Chigring

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Chigring is a rare tubular zither made of bamboo with sticks , which is used by the Garo in the northeast Indian state of Meghalaya as a percussion instrument . Their softer sound compared to the tubular drum dama is preferred for dances and folk songs.

Design and style of play

The sound box consists of a 55 centimeter long segment of a bamboo tube that was cut off just behind two knots. The diameter is about 7.5 centimeters. In the middle of the tube there is a rectangular hole about 1 × 1.5 centimeters, which is partially covered with a thin membrane . On each side of this sound hole, three strings run lengthways across the tube. The strings are idiochord, they are peeled out of the upper layer of the bamboo tube in fine parallel strips with a length of 45 centimeters and spaced from the tube with small bridges pushed under at their ends. The pitch can be adjusted by moving these bridges. Cord wraps around the tube at the ends of the strings prevent them from pulling out.

The seated player holds the instrument clamped between his knees and a shoulder or neck at an incline and strikes the strings lightly with both hands with two thin, 22 centimeter long bamboo strips. The strings produce bright tones that sound differently high on the left and right side with little reverberation. A dampening effect can be achieved if the strings are depressed with the left hand and struck with the bamboo stick in the right hand.

distribution

The Garo classify their musical instruments according to their use in entertaining or religious-ritual music. The latter follows the rules of tribal tradition. The long, double-headed tubular drum dama may only be used for religious dances and ceremonies. Similar restrictions exist for the kettle drum nagra and for the gong rang . In contrast to this, the chigring can be played by men and women to accompany entertaining dances and folk songs. You should all, in the former be usable usual beat techniques and therefore serves as a practice instrument for boys before the former play at official functions.

For entertainment songs and some secret, nocturnal rituals, the quieter beats of the chigring are better suited than drum accompaniment. During the two-day reburial ceremony mangona (or chugana ), a small bamboo hut called delang is built in the family courtyard , in which the clay pot with the deceased's bones stands before it is later buried under the doorstep of the house. The rituals for the spirit of the dead performed at night in the homestead and village include lamentations and dances. The dancers are accompanied by brass cymbals , the buffalo horn with a long bamboo tube adil , the bamboo tube held between the knees kimjim (also dimchrang ) and the chigring .

Some ethnic groups in Assam know a similar, two-stringed instrument of the same length with a diameter of four centimeters, which is called gintang ( jintang ), dhup talow or jeng toka ("string toka ", to distinguish it from the bamboo rattle toka ). This idiochorde tubular zither also has a sound hole in the middle, but the bottom of the tube is closed by the knot only at one end, the other end, cut off in front of the knot, is open. A bamboo stick is sufficient to strike both strings. Sound modulation is possible if the open end is pressed against the belly like the sound box of a musical bow .

Two other tubular bamboo zithers beaten with sticks are called tutum dar by the Mizo in the state of Mizoram and singphong or sing diengphong by the Khasi in Meghalaya. The Mog in Tripura , who belong to the Arakanese , know a tubular zither that lies across in front of the player like a slit drum on the floor and is tied to a block of wood to stabilize their position. The ronzagontam occurs in Andhra Pradesh and Oriya .

Bamboo tube zithers are the simplest type of stick zithers, of which the rudra vina played in North Indian classical music is a refined example. They are generally regarded as a possible preliminary stage for the formation of the vinas . A stringed instrument that can be traced back to bamboo tube zithers , which is struck with a stick and produces simple tone sequences, is the South Indian gettuvadyam , a long-necked lute with two double strings. The South Indian long-necked lute gottuvadyam is much more mature .

The few bamboo tube zithers outside of the north-east Indian region are not struck percussively, but are plucked with fingernails as melody instruments. The valiha on Madagascar and the sasando on the Indonesian island of Roti have been preserved .

literature

  • Keyword: Garo Musical Instruments. In: Late Pandit Nikhil Ghosh (Ed.): The Oxford Encyclopaedia of the Music of India. Saṅgīt Mahābhāratī. Vol. 1 (A – G) Oxford University Press, New Delhi 2011, p. 335

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Oxford Encyclopaedia, p. 335
  2. ^ PK Mohanty: Encyclopaedia of Scheduled Tribes in India . Gyan Books, New Delhi 2006, p. 206, ISBN 978-8182050525 ; Copied in: Festivals and Ceremonies of the Khasis . Department of Arts & Culture Meghalaya
  3. ↑ Dilip Ranjan Barthakur: The Music and Musical Instruments of North Eastern India. Mittal Publications, New Delhi 2003, p. 134
  4. ^ Roger Blench: Musical instruments of Northeast India. Classification, distribution, history and vernacular names. ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 5.1 MB) Cambridge, December 2011, p. 26f @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rogerblench.info
  5. ↑ Louise Wrazen: The Early History of the Vina and am in South and South East Asia. In: Asian Music, Vol. 18, No. 1. Autumn - Winter 1986, pp. 35-55, here p. 38
  6. ↑ Bigamudre Chaitanya Deva: Musical Instruments of India. Their History and Development. KLM Private Limited, Calcutta 1978, p. 149