Emanuel Ringers

The Emanuel Ringers is part of the music ministry from Emanuel Lutheran Church in Pleasantville, New York. This handbell group is comprised of ringers ranging from 8 and up. We ring on 5 octaves of Schulmerich handbells and 7 octaves of Malmark handchimes. We welcome all who want to learn how to ring, you do not have to be a member of the church to participate. Contact Eiko at emanuelringers@gmail.com for more information about our Music Ministry at Emanuel

Friday, July 30, 2010

July 29 Shinkansen and Hamamatsu

Thursday, July 29
Well I'll start off by saying that I will never get used to those pillows that have those round bead things in them. Everyone got up early, again, and we had a good breakfast at the hotel. We all said goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Takasu and headed on our way to the bullet train. The bullet train is very fast and my ears are actually popping every now and then but it's definitely worth it. Jessie agrees. But the bullet train is a good way to see the Japanese countryside.
After our first ride on the bullet train we went to the Hamamatsu Museum of Musical Instruments ( my ears are popping right now, we're on the train again). It was really cool and interesting. There were instruments from all over the world in one place.
One exhibit was the Keyboard Instruments Room. There were a bunch of organs, pianos, harpsichords and clavichords from the 1700's ( maybe earlier) to the 1900's. A woman who works at the museum played one if the harpsichords and explained how it worked. They also had an exact replica of one of the first pianos ever made.
Another room in the museum was the hands on room. They had some of the instruments from around the museum that we could actually play. I tried African drums and a Pan flute. They even had handbells! They weren't the ones we are used to. They were like the ones school teachers have with little springs with a piece of plastic at the end.
There were hundreds of instruments and many of them were some of the weirdest ones I have ever seen but they were also pretty cool. After the museum we went back to the train station and ate lunch. I love the food here, all the different kinds make every meal a good one. We then took the train to Himeji and got to take a brief rest at the hotel. It's a nice hotel and thankfully the pillows have a soft side instead of just beads. We took a walk down a long row of stores and had dinner at different places and even got to get a long distance look of the castle, which is being worked on right now so we won't be able to go inside or get a very good picture of it. After that we went back to the hotel and went to bed, which everyone was very grateful for.
Jessie and Luke
Sent from my iPad

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