Mujitsu and Tairaku's Shakuhachi BBQ

amokrun · 2007-05-23 09:47:01

Greetings everyone,

Yesterday at work I had a chance to try a simple plastic recorder. I'm not sure how things at in other countries but in here, everyone is forced to learn to play some silly tune on one on third grade or so. The ones used at schools are cheap plastic pipes that sound horrible. If someone thinks that Yuu sounds like plastic, you haven't heard one of these. It's been quite a while since I tried one since that thing made me hate wind instruments for many years back when I was on third grade.

Although I knew they are small, I didn't remember that they were quite that small. I also noticed pretty quickly that how you keep your head barely matters at all. You can raise the end of the flute to point to the roof and it still sounds exactly the same when you play. It made me appreciate the amount of detail one can add into the sound of shakuhachi.

There was one thing that I learned in the process. At first I played a simple melody because I had no clue about the fingerings. I kept thinking that the sound is quiet high even for a recorder. Sure, it's much higher than a 1.8 shakuhachi but it still didn't sound right. Soon enough I understood that I was overblowing the flute like crazy, so much in fact that the sound jumped up twice from the actual low point. I didn't think that I was blowing all that hard but apparently it was way too much. Getting the lowest notes was a very tough task because even a slight amount of blowing caused the sound to jump up. Playing a scale felt like I wasn't blowing at all.

When I tried the shakuhachi again I noticed that by blowing more like how I did with the recorder allowed me to blow somewhat longer. I always thought that I wasn't really blowing very hard at all but apparently I was wrong. Shakuhachi is much more forgiving and lets you waste air much more easily than the recorder does.

Now I'm hoping to blow for a bit with the recorder every night. It still sounds horrible, can't get past that, but it is a great way to make sure that you are using only as much air as needed. After I do that I try to blow the shakuhachi using no more air than what I need to get the recorder to play. It's a really humbling experience and just reminds me that just when you think you are getting somewhere, something comes along and shatters that illusion.

Alex · 2007-05-23 10:31:01

Hey Amokrun,

Great reflection indeed.

Yesterday I was thinking about precisely the same thing, the amount ot air I put into the Shakuhachi. It occured to me when I was trying to go through a certain line of the piece I was playing; what happened is that I kept on runing out of air towards the end of the line, being unable to finish it properly. Then I though about the possibility of being using too much air so I reduced the amount I put into the Shakuhachi and started looking for more resonance to increase the volume of the notes. And it works!

As you say, when you think you are getting somewhere suddently you discover another factor to add to the seemingly endless equation!

radi0gnome · 2007-05-23 11:15:50

I'm not sure what they use now in schools in the US, but when I was in elementary school the instrument everybody got was a "flute-o-phone". It was even worse than those cheap recorders. Recorders come in a bunch of sizes, sopranino on the high end, all the way down to instruments that need keys because the spacing between the fingers is too large. I suspect you had a sopranino. BTW, just like with shakuhachi, a good recorder player can get even the cheapest plastic instrument sounding OK. Since recorders have a fipple that directs the air over an edge to produce tone, the angle you hold the instrument doesn't make much difference. However, they are extremely sensitive to how much air pressure you use. Not all fipple flutes are like this, penny whistles are much more forgiving, but you can't get as much pitch and tonal variation as you can get from a recorder. Don't let this fool you though, penny whistles become real instruments in the right hands, but the skill is mostly in the fingers and musical ornamentation.

I can see where playing recorder could help develop breath control to a degree and improve shakuhachi playing. If you want to get a better recorder, you can get plastic ones that play very well for less than $50 US dollars. I'd say get your hands on as many different types of flutes as you can, transverse edge-tone (silver, bonsuri, Irish...), oblique (ney), fipple (recorders, penny whistle), and end-blown edge-tone (quena, shakuhachi). Learning to play the other instruments to some degree of expertise in my experience is a good thing and there is a transference of skills between the instruments. One example is that most silver flute players don't have much of a problem getting relatively decent tones out of shakuhachi almost immediately. Another is that I had got to a low level expertise on Turkish ney, kind of gave it up while I played around mostly with Irish flute for a few years, but then after experimenting a lot with shakuhachi for a few months decided to give the ney a shot again. It seems like playing shakuhachi helped out the ney playing by some amount!

It could be partly due to psychology. I heard it described from a teacher once that there's a board of directors hanging out in your head that while you're not practicing they are talking over and trying to figure out what this new thing is you're trying to do. So, when you take a break (hours, days, weeks, months, and even years) and come back to the practice, you may have improved some without even having practiced. Whatever the reason, experimenting with other flutes is very unlikely to hurt tonal development with any particular flute that is your primary interest, and if there's a chance it may help and you have the time for it, go for it.

amokrun · 2007-05-23 11:35:38

radi0gnome wrote:
Recorders come in a bunch of sizes, sopranino on the high end, all the way down to instruments that need keys because the spacing between the fingers is too large. I suspect you had a sopranino.

Yeah, I believe you are correct. It didn't feel odd back then but now I bet I could fit the thing inside the bore of my 1.8. The holes are so tiny that I could most likely use one finger to cover two holes if I angled it a bit. On the other hand, half-holing is a pain. Tsu Meri is a piece of cake compared to trying to figure out exactly what your fingering is covering rigth now. Then again, my fingers are pretty big even if they aren't very long.

radi0gnome wrote:
BTW, just like with shakuhachi, a good recorder player can get even the cheapest plastic instrument sounding OK.

I've heard people play those things and they sound just fine. My playing isn't that bad either. It's just the lack of aliveness that gets me. Recorder sounds a bit like what I would expect to get from a standard MIDI keyboard or something. Unlike shakuhachi the sound is very pure. Great for western pieces, I'm sure, but I'll still take the shakuhachi any day.

radi0gnome wrote:
However, they are extremely sensitive to how much air pressure you use. Not all fipple flutes are like this, penny whistles are much more forgiving, but you can't get as much pitch and tonal variation as you can get from a recorder.

Heh, I sort of noticed that. I don't know how much exactly the sound jumps every time but I managed to get it to do so quite a few times before I reached my limit. By the time shakuhachi hits Kan the recorder already sounds like a dog whistle.

radi0gnome wrote:
So, when you take a break (hours, days, weeks, months, and even years) and come back to the practice, you may have improved some without even having practiced.

I've had this happen to me so I find it easy to believe. At one point I didn't play at all for almost a month. When I started again I noticed that certain things which were difficult when I started the break seemed almost effortless. I learned to blow Kan like that as well. I forgot about it for a while and then figured that I'd give it another go. I don't really know what causes it but a short break occasionally seems to help clearing things out.

Mujitsu and Tairaku's Shakuhachi BBQ

#1 2007-05-23 09:47:01

Interesting experience with a recorder.

#2 2007-05-23 10:31:01

Re: Interesting experience with a recorder.

#3 2007-05-23 11:15:50

Re: Interesting experience with a recorder.

#4 2007-05-23 11:35:38

Re: Interesting experience with a recorder.

radi0gnome wrote:

radi0gnome wrote:

radi0gnome wrote:

radi0gnome wrote:

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