Passion Fruit - Sitar, a plucked stringed instrument (Translation of the post on 13th June 2011)

Continued from the last post on Fujifabric's 9th single, 'Passion Fruits'. (also in their 3rd album, 'Teenager')
Today, let me introduce you a marvelous musical instrument called Sitar.

According to Fujifabric's interviews and The Musical Scores of 'Teenager' , an electric sitar was used in the song.

The sitar ( /ˈsɪtɑr/ or /sɪˈtɑr/; Hindi: सितार, Bengali: সেতার, Urdu: ستار, Persian: سی‌تار ; Hindustani pronunciation: [ˈsɪ.t̪aːr]) is a plucked stringed instrument predominantly used in Hindustani classical music, where it has been ubiquitous since the Middle Ages. It derives its resonance from sympathetic strings, a long hollow neck and a gourd resonating chamber.

Some of you might have heard the songs below...

Used throughout the Indian subcontinent, particularly in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, the sitar became known in the western world through the work of Pandit Ravi Shankar beginning in the late 1950s, particularly after George Harrison of The Beatles took lessons from Shankar and Shambhu Das and played sitar in songs such as "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)" and "Within You Without You". Shortly after, The Rolling Stones used a sitar in "Paint It Black" and a brief fad began for using the instrument in pop songs.

(quoted from Sitar in Wikipedia)

Fujifabric is a prominent Japanese rock band who loves to try variety of different sounds, instruments and styles, and the sitar is used also in 'Mirror', the 9th song in their 5th album, 'MUSIC'. It is not surprising as Shimura kun listened to many kinds of music - ethnic music, rock, pops, classical music, jazz, hip-hop, rap music, etc, but his music is not falling too much on ethnic sounds, but an ethnic element is quite well balanced with other sounds in their rock music.

Please listen to the song, 'In The Light' by Led Zeppelin, and make a comparison between two songs.

The 8th song in Fujifabric's 4th album, 'Chronicle' also sounds quite ethnic, South Asian, right?

Shimura kun said that 'Passion Fruits' sounds like a Pakistani pop music, and the sound of the sitar is a key sound which makes such an atmosphere, I think.
In this song, Fujifabric was particular about making live sounds of instruments, so percussion, sitar are played by the band members. No synthesizer was used to create fake instrumental sounds.

There is a promotion video for 'Passion Fruits', too.
Band member's wear costume like 80's, and look funny!
Passion Fruits Promotion Video


The promotion video and the making scenes can be seen on the DVD, '2nd Collection of Video Clips FAB CLIPS 2' attached to the CD, Fujifabric SINGLES 2004-2009. It is available now.

Today's song is 'Passion Fruits'.
Enjoy listening to the song in the live version!
The arrangement is slightly different to the original one in the album, and both are admirable!!