samisen
/ˈsamɪsɛn
/(also shamisen /ˈʃamɪsɛn/)
noun
A traditional Japanese three-stringed lute with a square body, played with a large plectrum.She played her favorite tunes for us on her shamisen (three-stringed Japanese banjo), wishing him a happy future....
- He plays the futozao shamisen, a three-stringed instrument from which she extracts a soft array of sounds, from subdued scrapes, to slow, meditative plucking, to ratcheting and vibrating string-bends.
- They enter o-chayas/okiyas at a young age to learn the traditional arts - dance, music, which is performed mostly on stringed instruments like the samisen and the koto, along with conversational and entertaining arts.
Origin
Early 17th century: Japanese, from Chinese san-hsien, from san 'three' + hsien 'string'.