The Tambura is a double-string folk instrument
from the Balkan's (click
here for official info).
I play particularly the Macedonian Tambura, and it
has three double
strings.
And the story about how I started playing this
instrument is a
continuation of the general story of my love towards instruments:
the
acoustic guitar, the
electric guitar and the
bouzouki.
By the time I was 23-24, I was already playing
these three
instruments. while the acoustic guitar could be described as a
universal instrument, the electric guitar is definitely a Western
instrument and the bouzouki a Greek instrument.
While I learned all these instruments, I was
living in Skopje,
Macedonia. Especially with the bouzouki, I started encountering a
whole
new world of eastern European music. Naturally, living in Macedonia,
I
was forever surrounded by it's beautiful folk music, but I never
took
a real notice of it.
Starting with the bouzouki, I naturally became
more aware of all
the folk music around me. So my interest in Macedonian folk music
was
growing, and I started to search for songs, good old traditional
folk
songs.
Soon I discovered that the radio would play all this new turbo-folk
and similar. But if one would turn the radio early on (4-5am) one
could
hear the good all songs. Radio Belgrade as well as Radio Skopje were
my main sources at that time (middle 80's). I would wake up round
4am,
and had the cassette ready (no CD's, mp3 and similar at that time,
folks).
As soon as a new song would start playing, I would press the
"record" button, and then wait and see whether I like it. If yes, I
would leave it recording, if no, I would just stop recording and
rewind the tape back.
This way I discovered and learned a huge number of
beautiful songs. I
was playing restaurants at that time, and I was playing all these
Macedonian folk songs with the Greek bouzouki. But that wasn't
right.
I wanted to be authentic, so I started to be
interested in the
Tamboura. Gievski are brothers who are makers of old
traditional
instruments in Bit Pazar, the old town of Skopje. Soon I started
visiting them. The price for a Tambura was pretty high for my
budget.
Eventually, one day I offered them to swap: I would give hem my
hi-fi
system for a Tambura. They agreed, and that's the way I acquired it.
It was magic.
~~~
There is always this thing with
us musicians - we want to sound authentic, wherever possible. So,
since I acquired the Tambura, playing Macedonian Folk songs was a
pleasure. In fact, the whole "Pesnite
Zvedeni" album is recorded using the Tambura as solo instrument.
Tambura
