I just bought my new Shamisen - and all the strings were worn out.
1 string broke
1 string was too short - couldn’t tune it
1 string was only good
No extra strings
Is there anybody that lives in New York, Pennsylvania or around New Jersey (OR in New Jersey) that could lend me some Shamisen Strings.
I won’t get my Shamisen Strings set until April - according to Kyle’s information shipping from Japan.
I’ll give that person like $15-20.00 bucks
Sorry Kevin, I would, but I’m running a little low myself. Hope your strings come soon!
Hi, Kevin. I don’t know of any shamisen-only players, but there are a few koto/shamisen doublers. I would recommend you check with Henry Horaku Burnett (henry.burnett@qc.cuny.edu) or Masayo Ishigure (masayokoto@gmail.com).
i broke most of mine, but I might be able to dig around if you still need some
Jeez Grant. You owe me like 5 san no ito and at least one ichi no ito. If you find any, send 'em my way! 
Well for now - I have (2 Ichi no Ito) (2 Ni no Ito) (4 San no Ito) that should be good for now - The first strings I bought are still intact (nothing broke “yet”)
Give them to Kyle - he’s a better player then me. I mean I could always use extra strings (for the near future)
And actually, Grant has tsugaru strings, which are too thick for your nagauta shamisen.
Hi,
Just a lil note here, I put tsugaru strings on my shamisen (which is a chuuzao) and it plays fine, doesn’t come out of tune as much as I thought it would. Not 100% sure if this would be the case with a hosozao (also if the skin is very thin maybe the pressure is too much for cat skin) but it’s worth a try if you aren’t going to buy a tsugaru for a while, that huge thick ichi-no-ito takes some getting used to.
You should have seen my face when I got it out of the pack, it looked like a yellow bass guitar string.
Oh, that’s interesting. I mean, I’m sure it would play fine, and tension wouldn’t be a problem as long as it’s tuned with lower tension. However, lower tension means the thick string will sound… “thunkier.”
I suspect it’s like skin for shamisen. Thicker dog skin (for tsugaru) must be stretched tighter to get a crisp sound. Thinner dog skin can be stretched less and still achieve crispness in the tone.
And deep fried dog skin gives the ultimate crispiness.
:DD made my day
ha!
And just like that, our fragile relationship with PETA crumbles.
Then we’ll just have to make some jokes about human skin, they don’t care about those…
someone who knows japan should translate what the man is saying
Hah about that skin :PPP pretty “nice” vid.
Interestingly enough, I have some smaller strings that a friend bought for me a while ago thinking that they were tsugaru. So, in fact, I do seem to have nagauta capable ito. Kyle is right though, I’ve pretty much single handedly demolished our san no ito supply out here lo.