My Great Adversary: The Ichi No Ito

Playing/Techniques
#1

I’m having a really hard time getting my ichi no ito to have a clear tone. I can get a clean tone from any position on the ni no ito and san no ito, the ichi no ito sounds muted in comparison. I really started hearing it while working on Rokudan for the first time. Listening to other versions, I can clearly hear the difference in tone.

If it’s play technique, what are some common mistakes to avoid or look out for? It wouldn’t surprise me if it were a technique issue I’m not familiar with.

If it’s not technique, is it maybe a problem with the shamisen? Do some strings just suck or go bad and lose tone? Perhaps there’s a maintenance and care thing I don’t know about. I noticed the tone got a little better with a new koma. I also experimented using solid objects to press down on the string and the tone still sounds bad.

Thanks in advance.

#2

Heyo,

A couple things come to mind, although this is hard to diagnose without a video to check some things.

There’s three things that come to mind immediately.

1 You might not be getting a clear tone because the width of the sao is throwing off your fingering either by messing up the position or stopping you from getting a solid plant against the sao.

2 You might be hitting the first string with the bachi in a strange way.

3 Your shamisen might need kanberi. Is there a noticible rut under the first string? That can throw off tone; but I’m not sure if it can create a mute.

Hopefully someone else can chime in with some wider experience than me.

Best~

P.S: Some Koma have different sized gaps for the strings to rest in; if yours does, are you matching them?

Also, is the new koma the same height as the old one?

#3

Yes the ichi no ito WILL lose its luster over time and will lose some of the nice tonality.

#4

Howdy, Joel!

Christopher and Grant make great points. Kanberi might be a reason why it’s sounding a bit muted, and it’s also good to note the ichi no ito does lose it’s clarity with age, as Grant notes. My shamisen has an old (about a year) ichi no ito which sounds really thunky and not very satisfying, but because of the price and my own laziness, I just try to ignore it. :stuck_out_tongue:

Please post a video if the next day or two if you can! If it’s technique-related, I would like to address it in my Facebook LIVE lesson this Friday!

#5

Thank you everyone for all for the suggestions. I’ll run down the list tonight and try them out. I’ll try to get some video (along with close up pictures) posted before Friday. I won’t be able to play along since I’ll be at work, but I’ll be watching.

I wonder how well it would go over at the office if I rented a meeting/conference room for a hour to play shamisen?

#6

Yeah totally Joel! Post a video!

#7

You asked for it, so here it is. Please feel free to comment and critique. I’m all about getting better and the ichi no ito is my biggest pet peeve right now.

I noticed a few things after recording the video. I seem to get a crisper sound with my wooden bachi over a used bekkou I picked up on Ebay for cheap. Perhaps it’s had enough shamisen playing. Rewatching the video it looks like I’m using too much wrist and not enough forearm with the bachi strikes. I’m also no sure about the angle of the bachi (not parallel) to the head of the dou. Thanks all.

#8

Thanks for making the video, Joel! That helps tremendously.
From my perspective, I think cause lies in three points, and none of them involve the sao/left hand. :slight_smile:

  1. The skin appears to be the older style of synthetic which is infamous for being somewhat thunky, especially for the ichi no ito. Thus, I believe that will be the main reason why you’re getting an less-than-satisfying tone.

  2. Actually, I was gonna say that the wooden bachi might be a reason for a softer tone, so it’s interesting that you say sounds crisper than the bekkou bachi.

  3. Though the 1st answer is the biggest contributor, you also nail it with your last observation. There’s a lot of wrist action going on. :slight_smile: More forearm would be beneficial, and especially extra emphases on the thumb. I’ll try to address this in the Live lesson on Saturday! (Sorry you won’t be able to make it! But check it out later :slight_smile: )

#9

First thought was the wooden bachi. It would sound much better immediately with a flexible bekkou or imitation. One can still have a crisp tone even if your technique isn’t developed. I like the sound of wooden bachi over plastic actually.
But then I also noticed the skin and agree with Kyle. I swore I would never get a synthetic skin because of the tone they gave, but there have been so many improvements now that it’s much different.
I’ve used the same ichi for more than a year also, and it will greatly effect the sawari. But as long as I’m not doing a concert or something I don’t need to change them. I really like that you posted this video and added a lot of your thoughts.

#10

I can’t believe I didn’t think about the skin. Thanks for the feedback. Glad to hear my left hand is doing alright. More forearm movement for the right.

I’ll have to play around switching between my bekkou and wooden bachis and pay closer attention to the sound and feel. Initially I thought the bekkou was too flexible and the string was slipping past the bachi, not snapping/plucking. I like the feel of the bekkou a lot better than the wood (solid plastic is the worst) so I’ll take a closer look to how I’m playing.

As for the skin, the humidity and temperature in St. Louis are all over the place so a synthetic is probably preferred. Any idea what the usual turn around time is for getting the FiberSen skin and would there be a benefit to having both sides reheaded instead of just the front? I’ll have to talk to my instructor as well if she’s headed to Japan any time soon and sneak my dou with her.

Thanks all for the feedback. Most helpful.

Edit: Just re-read the FiberSen page and noticed it says “Please allow two weeks for the reskinning job to be completed”. Is that still correct and how about long does shipping take?

#11

Almost forgot, I had the sawari turned off for some reason. Can’t remember why, but that explains why it’s missing.

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