Lullaby for 2 Violins

T Ensemble Music

Bach would have enjoyed this too!!

Hi, Mom!!

Called my mom in Chicago the other day, and told her about my blog (and sorta expecting some compliments....). Obviously been reading my blog thoroughly, the young lady that gave my birth asked, "do you eat in Japan all the time?"
"No, " I said, "I don't eat when I am not eating."
I don't know about your mother, but my mom just does not let me get away that easily. "Then why you wrote about food all the time?"
"But I had an article about Japanese space program...", I tried to remind her.
"Even that was about food", as I told you, you just can not fool her.
"Eating all the time is not good for your health!", I could tell she was trying to be very patient with me.
(Silence......)

In fact, mom was right. Plus some of you folks probably started getting bored with my food talk anyway. So, let's detour from food talk for a healthy change.

On the way to a meeting I needed to take the O-Edo subway train at the Tokyo City Hall station. Walking down the stairs in the station I heard this music which was rather different from the usual elevator music. That got me started looking for the source of the sound. At the corner of the hall way, there was this gentleman dressed in his comfortable Japanese outfit, holding a Shamisen (三味線) and picking some random notes - and they are wonderful music to my ears!!

I always like the Shamisen, a 3-string Japanese music instrument. The body, or sound box, is relatively small but capable of generating an amazing volume of sound. The rectangular shape box is frame by hard wood, such as red sandalwood, and covered by two pieces of animal skins. (Well, I did not want to tell you this, but the orthodox Shamisens use the cat skins!) The bridge is placed directly on the top skin. Shamisen players use a "T" shape pick(a Bachi) to strike the strings to make sound. The well-trained musicians, as this gentleman in the video, can play extremely fast notes because of this Bachi.

In such office hour at the subway station, everyone was moving briskly to or from somewhere. I was the only person could afford the time (and having a not-so-real-job I guess) to stop and listen. That made us the only two static human being!! As if to reward this having-nothing-to-to guy, the Shamisen musician started playing this extremely difficult piece that I could not resist recording it on my digital camera. There is no doubt at all this gentleman must have spent years and years perfecting his art!!

The music style somehow sounded familiar to me, although it was a purely Japanese melody. It was not until much later that I realized the rhythm was similar to some phrases in JS Bach's Partita for Solo Violin. That just got me totally excited!!In fact, according to Wikipedia, both Shamisen and violin could trace their common origin to the equestrian cultures of Central Asia, the Mongolian instrument of Morin Huur, back to over 1,000+ years ago. If my beloved JS Bach were here, he would have liked this too, haha!!

Thank you, Shamisen-man. You made it my happy day!!