Mujitsu and Tairaku's Shakuhachi BBQ

I sometimes go busking, mostly to accustom myself to playing while nervous. I play in a tunnel and the acoustics sound great. I always use a 1.8. I sometimes use a 2.7 but its a bit low and quiet for outside playing, and my arms get sore after a while.

I won't claim Komuso style, but yesterday morning I took a hike in hills just on the edge of Boulder Colorado.  I took a David Brown wood 2.4 with me and played for about 30 minutes at a large natural sandstone arch with a nice view to the east over the plains.

I have just over a year of shakuhachi study, and several years of flute before that so I have decent wind, but I'm not very loud on the 2.4 or that good for that matter.  Only four people came through while I was playing.  Two complemented me, one dog was curious but seemed relatively complementary also.

mrosenlof wrote:

Only four people came through while I was playing.  Two complemented me, one dog was curious but seemed relatively complementary also.

I actually play in all sorts of places occasionally, including railway stations and such where you end up having to sit and wait. The only problem is that playing somewhere with a few people around means that all the questions people ask make it hard to get any playing done. By the time you are done with explaining what you are playing and how it works to everyone your train usually arrives. I figured that going somewhere to play when you aren't in a hurry would take care of that.

Every now and then I play in all sorts of unusual places, sometimes just for fun and sometimes because I was asked to. At first I thought that it would be a bad idea to do so when you aren't anywhere near good enough. However, few people talked me out of that idea and said that it's still a good idea to let people hear it even if you aren't perfect. Chances are that someone gets interested and you can then help them get started in something they would most likely have never known about otherwise. I suppose there is no harm done as long as I make sure that nobody gets the wrong idea about the level of my skills.

shinkage ryu wrote:

In the true spirit of a Komuso,  you would play in the presence of others, however you would play FOR yourself......or rather for the absence of yourself.

The komuso part was mostly a joke on my part. There is a lot more to that than just sitting somewhere and playing a melody.

shinkage ryu wrote:

Your skill level is nothing more than what other's percieve it to be.  Who can be the judge of good or bad?  (especially if it IS indeed an instrument that they have never seen or heard.

Funny that you mentioned it. Just a few days ago there was an amusing event that happened to me. I was playing at work (because, after all, what else is there to do at work except playing) and had to clean up my flute a bit. Since I had nothing but some paper towels there at the moment, I tried to use one for that. Naturally it didn't work out and a small piece got stuck somewhere in the middle. Oh well, it's a pipe so I might as well blow it out.

I tried to blow it out but it was rather stuck in there. Someone happened to walk past me and noticed that I was blowing into some sort of flute. She commented that the instrument has a rather unusual sound, something quite unlike what she had heard before. She was mildly amused when I tried to explain that it wasn't the sound that this thing usually makes and I was simply trying to get a piece of paper out of it.

Tairaku wrote:

BTW, I played in Helsinki at your natural history museum and people really loved it, so I would say they are predisposed to enjoy shakuhachi up there. They said it reminded them of Laplander music.

There is something strange about our culture - especially as far as music goes - in comparison to the japanese one. Both in here and in Japan many traditional pieces are rather sad and actually sound rather alike. There was one rather famous case where an old finnish piece became a hit in Japan even though it wasn't even particularly well known here.

Back when I tried to figure out good songs for the winter season I noticed that several traditional pieces from here sounded exactly like you would expect from a traditional japanese piece. It was very easy to play them because the scales matched many japanese pieces I knew perfectly.

I really don't know what the connection is. To my knowledge there has been absolutely no cultural exchange between these two countries and yet there are various similarities that keep appearing in various contexts. I actually find it somewhat strange that there are basically no shakuhachi players around here.

Yu-Jin,
Since you're in San Diego, have you ever gone to Quail Garden(s) and played in the bamboo grove?
-Bruce

Tairaku wrote:

There's another shakuhachi player in Finland named Jone Tamaki, do you know him? Maybe you guys can do it together.

