Mujitsu and Tairaku's Shakuhachi BBQ

Tairaku wrote:

JI-SUS CHRIST!

How many angels can blow ro on the head of a jinashi pin?

Hmmm. Depends. Is it a wide-bore pin and does it REALLY not have any Ji?

(I like the "Ji-sus" thing...)

you know ,i find jitard  preferable to retard , but not by a lot.

Tairaku wrote:

JI-SUS CHRIST!

How many angels can blow ro on the head of a jinashi pin?

Hey, that's MY line, dammit!

Justin wrote:

Hi Lodro. Riley Lee is one of those traditional owners of the instruments.

I learn something new about the Shakuhachi everyday, thank you Justin. My confusion (and it was confusion not necessarily judgemental) regarding this recent discussion was that I (thought I) was seeing, yet again, another ethnomusicological bash where the protagonists had not considered to simply 'consult with' the people that actually knew best, or simply had the answers. My experience from having worked intensively within the Australian Aboriginal music field for many years is that (many) ethnomusicologists tend not to look at their own place within the field and tend not to consider that their part and how they are playing it is actually an intrinsic part of the whole process itself, and by necessity it's always changing. And that they are meant to be 'seeking' clarification rather than assuming they have the authority to dictate it.

Please, if this actually does sound like condemnation, forgive me. I'm just going on my experiences. Respect to the protagonists.

Riley Lee wrote:

ABRAXAS wrote:

How strictly or generally to Dokyoku players stick to hocchiku/jinashi style instruments in playing that repertoire?

No stricture at all, as far as I know. .

That probably depends upon how you define "Dokyoku" and whether you even acknowledge the phrase. This will probably start another war of semantics which could cause all our computers to burst into flames, but I don't care because I can just use the word censor or change people's avatars and titles around if things get hairy for me.

"Dokyoku" seems to be the common term in the West for followers of Watazumi but it also seems to be used most frequently to describe followers of Yokoyama Katsuya and his line. Yokoyama is the most famous of Watazumi's students. But there are some other Watazumi students and devotees who teach and perform.

Yokoyama and gang do not care about jinashi, in fact they usually gravitate towards highly refined modern jiari flutes by Miura Ryuho. Part of this has to do with the fact that Yokoyama expanded his teaching repertoire well beyond Watazumi honkyoku to include Kinko honkyoku and gaikyoku, shinkyoku, Fukuda Rando etc. and you wouldn't play all that stuff on raw jinashi. Unless you make a project out of that.

Some of the other followers try to play and make flutes more similar to those used by Watazumi himself. They get closer to the sound Watazumi actually had for honkyoku.

And then there are plenty who use both kinds and everything in between.

Thank you for the replies Tairaku and Dr. Lee.

Ohh... this thread is wonderful. It got two risen from the grave. Well, it's that time of the year too.
As Ed said

edosan wrote:

Rumours of your death must be exaggerated.

Welcome back on the forum, Justin! I am sure we will hear more from you in the future.

The meditation centre where I live has a 'weekend of work' this weekend and then I have 8 concerts next week in Copenhagen...
So some silence from me on this front.

Kiku Day wrote:

Ohh... this thread is wonderful. It got two risen from the grave. Well, it's that time of the year too.
As Ed said

edosan wrote:

Rumours of your death must be exaggerated.

Welcome back on the forum, Justin! I am sure we will hear more from you in the future.

The meditation centre where I live has a 'weekend of work' this weekend and then I have 8 concerts next week in Copenhagen...
So some silence from me on this front.

Hi Kiku
Thanks for the welcome! It may only be a temporary visit though. I'm still very busy and don't have time for the forum to be honest. Plus, my computer will be away for a while for repairs soon. Just thought I'd pop in and say hello with these interesting threads. Jinashi and tengai! Where else in the world can we talk about those with such passion!

Great that you're living in a meditation centre. I hope it goes well for you. And good luck with your 8 concerts. Must be a lot of fun!

Best wishes
Justin

The following is in answer to Kiku’s previous post #125 of this thread. I recommend reading/reviewing what Kiku wrote before continuing.

