Siku: musical instrument of Bolivia

The siku is known by different names which are “sicu,” “sicus,” “zampolla,” or the Spanish “zampona,” is a traditional panpipe relating to the Andes used in a musical genre called “sikuri” and can also be found all over the Andes. It is associated to the music of Kollasuvo speaking regions and around the Lake Titicaca. Because of the nature of the mountain geography of the region which is difficult to understand, and because of many other factors or reasons in some regions, some communities would build their own pattern of the siku with their own tuning pattern and even the size and shape and mostly they have different pattern of playing this musical instrument. In the modern days, the musical instrument has been transported from its traditional roots because it has been standardized to fit into the modern western forms of music.

The siku is believed to have originally come from the Aymaaras of Peru and Bolivia. Here, a woman would play this musical instrument as she is coming down from the mountains. The largest siku is built to have every note and is too big for the woman. They normally have two sikus that can be played together with some other person and they play it continuously after each other. The women become musically bonded as soon as they partner with themselves and play the siku and as such, they cannot play the musical instrument with another person for the rest of their life.

The siku is representatively produced from bamboo shoots. They are also manufactured from bones, condor feather and many other materials. Many types of bamboo are used to change the quality of the sound produced by the musical instrument. Songo can give the instrument a more resonant sound and make it louder than any regular bamboo. Siku is divided across two rows of pipes. Traditionally, it is expected that two people play the siku, each taking one row of the musical instrument so one must interchange the pattern of the rows with every note so as to play a complete scale. The most common type of siku contains 13 pipes “6 in ira and 7 in arka” but the less quality types may have more or less pipes.