some shakuhachi notes

played by Riley Lee

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The following is a brief collection of sound clips of shakuhachi notes played by Riley Lee

Riley Lee plays a signature

The following sounds are all single notes. Ro is the name of the fingering with all fingerholes closed. With the normal embouchure it plays several different notes in the harmonic series, of which the lowest corresponds approximately to D4 (D above middle C). Tsu is the name of the fingering with all fingerholes closed, except the lowest. With the normal embouchure it plays to F4. In the equal tempered Western scale, there are two notes between these two. The shakuhachi player can play these, or intervening notes, by changing the geometry of his lips and face near the embouchure hole. By increasing the extent to which the face baffles the radiation at the input, the player can lower the pitch by one semitone (chu meri) or two semitones (no meri). Thus a chromatic scale from D4 to F4 inclusive could be played as ro, tsu no meri, tsu chu meri, tsu. Conversely, the player can decrease the baffling effect and raise the pitch (kari) above that obtained with normal embouchure. The notes played with kari or meri have a different timbre, which is due in large part to the changes in the impedance spectrum of the instrument produced by the different types of baffling by the face. Sound clips of several sustained notes are given below.

ro
ro kari
tsu
tsu chu meri
tsu no meri
ha chu meri
ha no meri