ZITHER: Italian musical instrument

The zither is a stringed musical instrument that is most commonly found in Slovenia, Austria, Hungary, northwestern Croatia, the southern region of Germany, alpine Europe and the East Asian cultures with china included. The term ‘cithare’, ‘sitar; or ‘cithar’ is also used more widely to explain the entire family of stringed musical instruments in which the strings do not extend past the sounding box , including the hammered dulcimer, psaltery, Appalachian dulcimer, guqin, guzheng, koto, gusli, kantele, gayageum and others. The musical instrument could be divided into two classes, which are fretted and fretless and they are played by strumming or plucking the strings like a guitar with a plectrum.

The word ‘citara’ is derived from the Greek letters ‘kithara’ that is an instrument from classical times used in Ancient Greece and later all through the roman empire and in the Arab world.

The term zither is mentioned in Daniel during the Jewish exile of the 606 BC, meanwhile, the earliest known instrument of the zither class is a Chinese guqin that was discovered in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng dating from the 433 BC. The instrument has a famous solo in one of the Johann Strauss II’s most prominent waltzes named, “Tales from the Vienna Woods”. At the end of the 19^th century in Slovenia, the instruments were used in small towns or villages for concerts. The musical instrument went through two periods of high popularity in the United States. The first of these was in the later part of the 19^th century when it was highly in vogue as a parlor musical instrument in so many homes. By that period, a good number of United State based instrument manufacturers were manufacturing the concert instrument. By the 1920s, the musical instrument’s popularity had begun to reduce while other instruments increased in popularity also there was a renewal of interest in the 1950s and it contributed to the success of the instrument in 1949. British movie titled “The Third Man”, the soundtrack of which prominently showed the concert zither. This new fame that was given to the instrument lasted for years until the 1960s.

In modern entertainment, the zither is approximately the most popular instrument because of its role in the sound track of the classic film “The Third Man”. The music for the film was performed by Anton Karas, his “The Third Man Theme” was released as a single track in 1940/50 and the track became the best-seller in the United Kingdom. Going by the release, the track lasted for 11 week in the United States Billboard and the best seller in stores lasted from 29 April to 8 July. The exposure of this single track made Anton Karas an international star and the trailer for the film opined that “the famous musical score made by Karas”would have the audience “in dither with Karas zither”. Shirley Abicair, a born Australian singer popularized this musical instrument when she used it greatly as accompaniment in her Television Shows, live shows and recordings in Britain in the 1950s and the 1960s. Recently the zither is used by multi-instrumentalist Laraaji on the third drop of Brian Eno’s surrounding area music series, Ambient 3: Day of Radiance.

There are three types of this musical instrument; the ‘fretless zither’ which can also be called the ‘guitar zither’ the ‘concert zither’ and the ‘alpine zither’. The concert zither, the alpine zither and the fretless zither like any other stringed musical instruments whether acoustic or electric form, the strings are stretched across the length of the soundbox and none of the version has a neck

The concert zither may have from about 29 to 35 strings with 34 or 35 being much typical. These are arranged as such; 5 fretted melody strings that are placed above the fret board, 12 unfretted accompaniment strings and accompanied by 12 unfretted bass strings and also a differing number of contrabass strings with 5 or 6 being the best common number. The Alpine zither is made up of 42 strings, and they varies from the concert zither primarily in having much more contrabasses that needs the addition of a harp like post at the top of the zither to stabilize the tuner for these added strings. These to zithers are tuned alike with the accompaniment and the bass strings each giving it a full set of 12 chromatic pitches designed in a circle of fifths and also the contrabass strings are arranged in go down chromatic scale. There are two main famous tunings for the fretted tune strings; the Munich and the Vienna.  The fretless guitar zither could have from about 12 to 50 strings; depending on the design of the instrument. There are no finger boards or frets and all the strings are played open in the pattern of a harp. The strings on the left part of the instrument are arranged in groups of three or four that form various chord; strings to the right of the instrument are single tune strings. The tuning of the instrument can differ very much from producer to producer as well as from model to model of the zither, but the tuning is always shown on the instrument’s body in the form of a painted chart that is glued under the strings.

The person that plays the musical instrument is called the “zither player” or a “zitherist” and the instrument is played by plucking the strings with the fingers and a plectrum while it lies on a table on the lap. On the concert and the alpine zither, the tune strings are pressed to the fingerboard with the finger of the left hand and plucked with a plectrum on the right hand. The first and second fingers of the right hand pluck the accompaniment and the bass strings and the third finger of the left will do the work of plucking the contrabass strings. The fretless guitar zither is performed in a similar manner as the concert and the alpine, except that there is no work for the left hand since there is no fret board.