Dramyen
www.atlasofpluckedinstruments.com/central_asia.htm
Tibet | |||
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dramyen
In spite of the many items sold on eBay called "Tibetan", they are all Chinese instruments - although painted in some typical way. The body and beginning of the neck are carved from one piece of wood and hollowed out. The bottom half is covered with thick skin; the top half (which has halfway a sharp point at both sides, over the entire depth of the body - not just a shallow extension like on the rababs) is covered with thin wood. Between the two points is a cut-out rosette soundhole. There is a piece of wood under the top edge of the skin, with a gap between the skin top and the wooden top. The back of the body has carvings in such a way that it looks like it is made from separate ribs, with a narrow halfround strip over the "joins". The neck of the dramyen is rather heavy, and glued with a lip-join to the body. It is fretless. The pegbox is sickle shaped, and usually ends on the front in a flat ending (and sometimes in the carving of a horse head). There are 6 long round pegs, three on each side of the open pegbox. The 6 silk strings (in 3 courses) run over a loose wooden bridge to a wooden extension on the end of the body. A plastic plectrum is tied with rope to this extension. Playing is with plucking simple "riffs" to accompany usually quite jolly singing. Hardly ever does a player go up the neck, all is done in the first position.
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