Mike's Oud Forums

ottoman ouds

thdrivas - 4-28-2015 at 02:23 PM

Hey,

I recently came across these ouds displayed on this museum's webpage (I think its a museum...).

http://www.everyobjecttellsastory.com

Anyway they are beautiful and look quite old. I was wondering if anyone knew anything about their history? I found it interesting that the one has a long fingerboard, I always thought that was a more recent addition to the oud.


adamgood - 4-29-2015 at 04:33 AM

So strange, those instruments do not look like they date back to late 1800s. Looking at the "Ottoman tanburs", I've never seen any tanbur that was so ornamented! Where are these things??

jdowning - 4-29-2015 at 04:44 AM

The fingerboards do not seem to be long for an oud - they are about 1/3 string length so are conventional? There seems to be some optical distortion of the images due to the camera being positioned above the instruments rather than full face on.

Don't 'tanburs, have much longer necks than this - at least double the length?

thdrivas - 4-29-2015 at 04:58 AM

Dear John,

I was referring to the fact that on the first image the finger board extends down onto the face of the instrument. Is this common for old instruments?

Also, no idea where they are but I guess somewhere in england.


Lysander - 4-29-2015 at 05:24 AM

They're in London. Wonder if I can get down there and take some photos. Either way it would be great to see them

Edit: Just spoke to the organisers, they said photos were ok as long as I let them know when I'm coming. Hopefully I can find out more about them then.

jdowning - 4-29-2015 at 06:28 AM

Sorry I misunderstood. I was of course referring to the length of fingerboard from nut to neck joint.

I am not sure if finger boards extending on to the sound board is a relatively modern feature or not as there are not many ouds surviving from before the late 19th C. to form a positive judgement.
I have an oud that was old and well worn when I purchased it in Cairo in 1963 so dates earlier perhaps from around the first quarter of the 20th C ? This has a fingerboard inlay extending to the large sound hole. The fingerboard is also inlaid to give the appearance of having frets so may be an indication of early 20th C Western influences in the Near East?

http://www.mikeouds.com/messageboard/viewthread.php?tid=15414#pid10...