Instrument Of Honour

Sitar

If we go back 500 years a poet, philosopher and preacher called NASIR KHISROW came to Chitral to promote  religion in the feudal area where most of the people used to make prayers to fire.He analyzed the people and found out that the people are interested in music so he used sitar as a tool to gather people of Chitral to one place and preach then religion.Chitrali Sitar being very old but is still very famous in the youth as well as elders of Chitral.

Although Chitrali sitar is not as broad musical instrument as other instruments like Guitar but still it impresses its listeners Chtrali sitar is made up of a local wood called mulberry. It has a long handle which is tied up with sheep's intestines for make its tunes more melodious steel string of thin size are tied along the chest of the sitar, the small wood which connects the strings to the chest of the sitar is called Kharek. There are five strings which are tied to end of the handle bye wooden made tuners called Gushek the main body is called the door and the wooden handle is called the Gazdar. The  string in the middle of sitar which all the strings are tuned with is called the Parda-e-saz the touching zone is called Pazdar. The instrument is not very loud, and is played by strumming the top course of strings with the forefinger while allowing the finger to also play the drone strings. It is related very much to instruments from Central Asia.

The tuning of the instrument is unusual, as the single middle string does not go down the whole length of the neck of the instrument, instead it passes under the first four frets, where it then emerges and takes its place with the other strings. At this fret all the strings have the same note (g) - the actual tuning of the instrument is cc g cc. All the strings are of the same thickness, and are made of very thin metal wire, far thinner than the thinnest guitar string
 The old songs of Baba siyar echos in the in the valley and make the environment romantic,some excited young boys starts to dance along the sound of sitar and Damama.