The chiwang ( Dzongkha: སྤྱི་དབང་; Wylie: ''spyi-dbang'') is a type of fiddle played in

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountai ...

. The chiwang, the lingm ( flute), and the dramyen (

lute A lute ( or ) is any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity, usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted. More specifically, the term "lute" can re ...

) comprise the basic instrumental inventory for traditional

Bhutanese folk music The music of Bhutan is an wikt:integral part, integral part of its Bhutanese culture, culture and plays a leading role in transmitting social values. Traditional Bhutanese music includes a spectrum of subgenres, ranging from folk to religious song ...

. Although the chiwang is considered typically Bhutanese, it is a variety of the piwang, a Tibetan two-stringed fiddle. It is heavily associated with

boedra Boedra ( Dzongkha: བོད་སྒྲ་; Wylie: ''bod-sgra''; "Tibetan music"; also spelled bödra) is a traditional genre of Bhutanese music. Boedra, which is influenced by Tibetan folk music, is one of the two main folk singing styles in Bh ...

, one of two dominant genres of Bhutanese

folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has ...

, in which it symbolizes a

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million ...

References

Himalayan musical instruments Bhutanese musical instruments String instruments Bowed instruments {{Zither-instrument-stub

See also

References