I have a book of short Japanese Buddhist songs called *wasan* and am looking for help reading the [Japanese notation](https://i.redd.it/aj9t6c34l2ta1.jpg) that is used. For songs I know it is easy enough to read, but for the rest, it is hard to know what the scale and starting pitch are. The information available generally on the internet is either tablature for instrumental music or notation for a kind of Buddhist chant called *shomyo* that is very different.
In addition to the vocal part pictured above, there is a simple percussion part using circles and triangles to represent different chimes.
I posted on the ethnomusicology sub and somebody suggested I post here. I hope you can help me!
https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/12i118j/help_identifying_japanese_musical_notation/
1 comment
Hard to find any information on this, but I do get some hits with similar type of notation using 詠歌 (pilgrim’s hymn) + 譜面 (sheet music). Unfortunately, every image that shows up is so small you can’t actually make out much.
Could you take a picture of the whole page, preferably with the song title? May be easier to figure out what’s what if we know what the song is supposed to sound like.