三味線
Three-string lute
The shamisen (三味線) is the three-stringed lute of Japan: a long, fretless neck running through a small square body covered front and back with skin, usually struck with a broad plectrum called a bachi. It came from the Chinese sanxian by way of the Ryūkyū Islands in the sixteenth century and became the defining instrument of Japanese music in the Edo period.
- 箏曲演奏会（1966年）第一部Sōkyoku ensōkai, 1966 — side A — A concert of Japanese koto music, 1966 — side A26:20
- 箏曲演奏会（1966年）第二部Sōkyoku ensōkai, 1966 — side B — A concert of Japanese koto music, 1966 — side B19:25
- かっぽれKappore — Kappore (dance song)2:17
- 新生涯Shinshōgai — New Life2:52
Liner notes
The name means "three strings", and it is also called sangen, especially in koto chamber music.
The instrument
The neck, often made in pieces that fit together, passes through a wooden frame body. That body was traditionally covered with cat or dog skin, and synthetic heads are now common. The three strings, traditionally silk, rise from the skin on a small bridge, so the skin itself acts as the soundboard, rather as on a banjo.
Shamisen come in three broad sizes, named for the neck. The thin-necked hosozao serves nagauta, the music of kabuki. The middle chūzao is used for jiuta and several narrative styles. The thick futozao carries the weightier music of gidayū, the puppet theatre, as well as Tsugaru shamisen and naniwabushi.
How to listen
Listen first for the buzz. The lowest string is lifted off the top nut so that it brushes the neck as it vibrates, a deliberate effect called sawari. It is not found on the Chinese or Okinawan instruments, and players treat a good, ringing sawari as a mark of skill.
Then listen to the plectrum. It strikes downward and often hits the skin as well as the string, so many styles have a sharp, percussive attack. The left hand stops the strings on the bare neck, slides between notes and taps or plucks them.
There is no fixed tuning. The three basic ones are honchōshi, niagari and sansagari, defined only by the intervals between strings, so the pitch can follow the singer. Players often change tuning in the middle of a piece without stopping.
A short history
The ancestor of the shamisen, the Chinese sanxian, reached the Ryūkyū Kingdom, where it became the Okinawan sanshin. In the second half of the sixteenth century it arrived at the port of Sakai, near Osaka. One early account says blind biwa players remade it, and the use of a plectrum is thought to come from the biwa.
It spread fast. Narrative chanting, jōruri, took the shamisen as its accompaniment in the early seventeenth century, and in the Genroku era Takemoto Gidayū drew several styles together into gidayū-bushi, still the music of bunraku. Kabuki absorbed its own narrative styles and produced nagauta. Blind musicians built a chamber repertoire that, joined with the koto, became part of sōkyoku. In the Meiji era folk songs, naniwabushi and women's gidayū all flourished with the shamisen. In the twentieth century, players in the north of Honshū developed the improvised, virtuosic Tsugaru style from local min'yō.
Start with
Kappore is a dance song sung by Sokichi Kudzuoka with shamisen. For the narrative side of the instrument, hear Shinshōgai, a 1906 naniwabushi by Suehirotei Tatsumaru. The shamisen also takes part in the 1966 koto concert by Namino Torii and Minoyu Otaka, starting with side A.
Questions
- What is a shamisen?
- The shamisen is a Japanese three-stringed lute with a long fretless neck and a small skin-covered body, usually played with a large plectrum called a bachi. It accompanies kabuki, bunraku, folk song, narrative singing and chamber music.
- What is sawari on a shamisen?
- Sawari is the buzzing resonance made when the lowest string, lifted off the top nut, brushes against the neck. It is a deliberate feature of the Japanese instrument.
- Where does the shamisen come from?
- It descends from the Chinese sanxian, which passed through the Ryūkyū Islands, where it became the sanshin, and reached Sakai near Osaka in the second half of the sixteenth century.