Cat skin and Humidity

Building/Repair
#1

Hey all!

I’ve been lurking here for a while and I really appreciate this site’s strong community and wonderful pool of resources. I finally decided to make an account today and introduce myself, as well as ask a question which has been in my mind for a pretty long time.

I’m currently based in Tokyo and am learning the shamisen as part of my university nagauta club. Previously, I practiced my pieces on a chuko hosozao with pre-torn skin on the back that for some reason still has WONDERFUL sound quality. But recently, I was lucky enough to be able to purchase an incredibly high-quality, unbroken shamisen. The problem is that my school term will be ending soon, which makes it necessary for me to consider options on bringing the latter shamisen back home to Singapore.

There’s ample resources here on how to pack and transport shamisen safely, but I haven’t been able to search up past threads which really answered the question of how cat skin reacts to tropical climates. I’m really concerned about the humidity of Southeast Asia in particular, which is what distinguishes its weather from Japan’s summers.

How do I take preventive measures to stop cat skin from splitting after a change in environment? If any of you have good ideas, please do let me know. I’ll really appreciate it!

Cheers~

#2

Hello Yvonne!

Welcome to Bachido! Glad you have finally joined the community! :slight_smile:

That’s an excellent question. I personally am not sure how it would react (since all natural skin is unique, once skin may last many, many years in a new climate whereas another may only last a few months).

However, checking the Bachido global map, I do see there are a number of Bachido members in Singapore (http://bachido.com/community/members?bounds=0.762%2C103.258%2C2.075%2C104.571) I would recommend sending them a message, asking if they have shamisen and if so, how they maintain them.

Cheers!
Kyle

#3

Hi Yvonne,
After living in Saitama for 3 years and only a couple of broken strings
I have now moved to Palawan Island in the Philippines, I had the same concerns with the humidity, well it only took 3 weeks and one side, ripped open, so as to be able to keep playing I sent it back to Japan and had both sides re- done with artificial skin, and I’m really happy with the tone.
Sorry but this was my sad experience with what I believe was the humidity after moving from Japan to the tropics
Fellow lurker
Gerry

#4

Hey Kyle and Gerard,

Thanks for your replies! I’ve been intended to write back sooner but Golden Week has been distracting :slight_smile: I’m sorry to hear about your shamisen experience in the Philippines, Gerard. So, washi bags and other humidity-absorbing devices aren’t much help, I guess.

I haven’t had time to mail the other Singapore residents, but I will soon! If anyone has anymore suggestions though, please do keep them coming.

Cheers,
Yvonne

#5

Hello again Yvonne,
As it turns out, I’m living in northern thailand and have had to deal with humidity issues big time! One of the things I’m having to struggle with is that I am completely surrounded by dense highland forest (jungle). Though incredibly beautiful, it also gushes out moisture at times. When I first got here, the back of my shamisen just peeled off of one corner within a couple of days. This was just at the end of the rainy season here in early November.

The dry season came soon after and it was much easier to deal with though still higher in humidity than more open areas lower down but the main thing was than it gave me some time to contemplate moisture.

I live in an old Thai wood house that is full of little openings everywhere and not sealed at all. This is a good thing in general as it allows air to circulate. What I did was I took a section of the main level of the house and made a separate ‘room’ with sheets of clear plastic supported with bamboo lengths, a fair bit of caulking on the wooden board cracks in the walls and then got myself a dehumidifier after a fair bit of searching to try and get the humidity down. So far it’s working really well. I’m managing to keep the humidity around the 55% mark most of the time. I just re-skinned one of my shamisens the other day (I use calfskins usually) and it is staying really tight and solid. My koras are also in great shape and sounding good.

I still have some tweaking to do but I think that I’ve got it working well for the most part.

That all may well be too much for what you can do where you’ll be but earlier in the year I did get some large silica gel packs and put them in instrument cases and bags. There are a lot of this type of thing, but I do believe that the basic silica gel packs can be put in a low temp oven to dry out and then use over and over again. It wasn’t a perfect solution but it did seem to help a fair bit. Maybe you could make a fukuro out of plastic or something and put a few silica packs in it for general storage.

Actually, you could make a regular fukuro with an pretty outer layer and a lining and put some sort of waterproof layer in between and throw some silica packs in it. I’ll bet that could work! Aaaand, I guess, if you don’t like to sew, let me know. Maybe I could make something for you. I’ve been making fukuro lately both for my own instruments as well as to possibly to make for others. But even if you have just basic sewing skills (or have a friend!) it is pretty easy to make. You can do it!

Hope this ramble helps a little!
cath

#6

One thought re: Washi bags. To my thinking in REALLY humid conditions it wouldn’t help but would rather just act more of a sponge and actually hold the moisture once it soaked in. I don’t use washi bags myself, so I’m not saying this thought from any actual experience. I did however have some paper things of many sorts (including a bit of rice paper) and hell, I could practically wring the stuff out after a couple of days. And the few books that I brought, well, I could read them without the pages easily tearing.

I also wanted to add that before I made that little room. I used plastic bins with the silica to hold things and had one bin set aside for my shamisen and it worked pretty well. I think that that is where my plastic fukuro idea came from!
Cheers. C

© 2020 Kyle Abbott