Think lack of marketing and the proper skill level are issues too, but also the small potential market size and the lessons not being exactly what one wants are main issues too. The western shamisen scene (think japanese market has potential for Bachido too) needs to grow a lot before lessons on very specific subjects can really fly.
In other words, the lessons are a really valuable repository and like BH says, they can have very long term potential. Because I can’t see why people wouldn’t want to learn old shamisen songs 50 years from now, unless the easy possibilities to make your own music electronically really take over.
Personally I would like to see nagauta or kouta content, and I think there’s plenty of Bachido members with similar bias. But it’s not a core issue for the lessons I think, just goes to show that the shamisen market is quite splintered to different styles.
Courses don’t suffer from the problems that much, because they are aimed more towards beginners and kind of form a standard curriculum that most people follow. It doesn’t matter if you ultimately have 0 interest in tsugaru or minyou, you can anyway learn a song or two in the beginning just because it’s the best material that’s available. Personally I’m thinking to take the Nitta technique course in the mid-term, looks like it could be the best bang for buck in the entire Bachido catalog. But other than that I’m mostly grinding a few pieces based on tabs and then doing whatever ad hoc improvisation I come up with.
So far I’ve tried just two of the lessons.
“Three string baroque” was just a basic skill level issue. I started on it, then soon realized it’s a bit challenging or you need to be able to play fast in order to sound like anything. In the beginning the rate at which you can play (with Gion Kouta I’m breaking to the theoretical range of 120 notes per minute, should help in the long run) is a big limiter, and it seems it rules out a lot of western/modern music (copyrights being another issue).
Now “Strumming”, in principle, is an awesome lesson. Partly because it’s suitable for real beginners - a month on shamisen and you’ll have no difficulty repeating a single position once per each measure and so on. No rocket science here. In part, it also makes a 180 degree turn versus the overall Bachido/Monsters of Shamisen approach. It’s all about shamisen as an ensemble (supporting/accompanying) instrument, not a solo or shamisen-only setting like all other material tends to be. (From here we can get to interesting philosophical points that could concern Bachido as a whole.) However, I recall chords being a big part of the lesson, and I really could not find any that would suit to the pieces I tried playing along to. So I gave up about half way through the lesson. That said I’ve been playing along to my favourite enka pieces A LOT. While this hasn’t advanced my shamisen playing in any objective terms, I’ve felt certain musical development and of course it’s given confidence into a broader use of the instrument. You don’t have to be a star level player to jump into a band and start to have fun with your friends - think this is often overlooked. So you could say the $5 for the lesson has more than served its purpose in the end.
Looking at the titles of the now already quite impressive collection of lessons, I’d think there’s a few that could benefit me at the current stage. But so far I’ve been waiting and trying to build a better base before I jump to more lessons - finding the right ones is an issue and in any case the time spent on lessons would be taken away from the other types of learning I’m trying to do.
A monthly newsletter with a matter of fact list of new lessons and Bachido products would be very welcome, maybe with some discussion about whom the particular lessons are best suited to.
There used to be a list of shamisen songs on Bachido, arranged in level of difficulty, but it seems that it’s at least not linked anywhere any more. Came closest to specifying any kind of curriculum here.
Perhaps we, the community, should talk about courses and lessons more, too. The Schoolhouse forum has a total of 4 threads! If you want to learn X, but are not sure which lesson or approach is the best, just ask. Same if you’re wondering about a particular lesson or such, maybe somebody else has already taken it.
However, after some other awesome Bachido projects are completed, Luke will be constructing a Bachido Blog, which will feature text, pictorial and video insights and instruction right to your email on a bi-monthly basis. Perhaps I could feature the newest Schoolhouse lesson there as a non-intrusive way to remind folks as they get their regular dose of information.