What was happening next door

.....
While backstage between rehearsal and performance last Friday (outside of Nagoya), I could hear another type of music coming from a nearby practice room. As it turns out, a group of senior ladies were practicing on some type Japanese viol. If you know what it is called, please let me know.


They were very sweet, letting me listen to them struggle through familiar Christmas carols. Perhaps they were a class - I don't know for sure. But I do know that they were having fun at what seemed to be a new skill.

This is the music they were using. It's sort of a tabulature. The instrument has three silk strings, tuned to C (low), G, and C (octave higher). It is bowed with a horse-hair bow, and the tension is controlled by your grip.

Being a violin player, I had to try it. They got a kick out of me, trying to put it up under my neck (in jest, of course). I managed to get through "Jingle Bells" with the other ladies. What fun!

.....