Kono Oto Tomare

[Kraco]

"Since the graduation of the senior members of the club, Takezou ends up being the sole member of the Koto (traditional Japanese string instrument) club. Now that the new school year has begun, Takezou will have to seek out new members into the club, or the club will become terminated. Out of nowhere, a new member barges into the near-abandoned club room, demanding to join the club. How will Takezou be able to keep his club alive and deal with this rascal of a new member?" -Manga-Updates



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The manga is one of my current favourites. It's a shounen manga drawn by a shoujo author, which gives it special kind of oomph, namely the best of both worlds kind. It's not all about relationships like shoujo series, instead it's very heavily about the music and club activity like a shounen manga. But at the same time the relationships and what's inside of the heads of the characters aren't as simplified as in shounen manga. If you like stories where real progress happens, this is exactly like that. However, since this is a music series, the manga was, unavoidably, kind of lacking since manga is a mute media. That's why the anime announcement made me really happy.

The first episode is very much an introduction one. I'm not sure if it's a really powerful one either (the hook is kind of lacking), but it was necessary to understand what's driving two of the central characters.

[David75]

It's true that it's a very slow start. And it was severly lacking one very important thing: koto music/sound.
I'm pretty sure it was intentional, still it really was a bad idea.

A little too much shounen ai maybe ? I hope it was a misinterpretation from my part.

[Kraco]

A little too much shounen ai maybe ? I hope it was a misinterpretation from my part.

Yeah, there's nothing like that in the manga so far. But I guess the author's shoujo background shows since the guys do show strong, if rough, friendships throughout the series. I guess girls like to read about that sort of stuff.

[David75]

Might be just that. It's only tje first ep after all.

[KrayZ33]

It seems like a missed opportunity to make a show about that instrument but produce the background music with guitars and such.
At least I'm pretty sure it was a guitar during the flashback.

also:

are these instruments related? They look so similar.
I totally love these "bassy" sounds

[Kraco]

are these instruments related? They look so similar.
I totally love these "bassy" sounds

You'd think they would be related, from who knows how long ago. In the end Japan did import a lot of culture from China. Even the Finnish kantele is not that different from the koto, but that connection would be thousands of years old, haha. I reckon it's such a simple form that it could have developed naturally even without connections in different places, more or less, but on the other hand a couple of thousands of years is enough for a bunch travellers to cross a continent or two.

[David75]

It seems like a missed opportunity to make a show about that instrument but produce the background music with guitars and such.
At least I'm pretty sure it was a guitar during the flashback.

also:

are these instruments related? They look so similar.
I totally love these "bassy" sounds

Well, the koto is larger, has numerous versions with different number of cords, needs some finger picks... and some other differences.
There's a small interlude on NHK world with some very famous western tunes played with koto and other traditional japanese instruments, that's why I reacted to the size at least.

I must admitt I like that QuGin sound, particularily the sliding ones.

[KrayZ33]

Well, there is also this, the Guzheng



Pretty sure they are somehow all related. The QuGin might be the "bass" version of that thing... who knows, I'm no expert when it comes to instruments and music, interesting though

On a side note... the background in that video is lovely.

I'm interested in the music in this anime and how it'll sound and whether they'll focus on that too. Further more I wonder if they'll allow several instruments to be played at once, like a band... but probably not. I certainly expect at least one - long - song... otherwise it would be kinda pointless to have a focus on such an instrument.


That's reminds me how good Beck was because it did not focus on just the guitar.
Anyway, I'm very interested.

[Kraco]

I'm interested in the music in this anime and how it'll sound and whether they'll focus on that too.

Unless this anime is a total failure and unfaithful to the manga, it'll focus on the training, playing and, music helluva lot. This isn't one of the stories where the music is just an excuse to have regular drama, comedy, slice of life, or that sort of things. That's all I'll say to avoid spoiling anything.

[Kraco]

Ep 2


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I had forgotten the beginning had this much drama already, but now that I think back to it, the characters indeed were colourful enough for this.

As I thought, actually hearing the playing is nice, even if it wasn't more than this. Though I hope it won't always be cut super short.

[KrayZ33]

I'm really not a fan of characters who keep calling themselves dumb.
I hope that this will eventually stop being a thing once it's established that the blonde guy wants to play and should thus be allowed to.

[Kraco]

Ep 3



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I'm really starting to fear the director/producer are making this one of those music series that have very little music. That's the total opposite of what I wanted to see and hear. Perhaps recording enough koto playing would have been too expensive? I don't know. With that weighing on my mind, I other, smaller things will bother me as well. A real pity, unless things change.

