Shakuhachi on BBC Radio 2

Ken LaCosse playing the shakuhachi flute on BBC Radio 2


The following is the script for a reflective sequence on the BBC Radio 2 programme Pause For Thought. The programme is produced by the BBC religious broadcasting team. Here, Mike Ford reflects on the present day role of the ancient Japanese shakuhachi flute with flute-maker Ken LaCosse. It was aired April 2, 2004.

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Ford: I was stretched out on a beach in San Francisco, with my eyes closed and ears open to the roar of the breakers. It was bliss. Then, all of a sudden, there came an even more heavenly sound from the other side of the sand dune.

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Ford: It wasn't an acoustic I'd expected to encounter so close to the shoreline but the notes, as crystal clear as the sea, were soon transporting me to a realm of pure delight. The musician was a flute-maker testing out his latest Shakuhachi creation in the warm Californian air. As I listened to the impromptu recital by Ken LaCosse, I found myself casting my cares to the wind and simply marvelling at the fact that a simple piece of Japanese bamboo could be fashioned into an instrument of such serenity. Ken explained how the tapering bamboo had been cut below ground at the root joint, enhancing both the look and the sound of the flute. The secret of its haunting melody lay in the spacing of the seven nodes or joints from the base of the instrument to its blowing edge. I asked him whether the music spoke to him of anything:

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LaCosse: No knowledge. Just sound and a good feeling, and nothing that you need to speak of, nothing you need to know. No ego.

Ford: For the first time in a long time I felt in complete harmony with the world around me, a tranquil interlude in a life of constant movement and distraction. For once, I was actually living in the here and now.

In his classic spiritual text, 'The Practice of the Presence of God,' a 17th century cook describes how he discovered God in all things, whether working in his kitchen or worshipping in church. Brother Lawrence had served as a soldier and a footman, before entering the Carmelite Order in Paris at the age of 55 and immersing himself in the devotional life. A simple man, who laid no claim to special gifts, he felt God's company constantly because he lived eternity now.

'Be still and know that I am God,' said the psalmist in the Hebrew Scriptures, but attuning ourselves to the rhythm of the divine in our age is no easy matter. Perhaps we have to learn the art of chilling out, like the flute-player on the shore. It's only by letting go of the past and holding back from the future that we can hear the sound of the present moment.

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