Description
The tanpura offers the peculiar and mantric constancy of its sound and during a concert it is like the lighthouse or point of reference that the rest of the musicians need in order not to get lost in their long walks through these compositions free of score. Generally, it is the soloist himself who checks the tuning of the tanpura just before the beginning of the concert.
It is an instrument of great aesthetic beauty in its traditional form, but the volume of these tanpuras makes them difficult to transport and nowadays musicians usually opt for a more functional design, in which a thin, rectangular wooden box provides the resonance and at the same time supports the strings.
