The Japanese biwa (of which there are several distinct types) is a descendant of the early T'ang (Chinese) court-pi pa (pi: 2nd tone, i.e. inflection upwards, pa: 1st tone, viz. high pitch) and much closer to it than the modern Chinese instruments, including the plectra. I don't see what justifies describing them as wacky (whacky?). They are made to most exacting standards from very special timbers and quite close to the 6th-8th c A.D. Chinese pi pa plectra preserved at the Shosoin at Nara. The average modern Biwazen seems to spend much more time and effort on a good plectrum than most subscribers of this list would on historically informed lute equipment.
The metal tongue in the corpus is a feature of the yue ch'in and not of the pi pa, which also has hardly ever been played with gut strings. The latter are quite uncommon in China, especially for civilized instruments. They are not mentioned in any historic source on Chinese musical instruments I would know. Playing with nails (rather than plectrum) became common only recently under the influence of the cither ch'in (hoping its prestige would rub off, the pi pa having been an instrument of light music played in brothels by women of ill repute since the Sung dynasty at least). Best wishes, danyel ----- Original Message ----- From: "EUGENE BRAIG IV" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Greg Silverman" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Japanese parallel, biwa, is usually played with a wacky, big plectrum. > To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
