New format for AKB48 Theater shows

     Throughout the past few years, as AKB48 got more and more famous, they found it increasingly difficult to stick to their concept of "Idols you can meet". AKB48's home is the 250-seat AKB48 Theater, where they hold almost-daily shows. However, as their fanbase grew bigger, winning tickets for the shows grew harder. When once a lucky fan could win shows every week or two, now the duration is once every month or two, or more. And that includes SDN48 and Kenkyuusei shows too!

     Not only that. While it is true that they perform almost daily, many do not appear at the theater as much as before because of AKB48's growth in popularity leading to increased appearances on TV and radio . So most of the shows now are, in fact, Kenkyuusei shows.


     However, starting 8 April, AKB48 Theater shows will be getting a new revamp! In the past, they would announce on the ticketing site which team will be perform (example: "Team B" show) and which members would be absent. Instead now they will announce which stage will be performed, and the members performing. For example,

4/8 (Friday) 19:00 "Theatre no Megami" show
(Ticket price)
Regular (men) 3000 yen / Regular (ladies) 2000 yen / Students from elementary to high school 2000 yen
(Performing members)
Ishida Haruka - Oku Manami - Kashiwagi Yuki - Kitahara Rie - Kobayashi Kana - Komori Mika - Sato Amina - Sato Natsuki - Suzuki Mariya - Chikano Rina - Hirajima Natsumi - Masuda Yuka - Watanabe Mayu - Kobayashi Marina - Suzuki Shihori - Nagao Mariya

     Kenkyuuseis will be included in the name list too. And if a show has more Kenkyuuseis than regular members, they will charge the price of a Kenkyuusei show (2,000yen males, 1,000 others) instead of a regular show (3,000yen males, 2,000yen others). With this move however, there won't be any more Kenkyuusei-only shows.

     AKB48 management have always said that they wanted to go back to how they were in the past and have Theater shows like they had back in the old (pre-Oogoe Diamond) days. However because of the increasingly tight schedule, it wasn't something easy to do. It is unfortunate that they had to resort to this, but it is at least a step forward.

     This is one of the announcements that were supposed to be announced at the cancelled Takamina ni Tsuite Ikimasu concert.


Translated by: BLOG48

We set as our theme for this year "Back to our starting point".

We should relive that "December 8th 2005", and this year we've been in preparations to have theatre shows in a good balance.

So far, we have announced the schedule indicating shows as "Team shows" and "Kenkyuusei shows", but from April 8th, I announce to the fans that we have set up a system in order to perform the four stages:
AKB48 "Mokugekisha" stage
AKB48 "Reset" stage
AKB48 "Theatre no megami" stage
SDN48 "Yuuwaku no garter" stage
in a well-balanced fashion.

Moreover, so far we have announced who the resting members were, but from now on we will announce the members who will perform, including kenkyuusei.

If more than half of the 16 members are kenkyuusei the ticket will be 2000 yen.
If more than half are team members, the price is 3000 yen.
Moreover, from April 4th tickets for performances by the 2nd generation of SDN48 will cost 3000 yen, too.

"Sending out to the world a new generation of stars from the theatre"
We will relive the concept that we had when the theatre opened.

We also expect the percentage of people winning shows to be higher if we schedule more, better balanced shows.

Lastly, about the announcements that were scheduled to be made at the Yokohama Arena concerts, we will be able to make them soon, so please wait just a little more.