撥 “huge guitar pick” 三味線 shamisenģ – 尺八 (shakuhachi) is a Japanese type of woodwind instrument. The instrument itself is derived from the Chinese instrument 三弦 (sānxiàn). It dates back to the 15th and 16th century, so compared to other traditional Japanese instruments it is quite “young”. It is a plucked 3 stringed instrument played with a “huge guitar pick”, which is called 撥 (bachi). Here are a few :ġ – 三味線 (shamisen) is one of the most famous wagakki. Now, lots of traditional Japanese instruments actually came from the Asian continent West of Japan and were imported into the country, then evolved and were fully completed in Japan. I was really surprised by the sound it made when I first saw this video! (the mukkuri performance starts towards 4:30, before that, the mukkuri player talks a bit about the History of the instrument)Ģ – トンコリ (tonkori) is another Ainu instrument, this one is a 5 stringed instrument (although some with 3 or 6 strings also exist) and each of the strings, contrary to modern instruments, are not fretted or anything but are played open. At its origin, it was often played by women and it was an instrument that was played improvised as people played often alone in order to express their thoughts. The mukkuri is placed in the performer’s mouth, the string is pulled and makes the whole instrument vibrate. There are also instruments that come from the Ainus, Japan’s native tribes :ġ – ムックリ (mukkuri) is a small instrument made from bamboo, with a string attached to it. It’s composed of two 笏 (shaku) which are two small wooden planks, and they are hit together in order to make sounds. 神楽笛 kagurabueģ – 笏拍子 (shakubyoushi) is another traditional instrument used in gagaku. It’s pretty small compared to western flutes, it’s about 46 cm long (that’s right, metric system!) and only has 6 holes. 和琴 wagonĢ – 神楽笛 (kagurabue), also known as 大和笛 (yamatobue) or 太笛 (futobue) is a type of transverse flute, which means that it’s blown from the side, perpendicular to the instruments. There are no frets or anything to adjust the sound of the instruments, it is played similarly to a violin (without the bow). It is used for court music called gagaku. It even has a role inside Japan’s mythology.
Here are some instruments that originated straight from Japan :ġ – 和琴 (wagon), also called 大和琴 (yamatogoto) or 東琴 (azumagoto) is a stringed instrument and believed to be one of the oldest in Japan. However, they derived from that and usually often divided instruments into percussion, strings and winds, the same way we do in the West.
Now, formerly, in Japan, classification-wise, they followed the Chinese principle of dividing instruments into 8 categories based on the materials out of which they were made: metal, stone, silk, bamboo, gourd, clay, hide and wood. Although some instruments like the wagon (和琴), the kagurabue (神楽笛) or the shakubyoushi (笏拍子) originated from Japan, most of the traditional instruments we know today were brought from the from the Asian contient to Japan and then continued to evolve inside the country into the instruments that we’ll talk about just a bit later on. These wagakki (which is also the name of a J-Rock band using traditional instruments) are traditional Japanese instruments which were used during the Antiquity. They’re pretty different from western instruments and it’s really interesting. These instruments are called Wagakki (和楽器, literally Japanese instruments) and were used during the Antiquity. As it turns out, there are plenty of traditional instruments in Japan with a lot of variety in all classifications, from strings, to winds, to drums…. As a musician and general music lover, I’ve been wanting to learn more about Japanese traditional instruments and music.
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