Hello,
I'm just joining the list and thought I'd throw in a little
bio and a comment or two.
I live in Naperville, Illinois (a suburb of Chicago, about 25 miles
due west of the City). I've been playing shakuhachi for about 4 or
5 years now (the last 3 of which, I have been studying with a teacher).
I first heard the shakuhachi in the early 70's on a recording of a
classical piece composed by Toru Takumitsu called "November Steps".
I always liked the composition but didn't really know what a shakuhachi
was (nor did I know what a Biwa was either - it's also featured in
the piece). Many years later (about 5 years ago now actually) my wife
saw a shakuhachi in a catalog ("Music for Little People") and decided
to surprise me with it for some event (I think my birthday). Well,
the flute came from Monty Levenson (shipped directly from him) and
turned out to be one of his student models - actually a very nice
flute indeed. I proceeded to blow on it for about a year, having ordered
some books and recordings from Monty. I then became a bit more serious
about all of this and ordered a "nicer" flute (again from Monty).
Finally I was able to locate a teacher in Chicago and began lessons
(by the way, I should mention that I do play other instruments; piano,
and woodwinds - sax mostly). My teacher is of the Kinko school and
has studied in Japan with Tadashi Tajima. I have been recently working
on Chidori no Kyoku (for my sankyoku piece) and Nasasaha (sp?) for my
honkyoku piece. I play honkyoku on a long instrument (a 2'4")
By the way I'm surprised that people have mentioned the Tadashi Tajima
recording and neglected to mention "Zen - Classical Shakuhachi Masterworks"
by Yokoyama Katsuya (it's on the Wergo label and is a two CD set). It's
a very fine recording by a undisputed Kinko master (who was highly influenced
by Watasumi). Tadashi studied with Yokoyama, by the way.
Well, until later,
------------------------------------------------------------
|Michael A. Firman <maf@mcs.net>
|Naperville, IL USA (finger maf@cluster.mcs.net for PGP key)
|http://www.mcs.net/~maf
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu May 01 2003 - 15:16:52 PDT