Rajasthani desert folktune - 3.3mins
For most of the year you can find Neru and/or his brother Kishna on or near Gangaur Ghat in Udaipur playing Rajasthani folktunes from the desert on their ravan-hattas. These instruments normally have one main horsehair string and a longer steel string with up to a dozen or more steel sympathetic strings under the bowed ones. The bow uses horsehair and has a cluster of small bells at the tip.
The strings are attached to a bamboo stem one and a half to three feet long which in turn is attached to a half shell of coconut with a goat-skin resonator. Due to the shortage of horse tails in Udaipur ... they now use a long-lasting thicker nylon main string and violin nylon strings on the bow. The horsehair strings wore out very quickly and the few horse owners in Udaipur started complaining!
Photo: where's Neru?