Re: whither the zither

[Seth Austen <seth...>]

on 6/7/00 4:43 PM, Paul M. Gifford at PGIFFORD (at) flint(dot)umich(dot)edu 
wrote:


> Related to this might be why klezmorim never adopted the Lithuanian
> kankles, or gusli, as it is called in Russian. Perhaps it was too
> associated with traditional Lithuanian singing. Maybe they played
> instruments identified with "professional" rather than amateur music.
> The latter would include homemade flutes, zithers, and bagpipes, etc.,
> while the former would include all the standard instruments of
> classical and martial music, plus others identified with itinerant
> beggars (dulcimers, hurdy-gurdys [there is an illustration of a
> Jewish hurdy-gurdy player playing in an 18th-century wedding
> procession]). 

Could you tell whether it was a Hungarian hurdy-gurdy or French? My duo
music partner is learning to play the French instrument, and we've been
thinking about trying klezmer on it. We've listened to lots of Hungarian and
Gypsy hurdy gurdy music, I've often wondered about whether there is any
tradition of klezmer using it. Your mention of this picture leads me to
think so...

Seth

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Seth Austen
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