The snakeskin shamisen isn't a real shamisen, but an Okinawan sanshin. They don't make them with snakeskin any more. The real shamisen dou are made of cat skin or dog skin, but you won't find many of those anymore. Animal rights, ya know? If you're lucky you can score a repaired dogskin shamisen off ebay for about $600 or 700 but you can get a pretty good starter's shamisen with good synthetic skin for about $400. You didn't get your driver's license driving in a ferrari too, now did ya?