I believe I know him, yes. Well, not know him as much as know of him. I tried to track down other finnish players some time ago. It is somewhat easier than one might think since if you count out people who have learned it somewhere far away (and I have no way to find those people), they have to either be self-taught or students of Gunnar Linder. Gunnar gave me a rather short list of half a dozen or so people. Out of those several live more or less permanently in Sweden nowdays. Not surprisingly almost the entire list consisted of people who also attend to the activities at the local Zen center.

I met one of those people and we talked a fair bit about the whole deal. He told me that most of the others who had started playing either didn't continue it for long or moved to Sweden. He also knew Jone personally. As far as I understood, Jone mainly plays other instruments - sax, I believe - and actually plays for living. I do not know how far he has gotten in his practice of shakuhachi. The way I understood it was that he was planning on starting it seriously but hadn't found the time to do so. I do not know if has since started to practice more intensively or not. Guess I'll have to ask Gunnar the next time I meet with him.

So far the only thing I know for sure about shakuhachi in Finland is that nobody here has progressed far enough to earn any sort of official paperwork on it and nobody seems to teach around here. Of course, now that I say this out loud I'm sure someone will prove me wrong soon enough.

Tairaku wrote:

This is a problem with shakuhachi in the West. Not enough teachers and the ones who exist are concentrated in certain areas like NYC and San Francisco. The Sawai school of koto players have spread out because Sawai told them to. Go forth and multiply. We need something like that with the shakuhachi instead of everybody hiding out in Japan. Even most of the Western players are in Japan! What's up with that? Let's become missionaries instead of hanging around the Vatican. I am issuing a public challenge for other shakuhachi teachers to move to obscure places and spread the sound. In one or two generations we'll have something amazing going on.

It actually happens already to some extent, although the progress is much slower. It's sort of like how - excuse me for the analogy - diseases spread. It starts from one point and first spreads to the nearby areas. Occasionally someone will move out of the central area and take the art with him. This starts another point where the art can spread.

It's somewhat problematic around here though. Take my situation for example. To get a lesson, I need to travel to Sweden. It's not as hard as it sounds but it's still roughly a day to one direction and another back. If I want to stay for longer than a day I need to figure out where to stay. All this also costs something. Although I can practice on my own and go to take a bunch of lessons occasionally to correct mistakes and to learn something new that I can practice, it's hardly the ideal way. Maybe I should move to live in a ditch next to Gunnar's place for the upcoming summer...

Few people brought up internet lessons. While I appreciate the idea and see how that could be one solution, I still like sitting next to someone who can nudge the end of my flute when it starts to drop too much. I'm a CS student and as such I should be the last person to have issues with computer-based solution. Yet even I don't really find the idea comfortable.

I'm working on some internet resources for people in Finland (yes, all three of them) to get started with shakuhachi. Stuff like where to find a teacher, where to get flutes, who to hang out with and what sort of problems you may encounter in Finland that are fairly unique (weather comes to mind). I'm also planning to translate Gunnar's site as soon as it gets done. While I can't do a thing to help people to play I can at least hopefully give people the opportunity to help themselves.

Oh well. Anyone into giving a volume discount on lessons to a poor student? People living next to a fairly comfortable ditch, haystack or other soft and free resting place preferred.

kyoreiflutes wrote:

I try to go outside to play, but it's often windy here, and I really have a problem playing in the wind.

Oddly enough, I love playing in the wind. I used to do it a lot during summer when we were at the summer house my girlfriend's parents have. It's a tiny island with nothing but islands and water all around you. Playing with the wind that runs through the forest is a lot of fun. I try to forget about pieces, scales and everything that would limit what I can do. Just go with the flow - literally - and it can be quite fun. Can't let that wind beat you at muraiki, no?

kyoreiflutes wrote:

I'd probably take a Tengai with me to practice, using it as a windscreen, but then THAT would attract even more attention. lol.

