Y7 Wk 7 Samurai

Praise from me too, for picking an unusual topic to write about - and coming through the minefield that is Bushido relatively unscathed. It's a tricky subject for the western mind to fully comprehend at the best of times! It's all about on, or one's obligations...in this case the Samurai would be obliged to protect his master first and foremost, and kill the thief - but the slight to his family honour would necessitate his committing seppuku, or ritual suicide - sometimes known as hari-kari in the west, although hara-kiri would be more correct - to satisfy his family honour. As Chris C mentioned earlier, the wife of a Samurai wouldn't hate him for being away - on the contrary, her husband's rank would bring her, and her family, honour. That's the way I understand it, anyway, although I could be wrong - as I said, it's a very complicated subject!

Fascinating, though - if you wished to read more, I'd reccommend "The Knights Of Bushido" by Lord Russell - or as a primer, you could read up on the 47 Ronin.

As for the music - you could look up and read about extended minor chords (minor 7ths, minor 9ths etc) - those could help you get a better feel for the music to go with the story.

Great effort, anyway!

(Oh yes - almost an afterthought - the second version works better for me, the third person rather than first person - if your Samurai did kill his son and committed seppuku, he certainly wouldn't be around to write a song about it!)

:D :D :D

Vic

Hi James,

Thanks for the info about your guitar - it looks like a little beauty. :) I guess the smaller body might be part of the reason that you are able to make it sound somewhat like a uke at times? I was looking at a similar style of travel guitar in a shop this morning (a Johnson) , but I don't think it was as good as yours.

I'm having a bit of trouble with download speeds right now, and I also only have 31 minutes left to my own devices before school holidays begin! :shock: So I didn't hear all of the new version. But what I did hear sounded as if you were giving a new approach a really good shake. Nice job.

Cheers,

Chris

Vic,

Thanks so much for the encouraging words and in-depth feedback. :D
As Chris C mentioned earlier, the wife of a Samurai wouldn't hate him for being away - on the contrary, her husband's rank would bring her, and her family, honour. That's the way I understand it, anyway, although I could be wrong - as I said, it's a very complicated subject!

By default, I am banking on the fact that with prostitutes, geisha and minor wives, there must have been at least some unhappy samurai wives....Or another angle, To be honest, ...Well, at this point let me just agree with you that it is a very complicated subject and I will plead guilty of using artistic license with the information gathered. :|
Fascinating, though - if you wished to read more, I'd reccommend "The Knights Of Bushido" by Lord Russell - or as a primer, you could read up on the 47 Ronin.
As for the music - you could look up and read about extended minor chords (minor 7ths, minor 9ths etc) - those could help you get a better feel for the music to go with the story.

Thanks again for the info on the facts and music. I will look up both later. I actually took a step back from embellishing the chords (after the U.N.C.L.E. incident in version 2 8) ) and I think the simplicity helped the overall song, but it could definitely use some creative arranging in a studio version.
(Oh yes - almost an afterthought - the second version works better for me, the third person rather than first person -
Yes, I agree...credits to David. :D

...if your Samurai did kill his son and committed seppuku, he certainly wouldn't be around to write a song about it!) Initially, I was going to have him commit seppuku...the song would be sung by those finding his dead body and assume that the thief outsmarted him and he couldn't live with the shame in their eyes...but the truth would be he would rather die than have to tell people his son was a thief....but then when I was reading about seppuku...and how formal and public it is...it didn't seem to work with him doing it at his post in the middle of the night...so I was hoping to leave it open ended...did he kill his son?...or let his son get a way and commit seppuku later for failing to protect his master's possessions?

Thanks again...I am still open to feedback on version 3

Bravo - a little bit more tweaking and I think you're almost there....

I think you could still shorten the intro riff a little bit, but the rest is good to go...

Although at nearly 5 minutes - I listened to it and it didn't seem that long...a sign of a good song eh :wink:

Rock on!

D 8)

Hi James,
I think version 2 is an improvement, in terms of sounding less upbeat and having a more interesting chord progression. In the lyrics I don't think there's much more fine-tuning that can be done.

With all this talk about the Samurai code, and the conflict of eastern ideology with western music, I thought you might be interested to read about the close connection between samurai and cowboys in the world of cinema. There is an obvious parallel between these two characters, and the genres have had various influences on each other. In fact, two of the most famous Westerns, "The Magnificent Seven" and "A Fistful of Dollars", were adapted from Akira Kurosawa's samurai flicks.

You can get more in-depth over here:
http://flickerfilms.blogspot.com/2004/11/kurosawas-samurai.html

I'm not saying you should change anything, but it could be interesting food for thought about how you could branch your story out into two separate songs - one set in Japan and one in the Wild West...

Martin,

:D Thanks for pointing out the parallels with cowboys and samurai....I hadn't noticed the connection before...maybe it is my slow processing, but before I heard Norah Jones' songs...My concept of a song was that it had to be a package in itself...unless it was a musical or progress rock...Anyway, when I heard "Come Away with Me" and "Don't Know Why (I didn't come)"....I thought, "Wow! She got 2 songs out of the same idea by just changing the singer's point of view....

All that being said, I thought a follow up or parallel song to Samurai could be from the son's perspective...where he knows the phrase "keep your friends close and your enemies closer" ...so he is stealing not out of need but out of a cry for his father's attention...(I have a feeling this might be a very western concept so I would have to do a bit of googling before getting underway.

.....oh and maybe get a cowboy song out as well or 2 cowboy songs! :D

Anyway, you brought up a good reminder that topics are rich for exploration...just because you write one love song doesn't mean you can't ever write another one.

Thanks
-James

Anyway, you brought up a good reminder that topics are rich for exploration...just because you write one love song doesn't mean you can't ever write another one.

And just because a classic song's already been written about one subject doesn't mean there isn't room for another one...!

:D :D :D

Vic