Sarangi

The sarangi is a short bowed instrument with three gut playing strings and around 35 sympathetic strings that resonate beneath them.

Players stop the strings from the side with the backs of their fingernails. Many musicians hold that, of all Indian instruments, the sarangi sits closest to the human voice.

A classical sarangi's body, neck and head are carved from a single block of wood, usually tun (Toona ciliata), and the belly is covered with the thin skin of a young goat. The arched main bridge, carved as an elephant, is ivory, stag-horn, ebony or bone and carries three gut playing strings. Sympathetic strings were traditionally copper or brass, and steel had become common by the 1980s.

A classical sarangi usually has three gut playing strings and about 35 sympathetic strings; some carry 39, and smaller ones 24 or fewer. Classical sarangis have never been standardised, so sizes and string counts vary. The bow never touches the sympathetic strings, which sound only by resonance with the bowed strings.

A sarangi can be tuned from C sharp to F sharp, sounding best with the first string at D sharp or E, but accompanists tune to the singer's pitch. The main strings take Sa-Pa-Sa or Sa-Ma-Sa, and the main sympathetic set is tuned chromatically. A full tuning, repeated several times, takes a skilled player 5 to 10 minutes.

Sarangi players stop the strings with the fingernails pressed sideways, mostly with the part of the nail just below the cuticle; the pads of the fingers are not used. Talcum powder lubricates the left hand, and practice brings heavy callousing and grooves in the nails. The Cretan lyra and the Bulgarian gadulka also use nail-side stopping.

The word sarangi names a stringed instrument in Jain texts from 1052, but no early text describes it. The first descriptions come from Akbar's period: the A'in-i Akbari of 1588 to 1589 calls it smaller than the rabab. The earliest painting of a sarangi player dates from the early 17th century, and the large classical form developed in or around Delhi in about the mid-19th century.

A sarangi has a skin table where the violin has a wooden top, and its player stops the strings with the side of the nail rather than the fingertip. It is held upright in front of the chest by a seated player. It also carries about 35 sympathetic strings that sound only by resonance with its three bowed gut strings.

No: the Nepali sarangi belongs structurally to the sarinda group of the wider sarangi family. It has four playing strings of metal and gut and is played by the Gaine (Gandharva) community; modern instruments often use nylon or steel strings. The classical Hindustani sarangi usually has three gut playing strings and about 35 sympathetic strings.

Most players use sarangis 50 to 100 years old, often inherited, and a new instrument needs about two years to settle. Joep Bor warned that new sarangis made for export or tourists were usually of very poor quality, and that good old instruments and skilled repairers were scarce. Either way, tone depends on set-up: bridge, skin fitting, string height and peg fit.

Check the back of a sarangi behind the string holder, where most old sarangis are bent or cracked. Check the set-up too: bridge placement and contour, skin fitting, string thickness and height, and peg fit. Sizes vary, because players ordered larger sarangis to accompany male singers and smaller ones for women singers. Instruments by the Meerut makers Masita and Abdul Aziz Behra were the most prized.