संतूर
The santoor is the hammered dulcimer of the Kashmir Valley, where it has been used for centuries in Sufi music and folk traditions. In the mid-twentieth century, Pandit Shivkumar Sharma transformed it into a vehicle for the full Hindustani classical tradition — a remarkable achievement given that the instrument's construction (it cannot sustain notes the way a stringed instrument can) presents unique challenges for a music built on meend (sustained glides).
The santoor is a trapezoidal wooden box with typically 72 to 100 strings arranged in groups of three or four across raised wooden bridges. Each group of strings is tuned to the same note, and the groups are arranged in ascending order across the instrument. The strings are struck with two light wooden mallets (mezrab) held in each hand.
Because the santoor cannot sustain notes (the struck string dies away quickly), the musician must use a rapid technique of repeated strokes to simulate sustained notes. Meend (glide), the most essential ornament of Indian classical music, is impossible in the conventional sense on a santoor; Shivkumar Sharma developed techniques using a combination of adjacent strings and controlled mallet pressure to approximate glides. These constraints forced the santoor style into its own unique vocabulary — one that is now considered as complete and expressive as any in the tradition.
The santoor (from the Persian "santur") is found across a wide belt from Hungary to Iran to India. In Kashmir, it was an important instrument in Sufi music and Kashmiri folk traditions for centuries. Pandit Shivkumar Sharma encountered it in his childhood in Kashmir and began the work of adapting it for classical performance in the 1950s and 60s. His landmark recordings through the following decades established the santoor as a full classical instrument, and his 1967 collaboration with Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia as "Shiv-Hari" brought both instruments wide popular recognition.
The santoor's integration into the Hindustani classical tradition represents one of the most successful adaptations in the history of Indian music. The constraints it imposed forced the development of an entirely new classical vocabulary, demonstrating the flexibility and vitality of a tradition capable of incorporating radically different sonic materials without losing its essential character.