Marking my shamisen odd markings

General
#1

Heyya, another marking my shamisen thread… as finally i have a material to mark it better… red electrians tape.
I tryed to mark it at 13 cm… but it doesnt sound like the 3rd position at all… my third position is at 11 cm.

Could this be due to its tuning? or that its a minyou shamisen?
Could someone post some markings so i can get a rough estimate as to where i should be playing?

i keep playing 6 when im trying to find 9… and 9-10 sound the same in my songs as i cant tell which im playing besides by sound… and all the rest beyond that i cant find at all.
my shamisen is 21 inches and 55 cm long for the sao(at 55 it cuts down in a slightly downward motion as its hatomune)

#2

Hey Cana! One thing to keep in mind is that it has a lot to do with where you place the koma. Moving the Koma back or forward even a little will affect the length of the string and consequently this affects the relationship of where you place the marks. The marks only coincide with the numbers in relation to the last placement of the koma. If you mark a spot once but have your koma off from where it was when you marked it the next day or something, it can be very frustrating because it can feel that it no longer matches!

The common remedy is to decide exactly where you will have your koma every time and always return it to that exact location. You can use a measuring tool or your finger or even a tiny mark to indicate where the exact location will be.

#3

I advise you to use a tuner to set marks. That will give you the exact positions you need for your shamisen. There’s a variety of electronic tuners. One of many free tuners for Windows PC can be found here. You’ll need a microphone.

http://otuner.sourceforge.net/

An empty first string should be C. So as it follows
1 is c#
2 is d
3 is d#
3# is e
etc.

#4

Hey Cana! One thing to keep in mind is that it has a lot to do with where you place the koma. Moving the Koma back or forward even a little will affect the length of the string and consequently this affects the relationship of where you place the marks. The marks only coincide with the numbers in relation to the last placement of the koma. If you mark a spot once but have your koma off from where it was when you marked it the next day or something, it can be very frustrating because it can feel that it no longer matches!

The common remedy is to decide exactly where you will have your koma every time and always return it to that exact location. You can use a measuring tool or your finger or even a tiny mark to indicate where the exact location will be.

Ahh… that makes sense lol
I was getting frusterated because it sometimes sounds right and other times doesnt, I usually tilt the koma in certain ways till it sounds perfect.

Also i have a clip on tuner… but its not chromatic… its a banjo, violin, mandolin, cello, and guitar tuner…
It gives me weird readings at times so i just go by ear.
I would prefer a chromatic tuner that actually gives me good readings and not always D3 D4 etc
I like straight tunings like D… D# Db

I usually have my koma about 3 to 4 fingerswidth of the bottom, tsugaru typically is at 2 fingerswidth if i’m correct. My shamisen sounds best at 3 fingerswidth, it sounds natural.

for now while im stuck with my current tuner, If my 3rd position is at 11cm, Could you give me a rough estimate as to where my 9th position is?

#5

Well I would recommend finding 9 by first finding 10 (the octave) and then going back down to 9 and calculating it that way. 10 should be clear and easy to pinpoint as there is a harmonic located right there. 9 is just one step below that! Not sure what that is in exact cm
But in music terms it is a whole step ( as opposed to half step etc.)

#6

hmm, finding it kinda hard to find that.
Seeing as the first note marked on a shamisen is typically 3 i’m not entirely sure what happened to two or all the other marks that could’ave been made. Finding 10 without being 100% positive where the rest could be. Think i could get you to pop on skype someday an see what i’m doing wrong?
I can hear where I think there should be markings, but that might not be the same for other shamisen players. They might hear a different tone and like that one more, being a tiny bit off will bug me if you know what i mean.

#7

I can go by my preference for sound right now but that could be my downfall later in life, or should i get to meet more shamisen players.

#8

Cana, based on your measurements I believe your instrument is shorter than a “standard” shamisen so the distances given in Kyle’s book won’t work for you. The beauty of string instruments is that the notes are all related by the same ratios regardless of string length. For example, taking the distance between the koma and the kamigoma (nut) the half way point is the octave (position 10).

Using just intonation you can use these ratios of string length to find the notes.

Name C D E F G A B C
Ratio 1/1 9/8 5/4 4/3 3/2 5/3 15/8 2/1

Remember the length is from the nut to the bridge.

You can also find some tuning software on line.

© 2020 Kyle Abbott