The Mystic Music Instrument - Chitrali Sitar

Last week i came across a very interesting instrument called ' Chitrali ' ..the invention of which is attributed to Amir Khusro, a 14th century mystic poet, scholar and sage. Khusro, in order to better express his mystic poems infused with messages of love for God and creation, used a sit as his instrument of predilection. Chitral sitar is most popular in Chitral, norther Pakistan. People of chitral regards it as an appropiate medium for preaching and spreading their doctrine of love and mysicism. Chitrali sitar is regarded as token of honor and highly esteemed decoration in many houehold and is also a precious souvenir for friends.



Chitrali sitar is about 4 to 5 feet long and features and oval sound box at the bottom. Body and sound box are made from two diff pieces of wood delicately fixed so the joints are almost imperceptible.The wood used in fabrication is called Mulberry wood as it contains no oil which suits the mechanism of instrument. The think wooden body or ' ghazdar' contains 13 sweet sounding parda or frets fixed at appropiate places by skilled sitar makers. It has 5 wooden pegs for tuning the strings.The baisc element in Chitrali is its middle string that goes under the fouth parda from above, it is known as ' parda-e-saaz' in local music terminology.

Playing chitrali sitar is almost same like playing normal sitar. The sitar is placed on the lap with the body face up and neck pointed up.The forefinger of the right hand is used to strum the string of the sound box. The index and middle fingers of the left hand are placed on the parda moving up and down in harmony with the strumming of the strings.

Chitrali sitar has the most mystic sound. Although i am still a learner but believe me i enjoyed running my fingers on the strings of it and listening to the mystic sound of it. It was a very very spirtual experience for me.