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The jori is a pair of separate drums from the Punjab region, played seated with the hands; its name means pair. The treble drum is the poorra and the bass drum the dhamma. Sikh tradition credits Guru Arjan Dev with creating it from the older mridang or pakhawaj, to accompany Gurbani kirtan sung in dhrupad style.

Learning the jori with KalaSudha starts at Foundation level, online or in a workshop. You begin seated with both drums on cloth pads, learning sath, the open, full-palm strokes. Children study with us as well as adults, so ask us about a starting age and about a size for a younger learner.

Players back after a long break pick up where they left off. Our courses run in levels, so your teacher first hears where you stand.

You can buy a jori from KalaSudha outside India: we sell each pair by quote or made to order and deliver worldwide. Every set goes out packed for international shipping; ask us about cases and insurance.

We service and repair any jori in any country, wherever you bought it. Ask us, too, for spare parts. For help with your drums after the sale, use the chat on any page or email [email protected]. For a gift voucher, a class set for a school or a flight case for travel, ask us as well.

On the jori, the bass drum, the dhamma, takes a fresh application of wheat-flour dough (atta) on its head, which produces its deep, resonant bass. The dough controls the bass pitch, set in the low octave, and is applied before each sitting and removed afterwards. The treble poorra carries a permanent black syahi, like the tabla's treble drum.

The tabla has replaced the jori in most gurdwara kirtan today, and the jori is now rare. After the 1947 Partition many Muslim rababi families moved to Pakistan, breaking the rabab and jori pairing at Darbar Sahib. The Namdhari Sikh community of Punjab has preserved jori playing, and Bhai Baldeep Singh has revived jori-pakhawaj playing.

The jori's bass drum takes fresh wheat-flour dough, while its treble drum carries a permanent syahi like the tabla's. Jori playing uses an open hand and fuller, heavier strokes, where tabla emphasises finger strokes. Practitioners describe the jori as louder, deeper and lower-pitched, and the two techniques do not transfer smoothly between each other.

The jori is a vertical form of the pakhawaj: the barrel drum's two heads become two upright drums, with timbre and technique close to the pakhawaj and the left and right sides inverted. Sikh tradition credits Guru Arjan Dev with creating it from the older mridang or pakhawaj. Bhai Baldeep Singh uses the term jori-pakhawaj to separate it from the tabla.

You can ask KalaSudha to book a jori player for a concert, event or recording. The jori accompanies Gurbani kirtan, the sung hymns of the Guru Granth Sahib, so tell us the setting when you book Indian classical musicians through us. To hear our artists, explore KalaSudha's recordings and concert videos.