Firstly, thank you Kiku for finally responding to my repeated requests for answers to a few questions I posed earlier, even if belatedly and somewhat heatedly. Never mind all of that; I will try to address only the parts of post #125 that might appeal to the Forum members. I will ignore the less interesting bits, the accusations and so forth. I would only like to remind us all, of the moderator’s request in the Forum’s “Read First” section: “When posting to the forum, please be nice. Respectful, civil interaction and debate keeps us closer to the original purpose of a forum.”

Secondly, many might think that I am making a big deal over nothing. In answer to that, may I point out that this entire Forum might be making a big deal over nothing (pardon the Zen pun).

More importantly, I first brought up and continue to bring up the subject of terminology only because it obviously is a VERY BIG DEAL in this section of the Forum. This section has two ‘stickies’, which are posts that are always listed first and that never go away. The very first, #1 Sticky is entitled, “Ji-nashi terminology”.  So, terminology must be very important here. Does any other section of the Forum begin with a ‘sticky’ called ‘terminology’?

For those who have not recently reviewed #1 Sticky, the ‘terminology’ sticky, I recommend that they do so now.

The problem is not with ‘Kiku’s’ terms (meaning she adopted them – she wrote the ‘sticky’ - neither inferring that they are Kiku’s personally, nor that she has any emotional involvement in them) and not with their definitions. It does not matter who originated the terms. They would not be less valid if Kiku had created and defined them personally, nor are they more valid just because my colleagues Simura and Tukitani first explained them to Kiku. 

The definitions as presented are not ‘too difficult to understand’, even for me. #1 Sticky is there in order to help clarify what Kiku rightly perceives to be a confusion that exists amongst the numerically very small but ever-growing number of people whose interests lie primarily with shakuhachi made without ji. The confusion that Kiku would like to help clear up lies mainly with other terms, kyotaku, hotchiku, hôchiku, etc. I believe that Kiku started another thread entitled, “Kyotaku”, in order to further deal with the confusion (see below).
No disagreement so far, I think.

As mentioned previously, anyone can define any word any way they choose, particularly in academic discourse. Thought-provoking, logical definitions might be better than ones chosen without any reason at all, but the choice is yours. Once a word is defined arbitrarily in this way however, it is best to use the definition consistently; if not, they soon lose their usefulness.

The definitions in #1 Sticky fall into this first category of arbitrary definitions. No problems.

There is another type of definition, the ‘common usage’ type. Dictionaries are full of these. This type is defined by common usage. If enough people use a word to mean a certain thing, then the word will eventually be ‘officially’ defined by that meaning by the dictionaries. This type of definition frequently changes over time, but the change usually takes decades if not centuries. This is what Justin called ‘the real world’.

Common usage definitions are frequently illogical, confusing (especially confusing), contradictory, nonsensical, vague and redundant, possibly because frequently their creators are also all of the above. Nevertheless, most people tend to understand them, not with much precision perhaps, but well enough, precisely because they are used commonly.
Okay so far?

Here is where we might disagree, though by not as much as one might think.

PROBLEM NUMBER ONE:  Arbitrary/Common Usage Muddle #1
The definitions in #1 Sticky are an attempt to simplify the terminology surrounding flutes that have little or no ‘ji’. The three terms, jinashi, jimori and jinuri are arbitrarily chosen and defined. They are examples of the first type of definition. As such, they are not ‘generic terms’. The definitions in #1 Sticky are arbitrary. The meaning assigned to one word conflicts with its ‘common usage meaning (see below) and the meanings assigned to the other two don't’ fit their literal Japanese definitions (see below).

Mix up perfectly legitimate ‘arbitrary’ definitions with ‘common usage’ definitions and the result is often a muddle. Also, arguing against other people’s arbitrary terminology while defining one’s own further tends to muddy the waters.

People are always creating arbitrary definitions. A pertinent example is Nishimura Koku and his followers. Nishimura decided to arbitrarily define a pre-existing term (kyotaku). His definition (see: http://myoanflute.blogspot.com/) implies that flutes by any other name (eg. jinuri and jinashi) are inferior to kyotaku.  The above blog explicitly states this with regard to jinuri / ji-ari flutes.

