Charango: Chilean musical instrument

The charango is a small Andean stringed musical instrument of the family of lute, it is 66cm long, and is traditionally built with the shell of the back of an armadillo. The charango is primarily played in the traditional Andean music and is often used by the other Latin American musicians. Many existing charangos are now made with different kinds of wood. It is specifically carved to have 10 strings in 5 courses of 2 strings each, although other variants of the instrument exist. The player of this musical instrument is called Charanguista.

source: fr.wikipedia.org

The charango was first invented in the early section of the 18^th century in the Royal Audienca of Charcas in what is now known as Bolivia. When the Spanish conquistadores came to the southern part of America, they brought along with them the vihuela. It is not clear from which Spanish instrument the charango emanated from. Many assumed that the instrument could have evolved from the vihuela, mandolin or the lute. There are many stories of how the instrument came to be made with its different diminutive sound box of armadillo. One story opined that the native musicians got used to the sound that was produced by the vihuela, although it lacked the technology to shape the wood in that way. Some other story opined that the Spaniard banned natives from practicing their ancestral music and that the charango was an attempt to make a lute that could be easily hidden under a cloth like a poncho.

The first historic information on the charango was brought together by Vega going back to the year 1814. It is believed that the charango came to be what it is known for today in the early days of the 18^th century in the city of Potosi in the Royal Audienca of Charcas part of the Viceroyalty of Peru, assumingly fro Amerindian contact with the Spanish settlers.

Traditionally, the musical instrument was produced with a dried armadillo shell for the back and woo for the top of the sound box and the neck of the instrument. This is no more the rule of the production of the instrument, they are now made of wood, with the bowled back merely mimicking the shape of the armadillo shell. Different from most wooden lutes, the body and neck of this musical instrument are made of a single block of wood that is carved into desired shape. The ten strings of the charango need quite a large headstock that is usually approaching or even passing the size of its diminutive sound box. The total length of the charango is about 66 cm with a string scale length of about 37 cm and the number of frets ranges from 5 to 18. There are many degree of difference in the shape of the top in ‘plan view and species of wood, but cedar family woods are better for the soundboard of the musical instrument and there is generally a narrowed waist that is similar to the guitar family. The typical construction of the instrument is a one-piece body and neck, classical guitar style peg head, machine tuner, spruce top and some degree of decoration. Differences include a separate gummed-on neck, palisander or ebony vertical tuning pegs, guitar-style box construction or a hollowed-out neck. More recently, solid body electric and hollowed acoustic-electric charangos are coming on the scene. The solid bodies are carved very much like the miniature electric guitar; meanwhile the acoustic-electrics are more often like a standard acoustic charango. The musical instrument has 4 to 15 metal, gut, or nylon strings.

The charango has 5 pairs of strings that are typically tuned GCEAE. This tuning, not minding the octave is analogous to the C-tuning of the ukulele or the cautro that is used in Venezuela, with the addition of a second E-course. Different from some other stringed musical instruments, all the ten strings of the charango are tuned inside one octave. The five courses can be pitched like this G4 G4 - C5 C5 - E5 E4 - A4 A4 -E5 E5. The ramification of the instrument’s tuning is a very narrow tonal range in many chords and as such, there is a very great wall of sound. There are both the string and nylon string charangos that are in existence. Some steel-stringed instruments have all ten strings at the same time size and shape and there are also some solid-body electric charangos. With the intervals similar to the minor 2nds and major 2nds fingered on different strings of the musical instrument, the player of the charango can play sustained melodies at rapid speed with an alternating finger or thumb style.