Music of Mongolia

Across the entire world one of the most unique musical cultures you will find is Mongolia. With rich history and vast cultures with many different groups of influence it becomes one of the greatest melting pot for music cultures. From the long songs to the overtone singing and morin khuur the music cultures of Mongolia have a lot to give to us. So without further ado I hope you enjoy!



We begin our trip through Mongolia talking about the Morin Khuur which is the national Instrument of Mongolia. A plucked chordophone that's origin begins in the 13th century. The origin of the instrument is so old that legends have been created to describe the origins. One legend is deeply rooted in Mongolian tradition and describes how a shepeard is gifted a flying horse. He would mount his horse at night and fly to his beloved. The end of the story states that a jealous women cuts off the horses wings and it falls and dies and the shepeard takes whats left and turns it into the Morin Khuur. Another legend states that the creation of the instrument is credited to a boy named Sükhe had his prized white horse killed by the Lord out of jealousy. The horses soul came into his dreams and told him to create the Morin Khuur so that they could be together forever and would never be lonely. With using the parts of his dead horse he created the instrument using the bones as the neck of the instrument, horsehair strings, horse skin covering its wooden soundbox, and its scroll carved into the shape of a horse head. These legends are deeply inbedded into Mongolian culture and music and with that I hope you understand more about how important the morin Khuur is to Mongolians. (Source)

A traditional Morin Khuur. Notice how there is only two strings giving it its distinctive sound.

A video on how the morin Khuur is played by Naizal Hargana

more videos on the Morin Khuur....

before we begin our next topic I would like you to play this video while you're reading

Mongolians are known for their unique singing style and sound that it gives off. The singing style is referred to as Mongolian throat singing or höömei which is a type of overtone singing sung by people in Mongolia. Utilizing a range of singing style where a singer sings with more than one pitch creating a harmony or overtone that complements itself. The origin of Mongolian throat singing comes from the indigenous mountain tribes  Altai and Sayan mountains of western Mongolia. These communities embrace the practice of using harmonically rich vocal timbres, such as those employed in throat singing. Throat singing is deeply rooted in Buddhism and would be used to connect to the natural/supernatural world. In the first half of the 20th century, Mongolian throat singing was outlawed by the communist's regime due to its ritual and ethnic associations that throat singing is "backwards". Unfortunately this meant that until the 1980s that these practices were not allowed in Mongolia or Russia but thankfully the art did not die off and is still being used to this day. (Source)

One example of a group that still uses Mongolian throat singing is The Hu! They are a group of Mongolian folk rock and heavy metal band formed in 2016. This band originally went viral with there first song hitting 100 million on YouTube. The meaning behind the word Hu in Mongolian means human beings. Their style is inspired by the Hunus or Huns, an ancient civilization in Mongolia. Members of the group include Gala / Lead Throat Singer and Morin Khuur. Enkush who is the Lead Morin Khuur and Throat Singer. Jaya who plays the Jaw Harp, Tsuur, Flute, and Throat Singer.Temka plays the Tovshuur. I loved listening to this and I hope you will enjoy some of their music in there free time. Here is one of their most popular songs (Source)

Moving on to another form of Mongolian music culture, long songs or Urtyn duu. Long songs are respectfully called that because they are long but also because they elongate the syllables of words in the songs. For example, a 4 minute song may consist of 10 words which is crazy to think about in English. Lyrical themes differentiate depending on the song. They can be religious, philosophical, romantic, or celebratory, and often use horses as a symbol or theme repeated throughout the song. Mongolian folk music embraces long songs and utilizes them to portray national traditions and customs, including history, culture, aesthetics, ethics and philosophy. The main part of the long song is the shuranhai (prolonged, tenuto notes with deep vibrato on the vowels). There are three different styles of long songs. These are besreg urtyn duu ("minor long song"),
suman urtyn duu ("ordinary long song") and aizam urtyn duu ("major' or majestic long songs"). The styles reflect the way of the performance of the techniques rather than the sizes of the songs. The word ‘Aizam’ comes from the non-lexical vocable of ‘Aya, zee khu’ at the beginning of the grand long song, which features a long melody with a context of philosophical theme, ceremony and quality of ode, honor, respect or solemnity. The aizam grand long songs are sung at the beginning of a ceremony or feast. (Source)

Bibliography

“Morin Khuur.” 2022. Wikipedia. January 4, 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morin_khuur#Origin.

“Music of Mongolia.” 2022. Wikipedia. January 18, 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Mongolia#Overtone_singing.

“Long Song.” 2021. Wikipedia. March 10, 2021. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_song.

“Music.” n.d. The HU. https://www.thehuofficial.com/music.

“Throat-Singing | Music.” n.d. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/art/throat-singing.

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