Because Nishimura’s ‘kyotaku’ belongs to the first type of terminology, he is free to use the term any way he likes. We can point out problems, such as his convenient omission that the “Kyotaku Denki”, the source of the term, and which he uses to give legitimacy to his arbitrary definition, is a piece of fiction, a fraud. The general consensus is that the document was written in the 17th century, though it claims to have been written in the 12th century. To call it ‘history’ is inaccurate and misleading.

Nevertheless, Nishimura and his followers can define the word ‘kyotaku’ to mean anything they want, however problematic that definition might be. The same is true with the term ‘hocchiku/hotchiku’.

I was interested to read in posting #7 of the ‘kyotaku’ thread, that according to Tilo, ‘kyotaku’ flutes are different from (meaning ‘better’ than) mere jinashi flutes because more work has been done on them (painted with urushi and inlay added at the blowing edge) and so they are more refined. Yet not even Tilo however, could argue that these attributes make them different from jinashi flutes as defined in #1 Sticky. Refinements such as these play no part in the terminology.

BTW, Kiku tried to initiate a discussion of Nishimura’s writings, in the thread entitled “Kyotaku”. Her first entry quoted writings by and about Nishimura, who appropriated the term ‘kyotaku’ to describe his flutes, and invited responses. It was interesting to note that there were none; initially no one replied to this post. Possible conclusion: very few knew and even less cared about what Nishimura calls his flutes. But if I was really into, for example, jinashi flutes and someone else starts calling his flutes by a catchy name, implying that they are special, even though they are really just jinashi, then I would be bothered by this, too.

We can’t stop people from using these terms, though we don’t have to accept them. One can’t really say that such arbitrary definitions are ‘wrong’ and I’m glad to see that when Kiku did so in #1 Sticky, she immediately followed with a qualifying ‘it’s only my opinion’. In my opinion however, one need not and really shouldn’t express one’s opinion about others’ arbitrary definitions when defining one’s own terms. So, I suggest that #1 Sticky be rewritten (see below) to include only the arbitrarily defined terms used in this section of the Forum. The terms could be defined as ‘such and such’ without defending them and with no reference to other terms.

PROBLEM NUMBER TWO: Arbitrary/Common Usage Muddle #2 - Jinashi versus Jinashi
The word, jinashi has entered into the category of common usage, unlike jimori, kyotaku, hocchiku and maybe even jiari/jinuri, since there is still the confusion of two terms to mean the one thing. Everyone uses the term, ‘jinashi’.

As is so often the case, even though it has a literal meaning in Japanese (without ji), it is commonly used, in Japanese as well as in English, to mean something different or broader. The term shakuhachi is another example of this. Everyone knows that even though the word in Japanese literally means “one ‘shaku’ and eight ‘sun’” or” 1.8 feet”, in addition to this specific linear measurement, it also refers to a bamboo flute, amongst other things.

As Daniel illustrated with his examples, jinashi is commonly used to mean flutes with little or no ji, that is, not jinuri flutes, but also not solely jinashi flutes as defined in #1 Sticky. The common way jinashi is used also includes some jimori flutes. There is nothing wrong with this; by definition, common usage definitions are never ‘wrong’, and it is usually futile fighting against them.

In all likelihood, the term ‘jinashi’ will always mean things other than its literal definition. To me, and to many others, for example, jinashi also denotes a tone quality, though flutes with ji can also have that quality.

Problems may arise when a common usage word is used as an arbitrary term AND when the definitions of both are so close as to cause confusion. This is why I suggested the arbitrary term, ‘senchiku’. Since ‘jinashi’ is taken to mean more than just shakuhachi with absolutely no ji, why struggle against that? It would make more sense to adopt another, precise and arbitrary term. The term, jimori is such an adopted word, a precedent for adopting ‘senchiku’.

