Kiai sounds

[emitbrownne]

When I first watched Kendo, I wondered what the sound was that they were shouting.....
As I have practiced I have learnt that you shout the target name when striking, and in Kata you have YAH and TOH.

However when I kiai and seme (semi ?!?) I vocalise a strange zion sort of noise.
Listening to others in my dojo and dojos that I have visited, I have noticed a cross section of sounds from yells to japanese words....

I kiai and force the air down but Zion (well its sort of sounds like that )does not seem to expell the air sufficiently...

Can anybody give any advice as to what vocalisation best aids projection and breathing control?

Thanks in advance

[JSchmidt]

First, push the air out with the lower part of your abdomen.
Secondly, try to push the air up in the back of your throat. It has the effect of opening up your vocal cords, making it a bigger sound, takes less effort and it tends to straighten up your posture as well. (Have you ever seen a slouching opera singer?).
The actual sound is almost irrelevant. "Yah" is a good place to start and you will invariably modify it yourself from there.

Jakob

[saki_wooah]

In keiko you should kiai first the name of your waza (if u go kote, shout kote!)
You can try different kiai words/sound and chose the one you're more confortable to do!

[KhawMengLee]

yeah...something like, "Scoobie Dooobie DoouuUUUU!!!"

[Critical_Bill]

how about psychological warfare hehe, scream "men!" on seme and then hit dou! lol

[reicheru]

I have a different example of "psychological warfare" -- there's a guy at my dojo whose kiai sounds a lot like the sensei's "yamei!" It doesn't usually confuse his opponent (I don't think he does it intentionally), but I still often "fall for it" and start to back off from my opponent, thinking it's the end of the match -- at which point I'm generally dealt a nice assertive men or kote...

[rottunpunk]

theres someone in my club that sounds like a banshee-now thats rather offputting

fortunately. cuz i cant wear my specs in the men i can rarely tell what the other persons face is doing or whether they are kiai-ing or not, so i dont get fazed much by the whole thing

[ak76]

Im a begginer and am finding difficult getting used to kiai , im sure with practise it will come to me or i'll end up shouting a homer simpson like do_

[emitbrownne]

Rottenpunk

theres someone in my club that sounds like a banshee-now thats rather offputting

Heh, thats me. It may be off putting, but it does'nt help my breathing.

Maybe I need to reach a comprimise

The fact that its off putting could be a useful tool

[Eldritch Knight]

My senpai has this weird guttaral sound that sounds like a tiger roaring. Its quite impressive.

[LNGUYEN]

If you have some kids or little brothers or sisters at home, try to scream at them at home for a whole month and You will do find in dojo

[emitbrownne]

Since my original post back in February.. my Kiai has evolved.

I have yelled with what seemed pure rage, more a viscious roar.
I have gone high pitched (but that hurt my ears and distracted me too much)
I tried japanese words.... but I'm sure my pronunciation warped the meaning into something quite offensive..!?!.

and now I am currently working my way through various celtic and nordic gods....

the one that got me through my grading was Wodin and is my current fave

C'mon lets hear it for the god of wisdom and war.

Zion is still there every now and again... along with the sister-sound A-zai..

[swrdply400mrela]

We have this one guy in our dojo that does high pitched bird sounds once in awhile, which makes it kind of hard to take seriously....

Anyway, when I was TKD I used something like "e-yah", which really helps pushing from the abdomen.

[Eldritch Knight]

When I was in Japan, I'd go with standard English words that no one would understand (like "yield" and "fall"), but now that I'm in the States, I changed to say "kiai", starting with a really long first 'i' sound and with an ultra-high pitch on the second 'i'

[Fraz]

I used something like "e-yah", which really helps pushing from the abdomen.

Isn't that what the power rangers shout...?