The Magical Work of Restringing Japanese Koto

You can hear a wide variety of koto music on this channel and in live concerts. When koto players perform in front of audiences, they get full attention and applause for the beautiful sounds of their instruments. A tremendous amount of work goes on behind the scenes though, and without the skills of talented professionals such performances would not be possible.
Here, we'd like to appreciate the work of Hiroshi Gomi, a master koto builder and technician. He traveled to Oregon in August of 2022 to restring over 50 kotos belonging to OKK members and other players from around the Pacific Northwest.
The techniques for restringing require a sharp intuition and strong sense of sound and pitch, along with an enormous amount of experience and physical strength. It's a beautiful art that most people never get to see. We hope you find it 'utsukushii' as well.
You can visit Gomi-san's website to see the variety of instruments he builds and sells at:
okoto-gomi.com/

[@JohnHasegawaCeramics]

Great video. Thank you for sharing how the restringing is done.

[@RedAkumaSan]

Very interesting! Gomi-san is quite a master at efficiently changing the strings ... and treating both the instrument and old strings with respect. I have changed strings before on a classical harp, and it is a long, tedious, difficult process, and not at all fun!

[@sarahcoomber]

Wonderful to see the process -- thank you for sharing it! I hope my old koto was among those being restrung and is now singing happily with the others.

[@LilFrg]

I'm obsessed with the beginning and how in sync you guys were!

[@yobrojoost9497]

Great craftsmanship! I have two koto's, a full size and a half size, which fits in the car so I can take it anywhere. I love the sound of them!

[@tanchong2629]

Awesome

[@nicavdmerwe]

Beautiful

[@lindareese4579]

Thank you for sharing this with me..

[@toumicarlos4037]

👏👏👏👍

[@fourtune55]

Is Mr. Gomi available in US? I am looking for Koto Shokunin who could care in Chicago.

[@mitsukidazai6830]

My name is Mitsuki Dazai, I'm the artistic director of Oregon Koto-Kai. Mr. Gomi is very busy, running his business by himself from making/preparing kotos/shamisens, restringing the kotos and often works as a stage manager at numerous concerts in Japan. He normally comes just to Oregon, works in very limited time and straight home in Tokyo. Hope you can find someone who could help...

[@fourtune55]

@@mitsukidazai6830 Mitsuki sama, thank you so much for the quick response. I understand Mr. Gomi is quite busy. I will find someone who could help to come over Chicago. Good luck on your Koto activity! I am very impressed your group plays beautiful tunes.

[@floperpoper2071]

I would like to ask, where can you buy the strings for this instrument?

[@floperpoper2071]

And also where to buy a koto as well

[@oregonkotokai]

@@floperpoper2071 Sorry for the late reply. Gomi-san sells both kotos and koto parts from his online shop, and we can attest to the high quality. okoto-gomi.com/ There are also distributors in the US, such as Sounds of Asia, that you can look into. Glad you enjoyed the video.