The new term doesn’t have to be senchiku. It could be anything as long as it doesn’t already have a common usage definition that will add to the confusion. By arbitrarily defining another term to take on the meaning presently assigned to jinashi, the term jinashi can revert back its common meaning, which incorporates ‘senchiku’ (or whatever), jimori, kyotaku and hocchiku. By doing so, the title of this section finally begins to make sense (it doesn’t now, as so much more is discussed here than just jinashi flutes as the word is presently, narrowly defined).

And yet...
Even though I am beginning to warm to the term ‘senchiku’, probably the simpler solution would be to acknowledge that jinashi literally means absolutely no ji, but has unfortunately, at least in terms of precise definitions, come to also mean flutes that have all the characteristics of those without any ji at all, but may have some ji, too.

PROBLEM NUMBER THREE: Shades of Grey
As Justin summarised in his post #146, it’s easy to differentiate between absolutely no ji (what I suggested calling senchiku) and even a little ji (jimori). There is however, no clear delineation between jimori and jinuri. How do we deal with the ‘how many grams’ question?

It helps to have a term that is vague enough to cover much of the grey area. I am suggesting that the common definition of jinashi be maintained, even though it’s not the literal meaning of the word, in part because the vagueness of that ‘real world’ definition is useful. Yet it really only covers the bottom end of the spectrum – the senchiku/barely jimori flutes.

I can’t think of any solutions to this problem. Perhaps the best solution for now is to acknowledge that there is a grey area between jimori and jinuri and leave it at that.

PROBLEM NUMBER FOUR: “A superior tone”
The entire topic of this section is mostly about wanting a flute with a ‘superior tone’. But that ‘s not what I’m talking about.

It is important and yet difficult to avoid sounding superior. A superior tone can be easily implied in what one writes. For example, in my opinion, the blog about Nishimura and his ‘kyotaku’ reeks of a superior tone. There is an even greater danger of others hearing, or reading a superior tone into a text where none was intended. Prime examples of this can be found in this thread. In any case, one should try to avoid writing with a superior tone as much as possible.

As it is written now, #1 Sticky implies that jinashi flutes are the best. Quotation marks used with the word “improved” suggest that there really wasn’t any improvement with the addition of ji. This may be true, but people who use jinuri flutes (the overwhelming majority of shakuhachi players) would find this implication condescending.

Also, the single biggest reason why I found the term jimori distasteful was the way #1 Sticky described them as being ‘reasonably priced, well-tuned alternatives’ to jinashi flutes.

The expression ‘reasonably priced, well-tuned alternatives’ implies that if price was no concern then why on earth would you possibly want a jimori flute when you could get a superior jinashi flute? Plastic recorders are reasonably priced and well-tuned alternatives to Fred Morgan recorders. Flying economy class is a reasonably priced alternative to flying first class.

I have had, since the 1970s, several flutes with only a bit of ji in the bottom end of the bamboo, perhaps just like the ones Kiku mentions having seen in #1 Sticky. According to our terminology, they are definitely jimori. These flutes have, in my opinion, the ‘amazing tone qualities’ that have all of us so captivated. I personally like their tone better than almost all jinashi flutes I’ve played or heard. Furthermore, they cost far more than any jinashi I’ve ever come across. They are NOT mere ‘reasonably priced, well-tuned alternatives’ to jinashi flutes, and so by extension, I don’t want to call them jimori flutes, at least as they are described in #1 Sticky.

Of course, my flutes themselves are quite comfortable being classified under the legitimate, arbitrary definition of jimori. I would be too, if the offending, superior sounding passages in #1 Sticky were removed.

PROBLEM NUMBER FIVE: Literal Meanings
This problem is one that may have to stay, as it might be too hard to fix in our lifetimes. But it is worth pointing out.

The term jinashi literally means “without ji”, yet is commonly used to refer to flutes with some ji. This conflict between the literal meaning and the common usage has already been noted.

Also, the term, ‘mori’ in jimori can mean, “pile up, heap on, serve up, etc.”. On the other hand, the term ‘nuri’ in jinuri means, “to paint, plaster, lacquer, varnish, spread, smear, daub, etc”. Finally, the term ‘ari’ in jiari can mean just ‘is’ or ‘exist’.

