Yamashiro Takeo
山城猛夫 - 蓮風
Geboren 1943
Shakuhachi
|
Takeo Yamashiro was born in Hiroshima in July of 1943 and is a registered survivor of the atomic bombing on August 6, 1945 (he was 2 years old at the time.) He started playing shakuhachi in Kyoto, Japan in his early 20's while in University. Takeo was the last uchi deshi (live-in disciple) of master Kikusui Kofu at the Shakado Temple, Kyoto, where he received his shihan certificate and shakuhachi name, "Renpu", Lotus Wind. In 1970 he moved to Vancouver, Canada where he first survived by playing shakuhachi on the streets. Takeo achieved landed immigrancy in 1972. Along with Jun Hamada and Michiko Sakata, Takeo Yamashiro founded the Tonari Gumi Japanese Social Services organization. For over 30 years Yamashiro-san has been the executive director of Tonari gumi and in July 2004, he retired from his position. At the moment he has no immediate plans beyond finding a job. What kind of job? He has no idea, he says. While the thought would make most people shake with anxiety, he just shrugs his shoulders and laughs. "I've never worried about money or what comes next. Somehow things work out for me." Although he gave up pursuing a professional shakuhachi playing career early on, Takeo has educated and inspired many people all over Canada about the magic and beauty of the shakuahchi flute. "Since abandoning shakuhachi as a professional career, which is what happened when I left Japan, I have reached a different kind of relationship to my music. I was fed up with promoting myself, selling myself and taking advantage of any kind of exposure. I thought, "No, this should remain in me as something I can enjoy my whole life," a way of life, let's say. And so there was an evolution in me and since then, music to me is always something that has to be enjoyable and somehow maintain a balance with other things I do in my life. So, in that sense, I'm very pleased that I have this. When I get frustrated and things get too stressful, I can still tune into my music. It's interesting, actually. If you consider, say, judo, kendo, they always have do. Basically do means "way". And the ultimate purpose is not to become a skillful player or anything. It's just to live through it. And it also helps psychologically to understand what your life is all about, although there is not a point of understanding or enlightenment. But you at least learn, through discipline, to live with it, to live through it. So, that's what I think do is all about. It's a way of life really. Getting back to my delinquent days, I know shakuhachi helped me. A lot. Otherwise, I'd still be back fighting in the streets, who knows....I'm not the kind of person who can plan my life. I somehow know, this is my way of life, and it just keeps going, I live through it. Other than that, I don't really play anything. My language skills were very limited, but the shakuhachi worked as a language, really, as a way of communicating with people." --from the article Takeo Yamashiro: Blowing in the Wind by John Endo Greenaway from the May 4 issue of The Bulletin. Takeo has recorded 2 albums of koten hokyoku: Takeo Yamashiro: Shakuhachi (1988) NYO (1998)
|
| Auch bekannt als Takeo Yamashiro--Renpu |
|
Lehrer
|