Shamisen three" or "lowered third" refers to tuning the shamisen to honchoshi and lowering the 3rd string (the string with the highest pitch) down a whole step, so that now the instrument is tuned in fourths, e.g. D, G, C. Instead of having a set tuning, such as on a guitar (i.e. E, A, D, G, B, E) or a violin (i.e. G, D, A, E), the shamisen is tuned according to the register of the singer, or simply to the liking of the player. The shamisen player can tune the shamisen to whatever register desired, so long as the above
Violin technique fingers on the right spots without such indications but from practice and experience. To attain good intonation, violin players train their fingers to land in the right places, learning to hear when a note is in or out of tune, and cultivating the ability to correct the pitch rapidly and automatically as notes are being played. "Singing" the note mentally helps to land in the right spot. (In practice, intonation may be checked by sounding an adjacent open string, and listening for the interval between the two notes.) Although adjusting to the desired pitch after landing the finger is indeed