Indian string instruments are plucked or bowed instruments whose sound is shaped by a wide, gently curved bridge called the jawari. That bridge, filed by hand, is what turns a plain plucked string into the shimmering, overtone rich sound people recognise as Indian. It matters more than the wood, the dimensions or the string count.
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Not sure which one you are looking for? Start here.
For the melody instrument of North Indian classical music, that is the sitar. For the drone that sits behind a singer, that is the tanpura, in male and female sizes matched to vocal range, or a smaller travelling tanpuri.
To bow rather than pluck, the dilruba and esraj are the accessible entry. Both are fretted like a sitar, so the left hand does something familiar and the bow takes the practice. The taus is their larger ancestor, carved into the shape of a peacock. The sarangi has no frets at all and sounds closest to the human voice, and it is the hardest instrument here.
For depth, the sarod is fretless and metal fingerboarded, and the surbahar is the bass sitar.
Two instruments with identical specifications can sound completely different depending on whose hands dressed the jawari. That is why serious buyers here shop by maker.
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Instruments from a one-string ektara you can learn in an afternoon to concert sitars that take a maker months. What connects them is that on every one of them the sound is made by a bridge, and on the best of them that bridge is filed by hand.
That word is jawari: the wide, gently curved bridge that turns a plain plucked string into the shimmering, overtone-rich sound people recognise as Indian. A sitar or tanpura is judged almost entirely on it. Two instruments with identical wood, identical dimensions and identical string counts will sound completely different depending on whose hands dressed the jawari, and it is the reason serious buyers here shop by maker rather than by specification.
Where to start
If you want the melody instrument of North Indian classical music, that is the sitar. If you want the drone that sits behind a singer, that is the tanpura, which comes in male and female sizes matched to vocal range, or a smaller travelling tanpuri.
If you want to bow rather than pluck, the dilruba and esraj are the accessible entry, fretted like a sitar so the left hand is familiar, with the bow taking the practice. The taus is their larger, older ancestor, carved into the shape of a peacock and central to Sikh kirtan. The sarangi is the hardest instrument in this catalogue and the one that sounds most like the human voice, with no frets at all.
If you want depth, the sarod is fretless, metal-fingerboarded and thunderous, and the surbahar is the bass sitar built for the slow unfolding of alap. The santoor is struck rather than plucked, a hundred strings under two light mallets. The veena is South India's great classical instrument and the Carnatic counterpart to the sitar.
For something you can play tonight rather than in a year, the ektara and dotara have one or two strings and centuries of wandering singers behind them, and the swarmandal is the vocalist's zither, swept behind a phrase to make it shimmer. The rebab is the plucked lute of Afghanistan and the Punjab, and the instrument Bhai Mardana played beside Guru Nanak.
Buying by maker
Compare them on Sitar Brands and Tanpura Brands. Kanai Lal & Sons of Kolkata is among the most storied names a sitar can carry. Hemen & Co is the Kolkata house best known for tanpuras and fine strings. MKS build across sitar and tanpura. Rikhi Ram, Jayanta Sengupta and Hiren Roy through Barun Ray occupy the top of the range. Our own workshop covers student and intermediate instruments, and electric sitars for the stage.
One practical warning
The large instruments in this collection are genuinely large. A full-size Miraj tanpura is close to five feet and ships in a fitted case inside a heavily padded box. Check the dimensions and weight on the product page before you order, and if you live somewhere with tight stairs or a small car, tell us and we will talk you through it honestly.
Questions we get asked
Which one should I learn?
Sitar for melody, tanpura for drone, dilruba or esraj if you want to bow and want frets, sarangi if you want the hardest and most vocal of them all.
What is jawari?
The hand filed bridge that gives these instruments their shimmer. It is not on any spec sheet and it is the biggest single reason two similar instruments sound different.
Why buy by maker?
Because two instruments with identical specifications sound different depending on whose hands dressed the jawari. That is why we list makers as well as instrument types.