Category Archives: Facts

It’s been more than a year since “The Lost Songs of World War II” were released by Six Degrees Records. There are 18 songs written by the Soviet Jews who lived through World War II and were long thought to be forever silenced by Hitler and Stalin. The album is available on Spotify, Amazon and…

Two world-famous bands: The American Rogues, a Celtic ensemble, from Sounds of Canada Season 1, and Nagata Shachu, a Japanese group, from Sounds of Canada Season 2 will perform together on the 8th of June. The concert will feature both groups on their own and together in collaboration. “While respecting the traditions of each culture,…

Tsymbaly is generally considered to be both a stringed and a percussion instrument. It is the Ukrainian version of a hammered dulcimer. Tsymbaly is a wooden trapezoid box with metal strings strung across it. It is played with two beaters, which are wrapped in leather. It is one of the oldest musical instruments. In Ukraine…

Drymba is a fairly common instrument in Western Ukraine, also called the Jaw harp. Drymba is a linguaphone instrument. It resembles a small metal horseshoe, the ends of which are elongated parallel to each other. There is a fixed steel tongue or reed with a curved tip in the centre. This tongue or reed is…

There are two types of traditional Indigenous music. The first one is social music, and the second one is ceremonial music. Ceremonial music is vocal with percussive accompaniment, while social music consists mostly of songs which are accompanied by rattles and drums.

Bombarde is a double-reed wind instrument, commonly used in Breton music. It has a shape of a straight conical tube with 7-9 holes. Bombarde is made of wood and is usually 25 to 50 cm long.

Dan Ty Ba is a Vietnamese guitar with four strings, which is often used in a traditional orchestra or played solo. The instrument is made of wood and shaped like a cut-in-half pear. To play this guitar, a musician has to use a plectrum, quickly plucking the strings of a guitar upward or downward. 

Burczybas is a Kashubian (Polish) folk instrument, made of a bottomless barrel and an animal skin stretched on one side. There are two types of burczybas: Burczybas włosowy and Burczybas łańcuchowy. Both types were originally used for ceremonial purposes, but currently they are used only during performances of Kashubian bands.

The Ōtsuzumi (大鼓), also known as the Ōkawa (大皮) or as a hip drum, is an hourglass-shaped Japanese drum. This musical instrument is commonly used in Noh, Nagauta, Geza, etc. The Ōtsuzumi is made of a cherry wood attached to the drum skin by iron rings. The drum is usually placed on the left thigh…

The music of Portugal has much in common with the music of Spain. The main reason for this is the influence of the ancient cultures of the East (Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians) on the formation of the musical culture of Lusitania (an ancient Iberian Roman province located where most of modern Portugal and part of western…