History of a kantele.
Kantele in the Twentieth CenturyThe twentieth century in the history of the Karelian kantele became an era of major changes. The instrument acquired the status of a symbol of Karelian musical culture and moved beyond its traditional context of use, developing into a concert and orchestral instrument before once again returning to amateur music-making, although predominantly in urban environments. These processes inevitably affected the instrument’s construction, repertoire, and performance capabilities. This study examines and describes these changes based on research into museum collections of musical instruments and diatonic kanteles made by contemporary craftsmen in Karelia.
The chromatic kantele, developed by V. P. Gudkov and his associates in the 1930s, became an independent branch in the instrument’s development and established an important place for itself in professional Karelian musical culture. While the concert instrument was actively developing and gaining a place on the stage, the diatonic kantele was disappearing from traditional everyday use. In the 1930s, researchers V. P. Gudkov and V. Ya. Evseev documented more than forty kantele players in villages in several districts of Karelia, but by the 1970s almost none remained. The last of them died in 1975.
Research and performance interest in the diatonic kantele emerged again in the 1980s, during a period of broader national cultural revival in Karelia. Members of the republic’s creative intelligentsia initiated efforts to revive the kantele and introduce it into contemporary cultural practice. An international program for the revival and development of national musical instruments, the Kantele Program, was developed jointly with Finnish colleagues. Craftsmen specializing in decorative and applied arts were involved in instrument making, and students at the Karelian State Pedagogical University were taught how to construct kanteles. Introductory courses in playing the diatonic kantele were introduced at academic music institutions, and regular competitions for kantele players and performers of related traditional instruments were organized.
These activities resulted in the emergence of instrumental ensembles performing on the diatonic kantele and other Karelian musical instruments, including the jouhikko and shepherd’s flutes. These instruments were also incorporated into various instrumental ensembles, new compositions for the diatonic kantele appeared, and a new generation of instrument makers emerged. Individual personalities played and continue to play an important role in this process, helping to revive an entire layer of traditional culture. Among them, ethnomusicologist I. B. Semakova and composer S. Ya. Stangrit deserve particular mention.
Over several decades of public efforts to revive the kantele, a distinctive cultural environment for the instrument’s use emerged, along with characteristic features of the construction of new diatonic kanteles. Comparing the traditional, authentic instrument with its modern reconstructed counterpart makes it possible to identify the invariant elements of the kantele and trace the extent to which its construction, manufacturing technology, tuning, and repertoire have changed during the reconstruction process.
NameIn contemporary practice, the name kantele has become universally accepted, corresponding to the traditional Karelian and Finnish pronunciation. The southern Karelian variant kandeleh, used in the Livvi dialect of Karelian, has fallen out of use.
MaterialsWood has always been the primary material used to construct the body of the instrument, although museum collections also contain an example with a metal soundboard. Tuning pegs on authentic instruments were made of wood and had a paddle-like shape. The instrument could be tuned simply by turning the wide part of the peg.
Modern tuning pegs are generally made of metal and shaped as posts in order to provide more precise tuning stability. This creates the need for a tuning key.
The strings of traditional kanteles were made of horsehair, gut, or metal. Modern instruments, with rare exceptions, generally use metal strings. This expands the instrument’s dynamic capabilities while providing more stable tuning and greater string durability.
Manufacturing Technology
All ethnographic examples of small-string kanteles known to the author were carved from a single piece of wood using a hollowing technique, performed from the top, bottom, or side. The ponsi, a comb-like projection on the narrow part of the instrument to which the stringholder is attached, was carved directly into the body.
Modern kanteles are generally constructed from separate wooden boards. Hollowing is used only for instruments of the so-called Finnish type. These instruments are hollowed from underneath and have no bottom soundboard, with the assumption that the surface on which the instrument rests will serve this function.
In all cases, a component imitating the ponsi is attached to the body with glue. Significantly, even when this element has no structural function and the stringholder is not attached to it, it is still present.
Number of Strings
Traditional kanteles had between five and twelve strings. In southern areas of Karelia, instruments with eight to twelve strings were predominant, while the relatively few five-string examples were found mainly in northern regions.
Modern practice uses primarily five- and ten-string instruments. A twelve-string kantele was also produced as a special commission for the anniversary of the Kalevala, based on a design by craftsman V. Chelombitko, but the instrument did not become widespread among performers.
Dimensions
The dimensions of the kantele were not standardized. Based on surviving examples, their length ranged from approximately 55 to 75 cm along the lower base of the trapezoidal body. Width depended on the number of strings, with ten- and twelve-string instruments generally measuring approximately 15–20 cm at their widest point.
