The composition below is called Woodmaster and it is written for solo Taimu
shakuhachi and dedicated to Ken Mujitsu LaCosse, designer and maker of Taimu.
Taimu is a wide-bore, natural bamboo variant of shakuhachi, the root-end bamboo
flute from ancient Zen Buddhism. This flute itself calls into question rigid
lines or divisions between masculine and feminine, sacred and secular: it comes
from Zen, but it also comes from the dirt (the root-end was indeed roots in the
ground, part of its rhizomial roots network underground); we play meditation
pieces on it but I play gutbucket blues riffs on it too. It is smooth yet coarse
in its textural possibilities (...)
We dissolve dichotomies with this instrument, yet the sacred masculine has
certainly fueled the making and playing of this flute and this song
specifically.
