Too many strings...

[calger459]

So I've been playing koto for almost three years now, I'm getting to be something of a competent player, at least until I take away the student koto "crutch"...having numbers on the strings. My koto came with a numbered strip on it, rather useful as there are 13 strings and it can be hard to keep track. This is a page of the music for Taka:

Comments

[scarreddragon]

I totally love that you play koto, and am also quite jealous. It is definitely something I'm going to attempt to look into when I get there, because, just, guh. Koto music.

Have you heard the Traditional Rockband Rin'? They have this amazing music with koto, shakuhachi, and shamisen. Pure loooove.

[calger459]

I got into koto when I saw it being played at the Doll Festival (hina matsuri) and I was taught a little song (twinkle twinkle little star) as part of a demo. I asked for lessons, and there you go! I was really lucky to find a group here in Columbus to play with. It's a fun instrument, and definitely challenging. I hope you can give it a try!

Alas, neither Youtube or Google seem to have Traditional Rockband Rin, do you have some of their music?

[scarreddragon]

Sure thing! Here are a few youtube vids to see if you like:
Sakitama *my fav
Sakura Sakura
Collab with alan, who is a Chinese-Tibetan-opera style singer, and it is really good as well!

And some downloads if you do (right click + save as)!
Jikuu Album
Genji Nostalgia Mini-Album

Hope you like! ^_^

[calger459]

Oooh they're awesome! The first ZIP file link doesn't work though :( gives me a "not found" error.

I love the camera work in Youtube videos, so dramatic! Bamboo forests were one of my favorite places in the Japan to go to, lovely place for a koto concert :D

[calger459]

I do! My old koto teacher had a cassette tape with Taka and a lot of other songs (I wish I knew who the performers were!)) and I made mp3s of everything. If you want I can upload a Sendspace file for you :) Let me know!

Cheesy huh? Well I wonder what pieces they're playing. To be honest I'm not big on traditional koto music, which is very quiet and slow and meditative, meant to be played in shrines mostly. I like the more modern stuff like Taka, which has more melody and movement to it.

Music!

[calger459]

Here you go :D It's an album called "Light Volume 3", but that's all the info I could get from it because that was the only part in Katakana I could read :P I only knew titles for a couple of them, the rest I made up. They're kind of long, so the ZIP file's 97 megs. I hope that's not too big :P Enjoy!!

http://www.sendspace.com/file/siei1i