Tar shehnai

The tar shehnai, also spelled tarshenai^[1] or sometimes tar shehanai,^[2] is an esraj (an Indian bowed instrument) whose sound is amplified by a metal horn attached to its sound board.^[3] The term is also used to refer to the horn itself. The horn of a phonograph has sometimes been used.^[2]

The instrument sounds similar to a violin^[4] or to a shehnai (an Indian reed instrument like an oboe or shawm). It is sometimes used instead of a shehnai when no shehnai player is available. The word tar means "stringed".^[3]

A tar shehnai played by Dakshinamohan Tagore is used in Satyajit Ray's film Pather Panchali to accompany the scene in which Harihar and Sarbajaya weep over the death of their daughter Durga. Ray considered Tagore "one of [the instrument's] best exponents", and found its high, "piercing" sound "suggestive of grief".^[5][1]

References

1. Ray, Satyajit (1996). My Years with Apu. Penguin Books India. pp. 77–78. ISBN 978-0-14-024780-0.
2. David Courtney. "Tar Shehnai". chandrakantha.com. Retrieved 21 April 2014.
3. "Tar Shehnai". Krsna Kirtana Songs. Retrieved 21 April 2014.
4. "The Tar Shehnai". Milapfest. Retrieved 21 April 2014.
5. Robinson, Andrew (1989). Satyajit Ray: The Inner Eye. University of California Press. pp. 85, 88, 96. ISBN 978-0-520-06946-6.