I got a special surprise this week! Active Bachido member Jamie Low contacted me, saying that he was in the area and wanted to get together. First time I met with an active Bachido member, so it was very exciting!
Great to meet you, Jamie! Can’t wait for more shamisen adventures when you move out here! :))
nice episode 
made me wanna visit you too. Though it would be quite unlikely for me to find myself there 
yesh i can also play that song Tsugaru Jinku 
feels good when i realize i know the song and can play it
Gah, so awwwwkwaaaard.
But fun! Thanks again for having me!
Oh, come on, Jamie. 
I thought it was actually less awkward than I thought it was going to be.
Yeah, you know what, you’re right. Hooray for edits!
Seriously! Man, I reaaaallly can respect people who can present a very tight speech (on the spot, as well) without edits. I practically rely on cuts to make myself understandable.
Nice to see the community get together IRL! It didn’t look awkward to me. But guys, what happened to the tuning? Maybe that’s why they kicked you out of the mall
I know! It was really fun. We talked about people in the forum 'n stuff, so it felt very “family-like”, if you know what I mean.
Ah yeah. It felt kinda awkward at the time, as we took a few takes of the same scene to make it smooth.
Hahaha!! My itomaki are a little loose, but I was too lazy to fix them before the filming. My bad. We got moved several times 'cause I unwittingly chose places where busking was prohibited.
Kyle you need to fix them then! Here’s what I would use: http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/518z6UaOVfL.SL500_AA300.jpg
Haha! Yes, that is the traditional way to do it. Traditional, hickory-smoked way.
I think I’ll be modern and use rosin powder.
Great episode guys!
Tsugaru jinku is the new roku Dan!
I don’t even know what that means…
But hey great to see Jamie out there in good old Cali.
Haha, I guess we coulda played rokudan, but we had already played it like 4 times on the mall.
Yeah Kevin! For the first time in five years, California (or more selfishly, the Santa Cruz area) is getting repopulated with shamisen players! Exciting stuff! This time I won’t take it for granted.
Heheh. Rokudan was our “money song” out there.
Amazing blogcast! I hope to see more just like this, and I wish I could have been there!!!
I’m so happy we’re starting to meet up and have fun! It’s going to be awesome when you move out here Jamie!
STOKED
ha this is beyond awesome! rare is it that you meet someone in the real world from online, it’s only happened twice to me. Nothing like getting together with someone from a different area who is as passionate as you are, shows you how small the world really is!
Definitely! I must admit, it was pretty awesome! I mean, it’s cool to see a profile pic of someone, and even cooler to see a video, (which puts more personality and “humanness” to the words in their posts) but almost surreal to meet the actual person for real, and then to start playing shamisen together!
I must say, the Bachido festival (nothing confirmed yet, of course) is gonna be really awesome, just 'cause of the fact that we’d all finally be able to meet each other. I can’t wait!
Well, I must admit, it was actually pretty disappointing.
Seriously, though, until the festival, we need to get this chat room thing going.
Jamie, I don’t know what you’re expecting. For two hours, I shared to you my favorite hobby, staring at the wall. What more could you want?
Oh right! Yeah, we should get that back up. Did the chat room meet ever happen last month? I had a gig and so wasn’t able to make it. :-S
The chat room thing was basically Stev playing some pieces for me. It was like 10 PM so I couldn’t bring my shamisen out since I live in an apartment. I’m all for it, and hope that it is during a time which I can play. We should try to decide a specific time. If it turns out to be great fun, I’m sure the ad hoc sessions will come after that.
Gee Kyle… You like staring at the wall too? Thats my favorite hobby as well! In July we should have a wall staring contest up in Hokkaido. Although Masahiro will probably win, just cause hes, well… Masahiro!
Yeah. I`d like to do a chatroom thing with all you guys! Keep in touch about the time/date (Karl) or anyone else who is thinking about it.
Wooo!