[ARTS] Any traditional/folk musicians in Treeleaf?

[Myo-jin]

I started playing mandolin in about 2004, carries one around Iraq while on deployment in 2005, then played fiddle mostly until I came back to Japan a couple of years ago. While I still play fiddle a bit the mandolin has been my main companion for the last couple of years now. It’s I did jukai shortly before picking up a second hand mandolin a couple of years ago, and the thing I notice compared to when I first began is a patience that wasn’t there initially.

I play slower, think more about fine details such as pick direction and articulation, and enjoy each not for itself rather than my earlier approach of learning as many tunes as possible so as to be able to keep up in sessions. Instead it’s just the repetitive pulse and rhythm of these ancient tunes and the resonances they bring out, each a wordless story, a feeling, an experience caught in time and preserved.

There are no folk sessions to speak of here, so no pressure to learn a tune for next week, just the time spent enjoying making music for its own sake. Part of it is probably just getting older and being in less of a hurry, part probably zen training but i certainly feel more able to engage with music as a thing in itself rather than a means to an end. This runs parallel to my meditation practice which is also much more goalless, I sit because I like to sit, not because I expect to get anything from it.

Any folk/trad musicians here? I’d be interested in hearing how your practice and music integrate.

Sattlah

Gassho

Myojin

[Jundo]

one around Iraq while on deployment in 2095

Ah, a time traveler ...

Gassho, J
stlah

[Myo-jin]

Ah, a time traveler ...

Gassho, J
stlah

Lol, well spotted.

Edited lest people start to think I’m Kyle Reece.

Gassho

Myojin

[Tairin]

Hi Myojin

I have played guitar for over 40 years. Primarily electric guitar and mostly original music. I’d say I am decently proficient.

Last Spring, as a retirement gift to myself I bought a nylon string acoustic guitar. I’ve spent the last year learning (trying to learn) to play songs finger style. Stuff like Blackbird, Sound of Silence, Hallelujah, some Spanish songs, some neoclassical songs etc. For me it is all about the fun of playing music and learning a new skill I.e. finger picking. Actually I am learning a second skill which is to play other people’s music.

Point is…like you said… there is no pressure to perform, no rush to move forward. Just time to be with the music and the instrument. It truly is a happy place.

Enjoy!


Tairin
sat today and lah

[Myo-jin]

Hi Myojin

I have played guitar for over 40 years. Primarily electric guitar and mostly original music. I’d say I am decently proficient.

Last Spring, as a retirement gift to myself I bought a nylon string acoustic guitar. I’ve spent the last year learning (trying to learn) to play songs finger style. Stuff like Blackbird, Sound of Silence, Hallelujah, some Spanish songs, some neoclassical songs etc. For me it is all about the fun of playing music and learning a new skill I.e. finger picking. Actually I am learning a second skill which is to play other people’s music.

Point is…like you said… there is no pressure to perform, no rush to move forward. Just time to be with the music and the instrument. It truly is a happy place.

Enjoy!


Tairin
sat today and lah

I have three brothers who all play guitar, and they too have recently begun learning fingerstyles and (gasp) using a plectrum! Mainly through listening to Bluegrass which seems to have gained traction recently. I did consider it when I was in my early 20's, listening to the music of John Dowland (lute) and John Renbourn (guitar, if you haven't heard and play guitar I can't recommend highly enough), but by chance stumbled across a mandolin in a music shop in Darlington, and sin'ce I'd been listening to English and Irish folk for a few years at that point it just made sense, and was small enough to strap to my rucksack!

Being a bit older and less in a hurry these days, coming back to it after a hiatus a few years back I noticed a new interest, I suppose the musical equivalent of stopping frequently to smell the flowers rather than being in a hurry to get somewhere. It seems that this is in line with my general attitude shift in recent years, marked by a new appreciation of Zen practice; no longer trying to 'get' awakened, but just 'being awakened' to the world in general.

Recognising that we are never going to be perfect, but enjoying it anyway as simple play, as a refuge in itself. There's a sort of present awareness, a focus with playing these repetative jigs and reels with their simple melody and driving pulse that is quite meditative and brings me back to myself in a way that little else can.

Gassho
Sattlah

Myojin

[Shinshi]

I have played guitar since I was 16 - I am a lot older now - you would think I would be better at it. I have been working on Travis picking lately. It has been very challenging for me but a really interesting trip. All of a sudden all the chord shapes I know are only slightly relevant.

I have also been dabbling with bluegrass. I started out in a punk band in the 80s and met a guy who was into the space where punk meets bluegrass and I have been caught up in that as well. Trampled by Turtles is the best example I have. So working on my G runs and the like.

Now I am babbling but there is a great Bluegrass album by Steve Earle and the Del McCory band called The Mountain.

Playing music is my great release. I spent a lot of time learning songs but I have laid that all down. Now I just play what comes to me in the moment.

Gassho, Shinshi
SaT-LaH

[Myo-jin]

I have played guitar since I was 16 - I am a lot older now - you would think I would be better at it. I have been working on Travis picking lately. It has been very challenging for me but a really interesting trip. All of a sudden all the chord shapes I know are only slightly relevant.

I have also been dabbling with bluegrass. I started out in a punk band in the 80s and met a guy who was into the space where punk meets bluegrass and I have been caught up in that as well. Trampled by Turtles is the best example I have. So working on my G runs and the like.

