SF show lecture reviews

[nagamaki - Franco]

Good afternoon,

 

It was hopeful that someone would post at least a short review of the highlights of Shigekazu Hayashi's lecture on polishing and Brian Tschernega's lecture on habaki at the SF show. What did you learn?

Many thanks in advance.

[nagamaki - Franco]

huh, then I take it the lectures were either A) poorly attended, or B) the lectures included nothing new and were otherwise of little or no redeeming value worth sharing, or C) sorry, but I fell asleep sitting in the back row, or D) sorry, too many great nihonto and tosogu deals on the tables at that moment, or E) sorry, but there was this beautiful ragazza running around, and, well, .... ! or F) sorry, but I already know everything there is to know about everything, besides, where were you anyway if you were so interested in these lectures , or G) sorry, but it's going to cost you a bundle to get this kind of inside information

[Keith Larman]

F) and G) actually.

 

Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

I'll post something a little later once the morning drugs have kicked in.

 

As a preview... I thought they were great. With a little contrasting comic relief built in as a matter of fact...

[nagamaki - Franco]

As a preview... I thought they were great. With a little contrasting comic relief built in as a matter of fact...

 

great approach, Keith, "always leave them wanting more" .......

looking forward to you having your morning espresso,

[Keith Larman]

Sorry, the drugs didn't kick in. And it was dayquil, not expresso. So I spent an extra few hours face down on a pillow trying to extinguish a nasty cold. Now I've moved on to something my wife called a "hot toddy". I was hoping for something more exciting, but it'll do as I seem to be slightly numb now. :D

 

But I digress...

 

Okay, San Francisco Token Kai NBTHK Presentation. This year they opened it up for everyone -- no admission fee for the presentation.

 

Ted Tenold was the "moderator" of sorts, introducing each person with a little history. He also acted a bit as the guy keeping things ideally focused. My understanding is that he is writing up something about the event for the NBTHK. So I'll be brief with my own take. Remember I'm watching through my interests and eyes, so some things I kinda glazed over and found myself back watching Jimmy working on the stones...

 

It started with Jimmy Hayashi. He had a togi-dai set up and was scrubbing away. He was working an area on the blade first on nagura then to koma nagura then to uchigumori. It was interesting watching how he worked the blade on the stone, the small area he worked, etc. He talked as he worked. One of the best parts of his discussion involved the issue of "fixing" things. He talked about how the first priority is always preservation of the blade. Somethings can be fixed, others should not. And he emphasized the uniqueness of each situation. He pointed out that while on rare occasions a polisher may be able to "touch up" a polish by redoing just the shiage, usually there are shape and condition issues that require a more complete approach.

 

He finished the window he was working on with each stone then set the blade out so we could see how the blade looked in each section. On his chu-nagura everything was somewhat visible. The Koma nagura was slightly different, more refined, and the hamon and hada were both fairly clearly visible. Then onto uchigumori where the hamon really started to "pop" and the hada became very easy to see. It is still a long ways from from a fully polished piece at this stage, but it was very interesting to see how he worked the blade.

 

He also worked a small section of a shinshinto era yari with a gorgeous hamon that had an area that looked suspiciously like a hagiri. But after a few minutes with him first on uchigumori then going back to koma nagura and back up to uchigumori the mark in the area vanished under the stones. So it wasn't a hagiri but an odd scratch. So there was one very happy person there. And it was interesting to see how he was able to work the area to resolve the issue.

 

Next was Brian Tscernega. Brian put out a display of 20-30 very nice habaki. He gave a sort of "cliff notes" quick summary of proportions of habaki and how they're fit. I very much enjoyed his discussion of how a habaki is supposed to fit on the blade and the dangers of using poorly fit habaki (most importantly how a poorly fit habaki can put tremendous stress on the hamachi). He talked about proportions, the depth of the slot on the mune, different styles of habaki, how foil is attached, and so forth. Really quite interesting.

 

Mike Yamasaki ( http://ricecracker.com ) followed up showing off a variety of restored koshirae. Lovely stuff and he talked about how easy it is to screw up a perfectly good old koshirae through amateur restoration. So lots of very nice fittings, saya, etc. to look at. Right about then I started watching Jimmy working on that yari so I missed part of Mike's discussion. Sorry about that, but the yari was really interesting as it was a Yokoyama piece and I've seen a few of those over the years and really like them. And I knew the owner so I was quite interested in seeing how Jimmy approached the problem.

