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Here is the PDF to print out and play: HiFuMi + Akebono

Note that both pieces, HiFuMi & Akebono, are arranged side by side. HiFuMi is right and Akebono is left, with a line dividing each set of […]

Akita Sugagaki #4 to #6
Akita Sugagaki #6 to #7
Akita Sugagaki #7 to End
Note: This is the rest of this piece. I’m not sure how helpful this approach is, so I thought I’d try something else next time. Perhaps […]

Akita Sugagaki #3 to  #4
Note: This section goes from HA-YURI-RO of line 3 to HA-YURI-RO of line 4. I play it twice, straight and diagonal (although I don’t know if the diagonal view is that useful)

The […]

Akita Sugagaki #1 to  #3
The notation for these honkyoku are in Blowing Zen Expanded Edition and Blowing Zen II
Honkyoku Line by Line
Every now and then I’ll post a small section of honkyoku. My guess is th […]

Akita Sugagaki #2
The notation for these honkyoku are in Blowing Zen Expanded Edition and Blowing Zen II
Honkyoku Line by Line
Every now and then I’ll post a small section of honkyoku. My guess is that b […]

Akita Sugagaki #1
 The notation for these honkyoku are in Blowing Zen Expanded Edition and Blowing Zen II
Honkyoku Line by Line
Every now and then I’ll post a small section of honkyoku. My guess is that br […]

Every now and then I’ll post a small section of honkyoku (1). My guess is that breaking honkyoku down into bite size parts may help some at the beginning of this journey… or not. This is an experiment, after a […]

Hi Fu Mi – Part A & C

The notation for these honkyoku are in Blowing Zen Expanded Edition and Blowing Zen II
Honkyoku Line by Line
Every now and then I’ll post a small section of honkyoku (1). My guess is t […]

Kyle meets Takeo & Yamaguchi Goro’s Shakuhachi! I met Takeo at Yamaguchi san’s house. Yamaguchi’s practice was to schedule students in such a way as to have a few lined up and observing him and the current student […]

If you can’t remember melody very well, you are like me and rely on reading notation. If you are like my son and can you play by heart. Paying attention may be more challenging if you read then if you play by […]

I was going to name this post The Real Lesson, but somehow that felt a little off base, so I named it after my shakuhachi flute teacher, Yamaguchi Goro. This photo is of him and Aoki Reibo playing a beautiful […]

A Science News article, Stone Age flutes found in Germany, reports that people living in Europe more than 35,000 years ago made this flute (shown from three different angles) out of a vulture bone. The magnified […]

I imagine everyone is naturally both over-rigorous and under-rigorous… just in different areas, according to their natures. It is when over or under rigor causes pain for us that it becomes problematic. The pain […]

In the book “Blowing Zen” CD, Hi Fu Mi, Track 24
Online Hi Fu Mi(Complete), MP3

Refer to page B12 of “Blowing Zen”, #111-115, and #131-134. I played both these sections with the meri tone dropping down to o-me […]

Yes! Of the Buddhist Hon Kyoku this is true. What you do need, however, is to pay attention. Yet, you don’t even need to do that. Of course, if you don’t really listen to what you are doing, you will not enjoy […]

Keep the same rhythm pretty much throughout, except for the usual slow down at the end. The piece feels like it is stepping up the pace, but actually, it is just the increasing inclusion of 1/4 beat notes… […]