"What is Choshi?" What a beautiful
> way to pause after such an intense round of discussion and wide-ranging
> investigation of our Sui-Zen tradition. What is Choshi? The question rings
> out clear as a bell. (I know that there are many shakuhachi historians among
> us who will actually take up your question).
OK..
I'm finally ready to jump in..
I'm too emotionally exhausted (and not nearly as talented in writing as the
many who have written in this newsgroup recently) to talk about my feelings
in detail..Although I feel like saying ,"Stop fighting, my children." (I
feel that I have the right to say this as almost all of the members who have
been writing this week are either my students or have studied with me some:
Phil Gelb, James Nyoraku Schlefer, Robert Jonas, Phil James, Bruno
Deschenes, Zach Braverman, Allan Nyoshin Steir, Brian Ritchie, Michel
Dubeau, Brian Miller, Brian Franklin, etc.)
But as for CHOSHI.. It means "condition" , as in ,"What shape (condition)
are you in.?" ("CHOSHI IKAGA DESU KA?").. Of course it is also a warm-up
piece, and can be played directly into another piece.. A "clearing" of the
Bamboo.. But my teacher also told me that CHOSHI was the unity of "Heaven,
Earth, and Humanity" (TEN, CHI, HITO).. I like this explanation.. When I was
in Japan ,2 different students of my teacher became KOMUSO for one year
each.. They walked the entire Island of Honshu, and played CHOSHI 50 times
each per day.. At night they would sleep in Zen Temples or in rice-fields..
They were after ICHI ON JO BUTTSU, or as my teacher would say,"To play the
perfect sound to cause world peace.."
This is why I play Shakuhachi - what I have told my daughters and anyone
else who has asked for the last 30 years.
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