Jero gave an enka performance at the Washington DC Cherry Blossom Festival last week, and the Washington Post has run an article about him:

Jero moved to Japan to teach English after graduating from college in 2003, sang enka on the side and eventually got noticed by a record label. He said his first release, “Umiyuki,” in 2008 rocketed to No. 4 on the pop chart in a week — the best performance ever for a debut enka song.

Enka singers, female and male, often perform wearing traditional kimonos. They don’t usually wear fur-trimmed North Face parkas, which is part of Jero’s allure.

But he said it is not a gimmick.

“I’ve lived in Pittsburgh till I was 21,” he said. “The kimono was not a part of who I was, and I never actually wanted to wear one. I didn’t want to be someone else when I went on stage. I wanted to be who I was. . . . I wanted to be me. I wanted to be true to myself.

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