Monthly Archive for July, 2006

I’ve made the Dou, the Sao, the Tenjin, the tuning pegs, the Dokake, (not all myself ’cause I got help from Pa for the critical parts) waterproofed it, put on skins, yadayadayada and it’s all been a fun since April 3rd (except the Sao-rod connecting ’cause that was frustrating getting it to fit snugly) when I started! Now I’ve finished and boy, does it sound good!

What’s just as good is I’ve filmed the entire process so I can prove to the people (who claim I bought it) that I made it.

Well, now that the Shamisen is done, I’m gonna finally get back into making the Bluegrass ‘n Stuff book. I was working pretty well at it until I started on the Shamisen. That’s when the book went on a three month hiatus. It’d be good to get back into that.

Oh yeah, soon, I’ll post a video of the final Shamisen.

So, I was looking for a pattern for the Dokake. Man, this was the mentally hardest part of the whole project. How could that be hard? Well, because I was going into a fabric store!!!

This was a challenge! I first was at the silks. They looked pretty good, felt nice. Only problem is that the little designs repeated. There was one that had these chinese looking seals (stamps) on the silk but it was the same one every inch and having it repeat like that didn’t look to pro.

Than Ma told me that there were some more oriental fabric racks. Whooboy! More than 100 different kinds to choose from! I found one that had flowers over it. It looked pretty good. Than I saw a dragon. That looked cool and it was small enough to where the whole dragon could fit across the Dokake. Plus the backround color was Maroon. Later, I decided that the dragon looked a little. . . chincy and figured that the novelty of it would wear off. Plus, not to mention any idiot uses a dragon for oriental style prints.

Than, I saw this other, cooler looking dragon! The eyes were the coolest part. The only problem is, it was too big too fit the whole dragon across the Dokake but if I cut it right, I could get the head and a claw and some of the body.

These were the big three. 3 out of 5 favorites! My mind was going crazy. I knew I’d have to get one ’cause if I waited and thought about it at home, I’d go crazy. Anyway, I went with the flowers.

The flowers were appealing for a while but then as we were driving home, it was looking less and less appealing. There were little sunflowers and things like that. I dunno. Sunflowers on a Shamisen. Hmm. . .

I stuck with the flowers for a little bit. Still the other dragon (the cooler one) was stuck in my head. Long story short, we went back and got that one. Not only was it cool looking, the backround was black. That was good ’cause it wasn’t a color that could get old (’cause it’s not even a color). Who knows how long I’d want to stick with maroon. (because the day before I was looking for orange).

So, I got the dragon and I think I made the right choice. (I know because I didn’t have second thought which I had when I got the flowers)

Ok, all of the woodworking and skin stetching is (hopefully) done. . . Oh, besides the Azuma Sawari. I still have to put that in.

Besides that, now I’m just putting the pretty stuff. I,e, the Dokake, the mat thingy and tailpiece where the strings attach too.

Since Pa is good at making knots, he helped/made the knot. We got the cord from a outdoorsy place called Bugaboo. They had nice cord.

Now, I’m making the Dokake, it’s kind of a shield or cover that goes over the part of the body on which the arm rests. . . in a way. I’m making the shell of it first so I soaked thick paper in glued and than pressed it on the side of the body (which was covered in then plastic). Now it’s dry and hard. Now I have to get some purty cloth to put on it.