Now I am babbling but there is a great Bluegrass album by Steve Earle and the Del McCory band called The Mountain.

Playing music is my great release. I spent a lot of time learning songs but I have laid that all down. Now I just play what comes to me in the moment.

Gassho, Shinshi
SaT-LaH

Just looking at the wear marks on their instruments makes my eyes water, punk/bluegrass is about right. I'm pretty sure I saw smoke coming of that fiddlers bow....................

A great release is a good description though. It's so easy to resort to mindless distractions, but playing an instrument of any kind offers something much more focussed, intentional, creative. And playing with others, something I rarely get to do these days, is an exercise in wordless communication that can't be got any other way that I know of.

Playing as fast as these guys takes a lot of time and effort, personally I used to try to play as fast as possible but these days I like to play a nice waltz or a casually bouncy jig. There's something pleasing about it when a tune comes together and actually sounds genuinely musical. When a few years ago I was vaguely considering entering a monastery one of the biggest downsides was the probability of having to give up playing.

Thanks for sharing.

Gassho
Sattlah
Myojin

[Naiko]

The mandolin is a wonderful instrument, isn’t it? My teacher says that the only thing sweeter than the sound of a mandolin, is the sound of two mandolins! I started playing in 2020. I dabble in bluegrass, blues, Irish trad (I love fiddle tunes), and swing. I don’t think I would have picked it up without the influence of Zen practice. I would have been too swayed by limiting thoughts, such as being too old to learn an instrument or on achievement instead of process. I do agree that practice has made me more patient, curious and just able to enjoy the simple pleasure of making music just for the joy of it.
Gassho,
Naiko
stlah

[Myo-jin]

The mandolin is a wonderful instrument, isn’t it? My teacher says that the only thing sweeter than the sound of a mandolin, is the sound of two mandolins! I started playing in 2020. I dabble in bluegrass, blues, Irish trad (I love fiddle tunes), and swing. I don’t think I would have picked it up without the influence of Zen practice. I would have been too swayed by limiting thoughts, such as being too old to learn an instrument or on achievement instead of process. I do agree that practice has made me more patient, curious and just able to enjoy the simple pleasure of making music just for the joy of it.
Gassho,
Naiko
stlah

I came back to the mandolin after treating it as a 'second intrument' for years, even though it was the first thing I picked up. That was mainly because fiddle/violin takes a lot of time, effort, concentration, and is also quite a bit louder, I no longer had the space in life to give to studying the fiddle, but the mandolin fits in nicely. It sounds sweet even when played less than optimally.
I used to play in folk sessions and occasional ceilidh in Wales when I lived there, often several times a week, one of the things I miss most living in Japan is the lack of folk sessions. I also like the Irish traditional music; I've probably learned hundreds of fiddle tunes, although to be fair I only play a handful at any one time and have forgotten more than I can recall now. After concentrating on bluegrass for a couple of years I've recently been playing more Irish fiddle tunes, getting the right-hand to do what it's supposed to do, concentrating on hitting the down-beat etc, it's become more of a study than a hobby. I'm getting nuances and applications that just were not in my mind when I first picked the instrument up, and it's much more flexible than the violin and sounds good even without playing loudly.

Another commonality with my Zen practice is the fact that I've never been afraid to just jump in and learn something, I'll never be a great musician, and probably never a great zen practitioner either for that matter, but the immersion is the thing, and by constant exposure something of it rubs off, somehow. The thing is, these days I can pick up the mandolin, play for a while, put it down, change a nappy of cook dinner, come back to it, and find a little refuge from the stresses of daily life in just a few minutes here and there. For me Zen has never been therapeutic, but more a constant practice of inhabiting the life I've been given. Music on the other hand is very much therapeutic.

Gassho

Myojin

[Naiko]

I came back to the mandolin after treating it as a 'second intrument' for years, even though it was the first thing I picked up. That was mainly because fiddle/violin takes a lot of time, effort, concentration, and is also quite a bit louder, I no longer had the space in life to give to studying the fiddle, but the mandolin fits in nicely. It sounds sweet even when played less than optimally.
I used to play in folk sessions and occasional ceilidh in Wales when I lived there, often several times a week, one of the things I miss most living in Japan is the lack of folk sessions. I also like the Irish traditional music; I've probably learned hundreds of fiddle tunes, although to be fair I only play a handful at any one time and have forgotten more than I can recall now. After concentrating on bluegrass for a couple of years I've recently been playing more Irish fiddle tunes, getting the right-hand to do what it's supposed to do, concentrating on hitting the down-beat etc, it's become more of a study than a hobby. I'm getting nuances and applications that just were not in my mind when I first picked the instrument up, and it's much more flexible than the violin and sounds good even without playing loudly.

Another commonality with my Zen practice is the fact that I've never been afraid to just jump in and learn something, I'll never be a great musician, and probably never a great zen practitioner either for that matter, but the immersion is the thing, and by constant exposure something of it rubs off, somehow. The thing is, these days I can pick up the mandolin, play for a while, put it down, change a nappy of cook dinner, come back to it, and find a little refuge from the stresses of daily life in just a few minutes here and there. For me Zen has never been therapeutic, but more a constant practice of inhabiting the life I've been given. Music on the other hand is very much therapeutic.

Gassho

Myojin

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on practice and music. They both are never ending and ever deepening and expanding. You have inspired me to be more mindful.
????
Naiko
stlah