[Kraco]

Ep 5


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I wish this concentrated more on the music, but I guess it's not an easy decision for the director. But as it stands, I wonder if the whole series will feature even a single composition fully played without interruptions. It could be that the koto music isn't, especially these days, quite so popular that the large audience would be especially impressed by it. The manga depicted various performances as really earth shattering, but in the end it would be difficult to really shake the anime viewers (especially when the animation budget seems to be challenging). I could see that being a reason why the director would like to rely less on the music itself and use the character backgrounds, personalities, and such to serve as half of the intended impact.

Some other series, like Angel Beats, could, possibly, rely on the songs more due to their nature.

I was going to critisise this show more, but after careful thinking, it's not really fair. I like the manga so much that my expectations for the anime were unrealistic. That's just how it is.

[David75]

You're right, anime and manga have very different approaches to try and move the audience.
Here the director used most if not all the techniques he could to touch the audience feelings.
It did not work for me in this instance like it did in many other anime. But I recognize the efforts and I think the sequence was nicely done.
I'm a little worried to have an almost perfect performance so early in the show. I understand that they all have room for improvement, but from the OP I fear we are to experience much dama with the new girl who is to join the club.

I hope we can get more Koto at some point.

[KrayZ33]

but from the OP I fear we are to experience much dama with the new girl who is to join the club.

huh? Her appearences in the OP doesn't look like that at all to me.
I actually hope she will bring something to the table though.

I find the "main MC"(?) to be lacking right now, he is basically just noise.

Feels weird to have the club-president be in the background like that. We basically know nothing about his level of play.
Mediocre I guess? Kinda lacks personality build up right now... He was in such a shitty position when the club nearly disbanded. Right now it feels unfair to me that they won't focus a bit more on him.

Honoring his ex-clubmembers by keeping the whole thing alive when he could just as easily give up on the club and all that.. coolest dude in the show.

[Kraco]

from the OP I fear we are to experience much dama with the new girl who is to join the club.

huh? Her appearences in the OP doesn't look like that at all to me.
I actually hope she will bring something to the table though.

The author is a shoujo mangaka drawing a shounen manga only this time, but I guess she couldn't help herself with having many guys and few girls, just like in a shoujo manga. A new girl is most welcome.

I find the "main MC"(?) to be lacking right now, he is basically just noise.

Feels weird to have the club-president be in the background like that. We basically now nothing about his level of play.
Mediocre I guess? Kinda lacks personality.

I guess that's his problem on purpose. The old club, before the seniors graduated, only had him as a follower, but after being left alone, he's the senior and thus naturally also the president. He's not really suited for it, it just happened with nobody else around. However, so far the club only has a bunch of ex-delinquents and one genius who can't cooperate, so ironically he's still the best man for the job.

[KrayZ33]

The author is a shoujo mangaka drawing a shounen manga only this time, but I guess she couldn't help herself with having many guys and few girls, just like in a shoujo manga. A new girl is most welcome.

Not only that, I hope she'll be interesting too.
Since Ballroom e Youkoso (both manga and anime) will probably never continue or only at snail speed I hope I get my music/art-topic related kick out of this one. This show isn't as centered about a single MC as Ballroom, but I'm smelling similarities here.

Hoping for a second Chinatsu (man, I miss that show..)

edit:
Right now, even though the episodes themselves weren't the best of the best, I'm still interesting in this show and want to see more.
Part of that is due to it being a highschool drama... they get me everytime, whether it's sports, club, love oriented, doesn't matter.
There is something about the inevitability of them having limited time together before they go into different directions after high school. In this case, the president is ahead one year. Depending on how far this goes... who knows, maybe we'll get to a point where he will have to leave the president's position to someone else, knowing that he fulfilled the promise to his former club-members.

[Kraco]

Episode 6


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A girl with long black hair naturally needs to have yellow pajamas with cat prints.

The beginning of this series seriously was loaded with drama. I thought how they, sarcastically, all thanked the vice-principal for his great encouraging and understanding was a nice touch.

[Kraco]

Episode 7



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It's quite peculiar how half the time koto is being played on screen, the background music is some other instrumental music. It's like the director didn't think people would want to hear koto music in a series about koto music and people playing it. I find this detail bothering me since the only reason why I wanted an anime adaptation was to hear the music. The manga is so good I wouldn't want anything to be different in it, but naturally it's mute.

[KrayZ33]

Ya, I read through the manga last week/the week before (good stuff btw.), and I want to listen to the sounds too.

Such a waste.
The manga is actually superior in showing the perfomance so far...in the anime, it always looks so "distant" when they are playing, as if it's happening in the background.