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Across the region the principal instrument types are plucked lutes, with two or three strings, the necks either fretted or fretless; bowed lutes, largely horsehair fiddles; flutes, mostly open at both ends and either end-blown or side-blown; and jew’s harps, either metal or, often in Siberia, wooden. Few percussion instruments are found, except for the shaman’s magic drum. Considerable instrumental polyphony is played on lutes and fiddles, particularly among the Turkic peoples. Vocal polyphony may occur in special ways. In a style known as throat-singing, Mongol and Tyvan (a Siberian people northwest of Mongolia) vocalists produce two parts while singing ...(100 of 19320 words)