It is impossible to find two identical traditional kanteles, because the instruments were made by the performers themselves and usually for their own personal use. The emergence of commercial instrument production naturally led modern craftsmen to use templates developed according to their own understanding of the instrument and/or based on information derived from the ethnographic examples on which they relied.
Tuning
Modern instruments are tuned using a special tuning key, with the kantele positioned horizontally. On ethnographic examples, the tuning pegs were located on the underside, making it more convenient to tune the instrument while holding it vertically and securing the ponsi between the knees.
This was also how Väinämöinen, the hero of the Kalevala, tuned his instrument. The image of Väinämöinen was strongly influenced by the living kantele-playing tradition known to Elias Lönnrot.
Tuning Systems
The tuning of the kantele is diatonic and based on the principle of stepwise tuning. Five-string instruments traditionally had a typical range of a fifth. In southern Karelian multi-string kanteles, the two lowest strings were sometimes tuned a fourth or a fifth apart, while the two highest strings were generally tuned a third apart.
This type of tuning was also characteristic of kanteles from the Pryazha region. The instrument was most often tuned to a natural minor scale with an additional characteristic interval of a tone and a half at the top.
Modern instruments use standardized tunings, largely as a result of ensemble performance. Five-string instruments are tuned from either G or D, while ten-string instruments are tuned from D. The highest, tenth string is often tuned a third above the ninth string, allowing octave doubling of the fundamental tone in the keys of G major and G minor. As a result, this tuning corresponds to that of traditional Pryazha kanteles.
In ensemble performance, the tuning is adjusted according to the key and mode of the piece being performed, with individual strings raised or lowered by up to a semitone.
Playing TechniqueModern performers, like traditional players, perform with the kantele resting on their knees, either parallel to the floor or at an angle. The traditional practice of playing the instrument on a table is now rarely used, largely because of stage conditions and the need for additional equipment. Exceptions occur when performers deliberately attempt to recreate an ethnographic setting.
The kantele is played by plucking the strings with the fingers of both hands. Usually only five fingers are employed: the thumb, index finger, and middle finger of the right hand, and the index and middle fingers of the left.
The right thumb generally touches the shortest string, located closest to the performer, while the left index finger touches the next string. The right hand covers the extreme registers and the middle of the instrument’s range, while the left hand fills the gaps.
With this fingering technique, the fingers of both hands alternate and come into contact with one another. This hand position was described by A. O. Väisänen as a close or compact technique and was considered typical of traditional kantele playing.
On a five-string kantele, each finger is assigned to an individual string, while on multi-string instruments each finger controls several strings. Both melodic and chordal textures can be performed.
According to V. P. Gudkov, the most characteristic playing technique among the Pryazha Karelians was harmonic figuration, essentially a pattern of alternating or arpeggiated strings. The strings are plucked with the fingertips and, less frequently, with the fingernails.
In modern practice, another technique is also encountered: strumming. This was not characteristic of traditional performance. It is frequently used in ensemble playing when another instrument carries the melody and the kantele serves as harmonic support. The technique is also considerably easier to learn and does not require a highly developed performance technique.
Repertoire
The study of various sources indicates that playing the kantele in its traditional context was primarily used to accompany dancing or simply for listening. The repertoire of kantele players consisted of characteristic introductory patterns and dance melodies.
Published recordings from northern Ladoga Karelia, together with materials collected by V. P. Gudkov in several Karelian districts, confirm this. According to Gudkov, approximately ninety percent of the repertoire consisted of lively, cheerful, energetic dance melodies. Such a repertoire could only have developed through extensive practice accompanying dances at village gatherings.
According to performers’ accounts, before the balalaika and accordion became widespread in Karelian villages, people frequently danced traditional forms such as the kadrel, ristukondru, and kruugu to the accompaniment of the kantele.
The repertoire of modern kantele performers is considerably broader. It includes both arrangements of traditional melodies and contemporary original compositions for the diatonic kantele.
Ensemble performance has become the dominant form of kantele playing. Solo performance on the diatonic instrument is now relatively rare, as is using the instrument to accompany singing or dancing.
Conclusion
The comparison demonstrates a significant divergence between the modern revived instrument and its traditional predecessor. The name, general external appearance, and tuning of the kantele have remained relatively stable, while almost all other characteristics of the instrument have undergone substantial changes.
Many of these changes were driven by the active development of ensemble performance. In addition, the musical nature of the kantele means that learning to play it does not require knowledge of the Karelian language. This allowed the instrument, during the period of national cultural revival, to become one of the means of engaging with Karelian culture.
