What do you think of when you think of sheet music?
For those of you who play musical instruments on a regular basis, you are probably familiar with staff notation and tablature.
In fact, there is a special type of music notation for the sanshin called “kunkunshi.
Unlike stave or tablature, “kunkunshi” is a notation of the part of the sanshin where the strings are pressed with the fingers (called “kandokoro”), written in Chinese characters.
The key to reading this “kunkunshi” is to read the score vertically.
When reading horizontally, you read one line at a time from the upper left to the right. When reading “kunkunshi,” you read one line at a time from the top right to the bottom.
Also, each row is divided into squares, and each beat is represented by a square. So each square has a kanji character written on it. Sometimes a circle (“〇”) is written in place of a Kanji character, which represents a rest.
It seems somewhat difficult to read until you get used to it.
Most traditional Okinawan folk songs are written in “kunkunshi.
Don’t you think that learning how to read “kunkunshi” will broaden the range of your performance?
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