John, the practical problem is that I am a very small person (and getting smaller by the month, it seems....). I am also younger than Elizabeth Taylor, but only just; 1932 was a very good year; it included Miriam Makeba, Nacy Kassebaum Baker, Sydney Harbour Bridge, Greater Tokyo, and Goofy (and, I belive, Johnny Cash, but maybe he was in the same year but not the calendar year).

I believe I am using a rather special tambourine that is made of plastic, and the only way I can use it is to stand with it in my left hand at full arm extension and hit wherever it happens to land (this being just below my knee).

While I admit to being an amateur, it is hard to find a professional who can help me. Two or three years ago when the BEC of Tokyo put on a world-first stage performance of Howard Goodall's "We are the Burning Fire", I went mad with Japanese wind chimes, Tibetan bells, Latin-American rattles, referees' whistles and what-have-you; the only genuine percussion pro was an African Griot drummer in dreadlocks, who, when informed that our performance was free and collecting for charity, proudly announced that he would dedicate his God-given talent for charity.

By now wildly off-topic, but I can assure you that the music scene in Tokyo (especially when it embraces folk in any form and of any century) is something you have to be here to experience.

While I am still searching, thanks to the other practical suggestions. Surfers' shops in central Tokyo may be hard to find, but I know the only place this will happen and will try it later this week; in sports, my main acquaintances are sumo wrestlers, and just last Sunday I believe I appeared in a brief segment in the Charles Osgood CBS show.

Doree still looking for an Okinawan who can _really_ demonstrate the exact finger configuration of the sanba)

Thank you, Paul. I have printed this out for future reference. But there are some practical problems: one is we've already rehearsed the piece, and the Choir Director has expressed satisfaction with the percussion effects; the only problem is that I got bruised. Another is that our large choir (we do a lot of double choir music) occupies all the stage in most venues and any extra effects sometimes have to be squeezed into some tight places.

More important: you seem to be looking at this from the point of view of an orchestral percussionist. Hitting the tambourine against the leg as I did is, in fact, a perfectly acceptable technique in 'ethnic' circles. What you are describing is an adaptation to orchestral use of an instrument from another genre. A similar instance is the orchestral 'castanet' consisting of a spoonlike handle with half a castanet attached; this is very different from the real Spanish castanet which is played with the fingers and consists of two equal clappers linked by a circular cord doubled over the thumb (and of course these are always used in pairs so an extra effect can be achieved by clashing both castanets together).

To return to my own problem; the children at the nearby kindergarten are nearly all ferrried in by their mothers on bikes; I'll ask the mothers where they get the protective gear. Thanks to all who replied.

Doreen Simmons

Chuck,

I've been doing percussion of one kind or another for over 60 years, though it's only in the last 15 or so that people, especially those running bars that feature Celtic bands or sessions, have been paying me -- or at least, discounting the beer. :-)

Technique is my second concern; my first is, getting the beat right and fitting in with the people playing the music (and, from time to time, raising the ante by challenging them).

My main instrument has been, for some 17 years, the bodhran. Do you play it with an upward or downward beat? My teacher (a professional) said either way was fine - and at the time the accepted wisdom was that it didn't matter which way you did it so long as you got the sound right. Lately I've seen a lot of videos and all the young men playing were using the upward technique. But this is not 'right' that makes anything else 'wrong'; it's just a new wave.

When I visited Seville, many years ago, I attended flamenco lessons to get proper instruction on the use (and the 'feel') of castanets. I can't manage the techniques now, because of loss of mobility in the metacarpals, but this does not impair my knowledge of how to use castanets -- and when. Likewise I had a private little session with a belly dancer in Tangier and she taught me the use of the finger cymbals, plus an unusual way of getting a beat from snapping the index finger of one hand against the joints of the other. (Though the finger cymbals I use today were bought much more recently in Istanbul after a refresher course.)

It's not how long you've been learning, either; I had djembe lessons off and on for three or four years, whenever the Griot sensei was free to teach (in the Drum Museum at Asakusa, Tokyo); but I would not consider myself as anything but a humble back-up djembe player. On the other hand, I don't recall anybody teaching me to play the spoons -- but I have never had the slightest difficulty in turning in what my fellow players (many of them professionals in Irish or other music) clearly regard as not only acceptable but desirable. They invite me to play with them.

Maybe I'm spoilt; the Celtic and general folk scene in Tokyo is wide open; many professional musicians (some of them also university lecturers) turn up to regular pub evenings just to let their hair down and play for the sheer pleasure of it. And if you don't fit in, the Japanese enthusiasts soon find ways to exclude you (for example, they don't tell you where or when the next session will be held).

Doreen, one of life's free spirits