idols are underrepresented. Most California-based idol-centric events tend to focus on female-presenting acts, and we believe that there’s an untapped realm to explore when it comes to male idols. This is important to us because we’re all nonbinary individuals who don’t want to be confined to any specific gender presentation. 

Within the group, we all contribute in our own ways. Cybacle does the audio mixing for any song covers posted online and any backing tracks needed for live performances, Clover takes over the video and photo editing, Mab is our self-titled manager and corresponds with convention staff regarding performance logistics, and Tenshi handles choreography and staging. 

In terms of your work and the industry, what are some of the changes you are expecting to see over the next five to ten years?
We’re involved in an indie capacity and don’t perform professionally, but it’s exciting to see J-Pop idols become more popular in the West. Currently, the type of infrastructure for pop idols in Japan simply doesn’t exist here, so most overseas idol groups are entirely self-produced. 

It would be interesting if the music industry here were to catch on – whether or not it’ll be viable as a career in 5-10 years is difficult to say. 

However, in our specific niche hobby circles, we simply hope that there will be more idol-centric events in California that are accessible to all. 

Contact Info:

• Website: https://edelweiss-idols.carrd.co/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edelweiss.idols/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/edelweissidols
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/edelweiss-idols

Image Credits
LuckyCadence
MiriHawke