In other words, all three words presently used in #1 Sticky have literal meanings that don’t fit that well with their arbitrary definitions.

It would be more in keeping with the original, literal meanings, if jimori was defined as shakuhachi totally full of (piled on) ji. The term, jinuri conveys far better the concept of daubing or smearing just a bit of ji onto the bore. The term, jiari just means ‘there is ji’, again seemingly more suited to what is now called jimori.

But the common usage definition of jinashi is here to stay, and the definition of the terms jinuri/jiari is also too widely accepted to change. If that is the case, then it’s probably better to keep jimori as is, too.

To reward those of you who have lasted this far, here is a little known fact for those who enjoy learning something new about shakuhachi every day. Perhaps, the deciding factor that finally overcame my resistance to adopting the term ‘jimori’ was my knowing that one dictionary definition of the character used for ‘mori’ (盛) is ‘to copulate’ (usually in reference to animals, as in a stallion ‘servicing’ a mare). In my opinion, this is most appropriate, since in Japan, one ‘common usage’ meaning of the word, shakuhachi is fellatio. I’ll leave the reasoning behind the latter to your fertile imaginations.

Moral: if you are going to use Japanese terms, try to learn about their literal, original and alternative meanings and allusions. And don’t be surprised at what you learn.

CONCLUSION:
I suggest that #1 Sticky be changed to the following:

[BEGIN QUOTE]

In order to avoid confusion, the following terms and definitions will be used in this section:

Jinashi shakuhachi (地無し) literally ‘without ji’ (generic term that denotes flutes with either little or no ji, in contrast to its literal meaning).

Jimori shakuhachi (地盛り尺八): literally ‘[a] serving of ji’ (denotes shakuhachi where there is some ji in the bore, but not where the entire bore is built up with ji).

Jinuri shakuhachi (地塗り尺八): literally ‘painted or smeared with ji’ (denotes shakuhachi where the entire bore is built up with ji). The term, jiari (地有り): literally ‘ji exists’, also refers to this type of flute. There is no clear delineation between jimori and jinuri/jiari flutes, but in most cases the difference is noticeable.

Note: The difference between the literal meaning of the word ‘jinashi’ and its commonly used meaning is a source of confusion. Examples of more precise terminology to denotes shakuhachi where the material is only bamboo;, with no ji at all, include simply, ‘true jinashi’, or the term ‘senchiku’ (專 竹尺八), literally ‘exclusively bamboo’.

Also, other terms, such as ‘kyotaku’ and ‘hocchiku’ are not included in this list as they are encompassed by the term, jinashi. Furthermore, the inclusion of or lack of urushi (lacquer) or blowing edge inlays in the construction does not affect the definitions of the three terms.

[END QUOTE]

Short and sweet, unlike this post.

Last edited by Riley Lee (2009-05-14 22:02:28)

Tairaku wrote:

Wow it's scary when Ph.D.'s and Ph.D. candidates get on the forum, we might have to buy more bandwidth!

It's a carefully guarded secret that Ph.D. actually stands for 'Piled higher and Deeper'....

Riley Lee wrote:

To reward those of you who have lasted this far, here is a little known fact for those who enjoy learning something new about shakuhachi every day. Perhaps, the deciding factor that finally overcame my resistance to adopting the term ‘jimori’ was my knowing that one dictionary definition of the character used for ‘mori’ (盛) is ‘to copulate’ (usually in reference to animals, as in a stallion ‘servicing’ a mare). In my opinion, this is most appropriate, since in Japan, one ‘common usage’ meaning of the word, shakuhachi is fellatio. I’ll leave the reasoning behind the latter to your fertile imaginations.

.

No-sword wrote:

the English-language online shakuhachi forum

Sure most of it is English but any language is OK, we've had some tasty German, French, Italian, Spanish and Czech posts.

International Shakuhachi BBQ.

No-sword wrote:

(maybe via mail if it's too esoteric/off-topic for the forum).

Hah. Like that's even the vaguest of possibilities