Sounds like a good idea to me. I'd use one if I had one. Unfortunately I don't - yet. Planning to get one for the summer. I suppose it could give a slight advantage in bad weather conditions. I have nothing but good experiences from getting attention. Every so often someone asks me about what I'm doing. The way I see it, people can't get interested in things they don't know about. Who cares if you can't play that well. Odds are that someone who sees you play decides to pursue the same path and finds joy in doing so. Isn't that worth getting over the fears of looking silly?

kyoreiflutes wrote:

Or maybe I'll just go out and actually play loudly today for the first time. I'm so used to blowing at home, and, while my girlfriend really tolerates it nicely, I never play it too loud. My flutes play well softly so it never bothers me.

I learned at one point that actively trying to be very quiet made my playing much worse. Since I tried to hold back on blowing as to not make too much noise I also didn't use enough air and the sound was often unstable and kan notes simply didn't work. Ever since I started to play loudly I've noticed that my playing has improved dramatically. Now I just start blowing without thinking about things like "oh, I wonder if this will sound bad. Maybe I should blow more quietly in case something goes wrong". When I do this the resulting sound is completely different. Strangely enough it also helped me to play quietly. When you go for it you get a good idea of what kind of blowing gets you what kind of sound. It then becomes much easier to find the spot where you blow hard enough to get a solid sound but not too hard so that the volume stays down.

geni wrote:

playing  outside is the best.
Real Life performance.

I used to play (flute) in the T stations in Boston with a guitar player. It helped my playing a lot. My sound grow bigger and I developed musicaly a lot..playing for hours.
When I was in Albania, i used to practise outside..in the garden of the school. No reverb,no echo...natural:-)
I am planing to do the some thing with shakuhachi now...Tired of practising inside.
peace
G

I've noticed that people who only play inside tend to sound that way. Tight, introverted, small. Whereas shakuhachi players who play outside much of the time sound like that. Expansive, big, open, natural. Very recommended.

About practicing loud versus soft. Kurahashi Sensei said to play as loud as possible all the time for the first ten years. After you develop your strength and air flow, then you start to reign it in. While this may be extreme taken literally it's still a good thought. It's easier to drive slow in a Ferrari than it is to drive fast in a VW Beetle. With shakuhachi strength is good. Relates to chi or ki (life energy). Of course you don't want your tone to be harsh and shreiking, but it is possible to play stong and still have a mellow sound. Yamaguchi Goro for example was a strong player.

geni wrote:

I got to try a Ferrari sometimes

Right! Not like I would kow what it feels like to drive one! I drive a Toyota. I think I'm the only rockstar who never owned a cool car. I spent all my money on bamboo!

Tairaku wrote:

About practicing loud versus soft. Kurahashi Sensei said to play as loud as possible all the time for the first ten years. After you develop your strength and air flow, then you start to reign it in. While this may be extreme taken literally it's still a good thought. It's easier to drive slow in a Ferrari than it is to drive fast in a VW Beetle. With shakuhachi strength is good. Relates to chi or ki (life energy). Of course you don't want your tone to be harsh and shreiking, but it is possible to play stong and still have a mellow sound. Yamaguchi Goro for example was a strong player.

Sounds about right to me. I find that it's easier to lower the volume after you play loud for a bit. If I try to start playing very quietly the tone is most of the time quite weak and as I try to make it louder the sound just fails to appear. This is why I almost always start my practice sessions by playing a short burst of few notes more or less as loud as I can and with quite a bit of overblowing thrown in. I then let the last note fade out with a slight vibrato. Although it sounds quite nice (or so I've been told) I actually do it just to get a feeling of the amount of pressure needed for playing in different ways. After that I can usually get closer to the kind of volume I'm looking for more easily.

As far as playing outside goes, I usually don't play any particular pieces but rather come up with the melody as I play. The nice thing is that you can adjust to changes in noise around you. You can move to playing low and quiet sounds if the area suddenly gets quiet or play more strongly if other sounds start to overpower your playing. I find that doing that makes you actually notice subtle changes in the environment whereas normally you would simply ignore them.