The changes that took place in the construction and cultural context of the kantele, driven by the demands of the modern era, enabled it to find a place within contemporary musical culture. There it acquired the status of a national instrument and a symbol of Karelian musical culture, capable of functioning as an ethnic and cultural marker.
You can buy the best kokles and kanteles featuring authentic designs, as well as modern designer versions of the gusli, from the ScandicInstruments workshop store.
The chromatic kantele, developed by V. P. Gudkov and his associates in the 1930s, became an independent branch in the instrument’s development and established an important place for itself in professional Karelian musical culture. While the concert instrument was actively developing and gaining a place on the stage, the diatonic kantele was disappearing from traditional everyday use. In the 1930s, researchers V. P. Gudkov and V. Ya. Evseev documented more than forty kantele players in villages in several districts of Karelia, but by the 1970s almost none remained. The last of them died in 1975.
Research and performance interest in the diatonic kantele emerged again in the 1980s, during a period of broader national cultural revival in Karelia. Members of the republic’s creative intelligentsia initiated efforts to revive the kantele and introduce it into contemporary cultural practice. An international program for the revival and development of national musical instruments, the Kantele Program, was developed jointly with Finnish colleagues. Craftsmen specializing in decorative and applied arts were involved in instrument making, and students at the Karelian State Pedagogical University were taught how to construct kanteles. Introductory courses in playing the diatonic kantele were introduced at academic music institutions, and regular competitions for kantele players and performers of related traditional instruments were organized.
These activities resulted in the emergence of instrumental ensembles performing on the diatonic kantele and other Karelian musical instruments, including the jouhikko and shepherd’s flutes. These instruments were also incorporated into various instrumental ensembles, new compositions for the diatonic kantele appeared, and a new generation of instrument makers emerged. Individual personalities played and continue to play an important role in this process, helping to revive an entire layer of traditional culture. Among them, ethnomusicologist I. B. Semakova and composer S. Ya. Stangrit deserve particular mention.
Over several decades of public efforts to revive the kantele, a distinctive cultural environment for the instrument’s use emerged, along with characteristic features of the construction of new diatonic kanteles. Comparing the traditional, authentic instrument with its modern reconstructed counterpart makes it possible to identify the invariant elements of the kantele and trace the extent to which its construction, manufacturing technology, tuning, and repertoire have changed during the reconstruction process.
NameIn contemporary practice, the name kantele has become universally accepted, corresponding to the traditional Karelian and Finnish pronunciation. The southern Karelian variant kandeleh, used in the Livvi dialect of Karelian, has fallen out of use.
MaterialsWood has always been the primary material used to construct the body of the instrument, although museum collections also contain an example with a metal soundboard. Tuning pegs on authentic instruments were made of wood and had a paddle-like shape. The instrument could be tuned simply by turning the wide part of the peg.
Modern tuning pegs are generally made of metal and shaped as posts in order to provide more precise tuning stability. This creates the need for a tuning key.
The strings of traditional kanteles were made of horsehair, gut, or metal. Modern instruments, with rare exceptions, generally use metal strings. This expands the instrument’s dynamic capabilities while providing more stable tuning and greater string durability.
Manufacturing Technology
All ethnographic examples of small-string kanteles known to the author were carved from a single piece of wood using a hollowing technique, performed from the top, bottom, or side. The ponsi, a comb-like projection on the narrow part of the instrument to which the stringholder is attached, was carved directly into the body.
Modern kanteles are generally constructed from separate wooden boards. Hollowing is used only for instruments of the so-called Finnish type. These instruments are hollowed from underneath and have no bottom soundboard, with the assumption that the surface on which the instrument rests will serve this function.
In all cases, a component imitating the ponsi is attached to the body with glue. Significantly, even when this element has no structural function and the stringholder is not attached to it, it is still present.
Number of Strings
Traditional kanteles had between five and twelve strings. In southern areas of Karelia, instruments with eight to twelve strings were predominant, while the relatively few five-string examples were found mainly in northern regions.
Modern practice uses primarily five- and ten-string instruments. A twelve-string kantele was also produced as a special commission for the anniversary of the Kalevala, based on a design by craftsman V. Chelombitko, but the instrument did not become widespread among performers.
Dimensions
The dimensions of the kantele were not standardized. Based on surviving examples, their length ranged from approximately 55 to 75 cm along the lower base of the trapezoidal body. Width depended on the number of strings, with ten- and twelve-string instruments generally measuring approximately 15–20 cm at their widest point.
It is impossible to find two identical traditional kanteles, because the instruments were made by the performers themselves and usually for their own personal use. The emergence of commercial instrument production naturally led modern craftsmen to use templates developed according to their own understanding of the instrument and/or based on information derived from the ethnographic examples on which they relied.