 

Finally David McDonald did his presentation. He laid out an impressive collection of old tsuka cores, some split to show how the internal channel was carved, how it was shaped, how the samekawa was applied, etc. Really interesting. He talked about panel samekawa vs. full wrap and the benefits of each. He talked about different wrapping styles and all the issues involved in putting together a good tsuka. Interesting stuff as the craftsman has to carve things to exact dimensions such that once the same is applied and the ito wrapped everything lies flush and flows nicely. Not a trivial task by any means. One thing I found very interesting was seeing how thin some of the wood cores really even to the extent of a few having areas where the wood was literally paper thin or even gone. These were full wrap samekawa applications and it showed how much confidence they had in the strength of the samekawa and ito combination.

 

At one point during the demo two young men came in wearing what looked to me like Yukata and Hakama. The first thought in my mind after "what the #**$*" was "Good lord, someone needs to show you how to tie those hakama correctly." And one of them was obviously a sword saint kinda guy since he was wearing a white hakama. Anyway, they also had their trusty "made in spain" wallhanger Japan-esque kinda katana thrust through their obi. One guy was banging his saya along the way in on most everyone (which shows how little he knows about the etiquette of wearing katana). Anyway, once things were for all intents and purposes over one of the fashion impaired neo-samurai brings out a sword with a gigantic wood slab handle to show Brian Tscernega the habaki this fella had made. Out of titanium. The slab of titanium was about 50% larger than the mihaba of the blade itself. I wish I'd had the presence of mind to get my cell phone out and photograph Brian's face... At this point Brian mumbled something about "file more" and the topic was changed... What I couldn't for the life of me understand was how the guy could pull that out after seeing all those incredible habaki on the table.

 

On later discussion some of us wondered if they might have been students of the (in)famous Hoshino who apparently lives in San Francisco. Who knows...

 

I must admit I was quite lucky in that later on in the lounge I spent a few hours sitting at a table with Jimmy Hayashi and Ted. Lovely discussion. Jimmy has a great life story and we discussed a lot of things about the craft today, the pressures, and then how the new generations are going to be trained. Jimmy came up in a very traditional training environment. And how he got there was really quite amazing. But that wasn't part of the public conversation and they really aren't my stories to share. I just hope someone someday writes a good article on Hayashi and his history.

 

Later on Brian Tschernega joined us and we commisserated with him about the neo-samurai visition. Mike Yamasaki dropped by a few times but feigned disgust that we were still talking technical things about sword crafts. And for me, well, mostly I sat there trying to listen, learn and remember as much as possible. It was all good from my point of view.

 

Enough for me. I talked with Ted earlier today and he said something about writing down something a bit more formal since he had moderated the discussion. My impressions were just my own and of course I tended to focus on Hayashi and Tscernega's presentations but that doesn't mean Mike and David's presentations weren't also very good. I was mostly interested in watching Hayashi work as I've seen some of his polishes and they are some of the clearest, most dazzling things I've ever seen. And Brian's work is of course totally top notch as well. So I was pretty much overwhelmed by the time Mike and David got to their parts.

 

I'll also say that there simply is no way to convey how much I saw and learned. But what you learn sometimes is simply watching the work being done. And writing it down just doesn't do it justice. It was the highlight of the show for me. And I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time studying a number of Juyo blades. But of course I'm a craft-geek in a sense. I've seen all this stuff done many times but watching guys at the very top of the craft is simply amazing.

 

So there you go, fwiw.

[nagamaki - Franco]

Keith, thank you very much for sharing your thoughts, much enjoyed.

 

A nasty cold in August and hot toddy, hmm, don't know about that, but hope you're feeling better soon. Seems I owe you

 

an example of Brian Tschernega's workmanship to go along with Keith's words.

 

[Keith Larman]

FWIW here is a photo of a habaki Brian made for me about 5 years ago...

[Brian]

Wow! We have posted that one before I think, but it never fails to blow my mind. Absolutely gorgeous!

Thanks very much for that write-up Keith, you have a good way with words, and I enjoyed your summary. Had a smile on my face reading about the "sword saints" :D

I wonder if they read the forum?

Funny how ppl still insist on trying to improve a 1000 year old tradition.

A great read, and sounds like a fantastic event. Maybe oneday they will film the lectures and publish a dvd for those "locationally-disadvantaged" guys like me. :lol:

 

Brian