Images from The Beede Gallery

Short-Necked Lute (Sarangi), Northern India, Early 20th Century

NMM 2403. Short-necked lute (sarangi), northern India, early 20th century. A bowed, vertically-held instrument carved out of a single block of wood with a parchment belly and a separate fingerboard. Three gut melody strings and three wire sympathetic strings. The pinched body helps facilitate bowing. This instrument was used by a beggar musician and shows many make-shift repairs. Length: 675 mm. Board of Trustees, 1978. Click on any image on this page to see a larger view.

Literature:  Thomas E. Cross, Instruments of Burma, India, Nepal, Thailand and Tibet, The Shrine to Music Museum Catalog of the Collections, Vol. II, André P. Larson, editor (Vermillion: The Shrine to Music Museum, 1982), p. 10.

Thomas E. Cross, Instruments of Burma, India, Nepal, Thailand and Tibet, M.M. Thesis, University of South Dakota, May 1983, p. 20, plate VII.

André P. Larson, The National Music Museum:  A Pictorial Souvenir (Vermillion: National Music Museum, 1988), p. 29.

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