Tuning
Modern instruments are tuned using a special tuning key, with the kantele positioned horizontally. On ethnographic examples, the tuning pegs were located on the underside, making it more convenient to tune the instrument while holding it vertically and securing the ponsi between the knees.
This was also how Väinämöinen, the hero of the Kalevala, tuned his instrument. The image of Väinämöinen was strongly influenced by the living kantele-playing tradition known to Elias Lönnrot.
Tuning Systems
The tuning of the kantele is diatonic and based on the principle of stepwise tuning. Five-string instruments traditionally had a typical range of a fifth. In southern Karelian multi-string kanteles, the two lowest strings were sometimes tuned a fourth or a fifth apart, while the two highest strings were generally tuned a third apart.
This type of tuning was also characteristic of kanteles from the Pryazha region. The instrument was most often tuned to a natural minor scale with an additional characteristic interval of a tone and a half at the top.
Modern instruments use standardized tunings, largely as a result of ensemble performance. Five-string instruments are tuned from either G or D, while ten-string instruments are tuned from D. The highest, tenth string is often tuned a third above the ninth string, allowing octave doubling of the fundamental tone in the keys of G major and G minor. As a result, this tuning corresponds to that of traditional Pryazha kanteles.
In ensemble performance, the tuning is adjusted according to the key and mode of the piece being performed, with individual strings raised or lowered by up to a semitone.
Playing TechniqueModern performers, like traditional players, perform with the kantele resting on their knees, either parallel to the floor or at an angle. The traditional practice of playing the instrument on a table is now rarely used, largely because of stage conditions and the need for additional equipment. Exceptions occur when performers deliberately attempt to recreate an ethnographic setting.
The kantele is played by plucking the strings with the fingers of both hands. Usually only five fingers are employed: the thumb, index finger, and middle finger of the right hand, and the index and middle fingers of the left.
The right thumb generally touches the shortest string, located closest to the performer, while the left index finger touches the next string. The right hand covers the extreme registers and the middle of the instrument’s range, while the left hand fills the gaps.
With this fingering technique, the fingers of both hands alternate and come into contact with one another. This hand position was described by A. O. Väisänen as a close or compact technique and was considered typical of traditional kantele playing.
On a five-string kantele, each finger is assigned to an individual string, while on multi-string instruments each finger controls several strings. Both melodic and chordal textures can be performed.
According to V. P. Gudkov, the most characteristic playing technique among the Pryazha Karelians was harmonic figuration, essentially a pattern of alternating or arpeggiated strings. The strings are plucked with the fingertips and, less frequently, with the fingernails.
In modern practice, another technique is also encountered: strumming. This was not characteristic of traditional performance. It is frequently used in ensemble playing when another instrument carries the melody and the kantele serves as harmonic support. The technique is also considerably easier to learn and does not require a highly developed performance technique.
Repertoire
The study of various sources indicates that playing the kantele in its traditional context was primarily used to accompany dancing or simply for listening. The repertoire of kantele players consisted of characteristic introductory patterns and dance melodies.
Published recordings from northern Ladoga Karelia, together with materials collected by V. P. Gudkov in several Karelian districts, confirm this. According to Gudkov, approximately ninety percent of the repertoire consisted of lively, cheerful, energetic dance melodies. Such a repertoire could only have developed through extensive practice accompanying dances at village gatherings.
According to performers’ accounts, before the balalaika and accordion became widespread in Karelian villages, people frequently danced traditional forms such as the kadrel, ristukondru, and kruugu to the accompaniment of the kantele.
The repertoire of modern kantele performers is considerably broader. It includes both arrangements of traditional melodies and contemporary original compositions for the diatonic kantele.
Ensemble performance has become the dominant form of kantele playing. Solo performance on the diatonic instrument is now relatively rare, as is using the instrument to accompany singing or dancing.
Conclusion
The comparison demonstrates a significant divergence between the modern revived instrument and its traditional predecessor. The name, general external appearance, and tuning of the kantele have remained relatively stable, while almost all other characteristics of the instrument have undergone substantial changes.
Many of these changes were driven by the active development of ensemble performance. In addition, the musical nature of the kantele means that learning to play it does not require knowledge of the Karelian language. This allowed the instrument, during the period of national cultural revival, to become one of the means of engaging with Karelian culture.
The changes that took place in the construction and cultural context of the kantele, driven by the demands of the modern era, enabled it to find a place within contemporary musical culture. There it acquired the status of a national instrument and a symbol of Karelian musical culture, capable of functioning as an ethnic and cultural marker.
You can buy the best kokles and kanteles featuring authentic designs, as well as modern designer versions of the gusli, from the ScandicInstruments workshop store.