Your Custom Text Here
The Tuvan byzaanchy
Word of the week: A distinctive sounding four-stringed vertical spike fiddle used in the traditional music of Tuva, similar to the Chinese sihu, but with a wooden soundbox, sometimes cylindrical or cubical, often with a with a carved head
Read more
A standard cümbüş is unfretted, but other versions include frets
Word of the week: A 20th-century hybrid of oud and banjo, this Turkish instrument, meaning fun or revelry, has a wooden bowl for resonance, giving it rounder, less tinny sound, comes in fretless and fretted forms, and was created by Zeynel Abidin Cümbüş, who unusually renamed himself after his instrument
Read more
A dundun set of three drums from the Playing For Change Foundation
Word of the week: These evocative, onomatopoeic variants are generic names for a family of West African talking drums, particularly in the Yoruba culture of Nigeria, Guinea, talking drums that mimic human speech, rope-tuned and cylindrical with a rawhide skin at both ends, and played with a stick
Read more
Esterilla translates as ‘mat’ in Spanish
Word of the week: Translated as mat or placemat from Spanish, this traditional percussion instrument hails from Colombia and dates back to the 1960s, and consists of long, narrow pieces of wood or bamboo woven together and played by either bending it or rubbing it against itself
Read more
Fujara players of Slovakia
Word of the week: A traditional Slovakian shepherd’s flute of unusual length (160-200cm) with distinctive deep mumbling tones, emitted by its lower register and very high overtones, a beautiful, meditative, ghostly sound, emitting melancholic and rhapsodic music, varying in relations to the life and work of the shepherd
Read more
Garrahands from garrahand.com
Word of the week: A modern instrument with a traditional sound, these handcrafted hand and stick percussion “gdrums” are made in Argentina using recycled materials, have a built-in microphone system which allows connection to amps and experimental effects pedals
Read more
An eight-string huapanguera with three pairs of doubled up notes
Word of the week: This guitar variant eight-stringed instrument of the Huasteca region of Mexico offers a deeper sound than its more conventional acoustic cousin, often played within a conjunto huasteco ensemble, alongside a five-string jarana huasteca and violin
Read more
The ikh khuur (centre)
Word of the week: This distinctive looking trapezoid-shaped sound box instrument is the two- or three-stringed Mongolian bowed double bass, complete with a ornately carved horse head neck, and related to the better known fiddle equivalent and Mongolia’s national instrument, the morin huur
Read more
A traditional jejy voatavo
Word of the week: With a rich, resonant sound mounted on a calabash gourd, this Madagascan instrument is a stick zither chordophone, traditionally with sisal strings and three frets, extra strings strung lengthwise down the sides of the neck and strummed with the fingers to accompany the primary melody played with a bow
Read more
Persian kamanchehs dated around 1880
Word of the week: Most commonly tuned like the violin (G, D, A, E) though with variants, though with its own distinct sound this Persian bowed string instrument used in Persian, Azerbaijani, Armenian, and Kurdish music, has a long neck and a spherical body
Read more
Just three cornettos … the largest of which is the curvy s-shaped lysarden, also known as the lizard or tenor model
Word of the week: One of several words for the Renaissance and Baroque period tenor cornett or cornetto, also known as the lizard, lyzard, lizarden, or lyzarden due to its s-curved shape, it has a distinctive horn-like foggy sound and is frequently played in ensemble alongside trombones
Read more
Harald Bode with his pioneering melochord in 1947
Word of the week: A postwar milestone and highly influential in electronic instrument evolution, the melochord is a monophonic keyboard created by German pioneer Harald Bode (1909–1987) in 1947 and based on vacuum tube technology
Read more
An 18th-century Bohemian nail violin
Word of the week: Invented in 1740 by German violinist Johann Wilde, this strangely beautiful sounding idiophone instrument consists of a semicircular wooden soundboard with vertical iron or brass nails that are then bowed to create a chromatic or diatonic scale
Read more
The Suzuki Omnichord
Word of the week: Out latest instrument in the series is was first released in 1981 by Suzuki, including a touch plate called SonicStrings, preset rhythms, auto-bass line function, and sets of single buttons for playing major, minor, and 7th chords in different keys
Read more
Pututu made from a conch shell
Word of the week: This Andean trumpet and also the Quechuan word for snail is traditionally made from conch shell of the adult Strombus galeatus, as well as animal horn, and emits a beautifully eerie sound with several natural harmonics with group tritonic music
Read more
The five-string quinton has a tuning of C-G-D-A-E.
Word of the week: Better known as a place or male name, this is also a five-string hybrid of violin and treble viol, popular in mid 18th-century France, used as the fifth voice (quinta vox) in ensembles, and created as a rival to the Italian violin with a greater range
Read more
The ryuteki - dragon flute
Word of the week: Literally meaning ‘dragon flute’, the ryūteki (龍笛) is pure and beautiful sounding traditional Japanese bamboo flute (or ‘fue’) designed to evoke the mythical creature, used in Shinto classical music gagaku, associated with Japan's imperial court
Read more
Varieties of bamboo and other sheng
Word of the week: A traditional Chinese instrument, representing natural harmony and life from the ground (made originally from bamboo), dating back at least 3,000 years, it could be described as a complex form of mouth organ played by breathing in and out, with a free reed, finger holes, mouthpiece and vertical pipes
Read more
Necking it: the baroque theorbo, known to some as the giraffe of the lute world
Word of the week: Designed to emanate the music of the spheres, for opera, and also allow improvisation, this Baroque-era member of the lute family has has a hugely extended neck, second pegbox, large volume with ornate sound holes, and wide range with harmonic options
Read more
The uhadi musical bow, like the umrhhubhe, with a gourd resonator
Word of the week: One of the world’s earliest instruments evolved from the bow and arrow, it is played by drawing a stick across the string whilst using the mouth as a resonator on the bow to add an evocative, often otherworldly tone to accompany simultaneous inward whistling
Read more