Songs

This is the first Japanese song I played on the sangen. Many of the songs written for jiuta sangen are sung. I can't sing worth a darn, but I wanted to learn the true jiuta style of sangen playing, and to do that, you will have to sing AND learn Hiragana (one of three styles of writing in the Japanese language).

There are tons of Iphone, Ipad, and other computer apps that will teach you Hiragana. It is not that difficult to learn (Hint: use lots of mnemonic devices). The Japanese language only has five vowels like English. Unlike English, however, it's a lot easier because each of the five vowels only has ONE sound associated with it.

So, to play/sing the following song, a brief introduction to Hiragana is necessary. 

Five Vowels:

A (pronounced "ah" as in "father")

E (pronounced "ay" as in "hey" or "they")

I (pronounced  "ee" as in "teen")

O (pronounced "o" as in "loan" or "phone")

U (pronounced "oo" as in "noon" or "spoon")

All Japanese words are made up of individual syllables. These syllables are made up of single vowels OR or a vowel sound made by a consonant immediately preceding a vowel. All words end in a vowel sound or the "n" sound. With a few exceptions, the consonant sounds made in the spoken Japanese language are equivalent to English consonant sounds.

In the following song, Spring Moon, the Hiragana character to the right of the ito to be played is followed immediately below with the pronunciation of the character. As noted in an earlier post, this song has the "narrative" sung at the same time the note is played. However, most other jiuta songs has the singing slightly delayed or just before the note is played.

Exceptions in this song for enunciating consonant sounds: R as in Ri or Ru. 

The Japanese R sound is considered the most difficult sound to make correctly by native English speakers. It is somewhere between an "R" and an "L" sound. However, IMHO, they are not consistent in how this "R" sound is replicated. Most of the time it sounds like an "L" and at others a silent "L." It sounds a little different depending upon what vowel follows it. Again, that's my opinion.

So, for RU in this song pronounce it like "LU" with your tongue going to form an "R" at the end. Same goes for "RI." All other consonant sounds are the same as in English. Thus, "KA" is pronounced "kah" and "YU" is pronounced "yoo."

For the correct pitch on the vocalization of the hiragana, see the information to the left of the song.

Spring Moon