The laouto ( el, λαούτο, pl. laouta ) is a long-neck fretted instrument of the

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 ...

family, found in

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

and Cyprus, and similar in appearance to the oud. It has four double-strings. It is played in most respects like the oud (plucked with a long

plectrum A plectrum is a small flat tool used for plucking or strumming of a stringed instrument. For hand-held instruments such as guitars and mandolins, the plectrum is often called a pick and is held as a separate tool in the player's hand. In harpsic ...

); in Cyprus the laouto is plucked with a feather. This instrument is known in Albania as "llautë" (indefinite form) or "llauta" (definite form), and in Romania as "lăuta".

Construction

Unlike the oud and other short-necked lutes, the laouto has a higher string tension due to its steel strings and longer neck, and hence it is brighter in tone than the oud. It also has movable frets to permit the playing of the dromoi, or modes of Greek traditional music. The laouto also tends to have only one sound hole (sometimes two) whereas the oud family tend to have three. Despite this, there are many similarities between the laouto and the oud. The soundboard is often made of

spruce A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the s ...

cedar wood Cedar is part of the English common name of many trees and other plants, particularly those of the genus ''Cedrus''. Some botanical authorities consider the Old-World ''Cedrus'' the only "true cedars". Many other species worldwide with similarl ...

, while the body is usually made of a harder wood such as

maple ''Acer'' () is a genus of trees and shrubs commonly known as maples. The genus is placed in the family Sapindaceae.Stevens, P. F. (2001 onwards). Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. Version 9, June 2008 nd more or less continuously updated since http ...

walnut A walnut is the edible seed of a drupe of any tree of the genus '' Juglans'' (family Juglandaceae), particularly the Persian or English walnut, '' Juglans regia''. Although culinarily considered a "nut" and used as such, it is not a true ...

. This is a practice consonant with the construction of other (round-backed) lutes. The 11 frets of the neck are removable (and can be re-positioned for differing intervals) and made of nylon (resembling the gut/nylon frets of the lute). Up to 9 wooden frets, mounted on the soundboard, are fixed. The intervals of the frets may be more frequent than that of a guitar to permit the playing of maqams. The

string String or strings may refer to: * String (structure), a long flexible structure made from threads twisted together, which is used to tie, bind, or hang other objects Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Strings'' (1991 film), a Canadian ani ...

s of the laouto were traditionally of gut, although modern laoutos have also steel (or steel wound nylon) strings similar to those of the bouzouki.

Tuning

Except for the first (A4A4) strings, which are tuned in unison, the laouto's other strings are paired, tuned an octave apart. The interval from one pair to the next is tuned in fifths (C3C4-G3G4-D3D4-A4A4). The Laouto has a

re-entrant tuning On a stringed instrument, a break in an otherwise ascending (or descending) order of string pitches is known as a re-entry. A re-entrant tuning, therefore, is a tuning where the strings (or more properly the courses) are not all ordered from th ...

, G3G4 tuned a fourth lower than C3C4. The two primary contemporary variants of the laouto, one somewhat smaller than the other, are to be found on mainland

(''steriano laouto'') and on the island of

Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cypru ...

(''Cretan laouto''). The larger sized instrument (wider body) is played mainly on the island of Crete and tends to be tuned differently (G2G3 - D2D3 - A2A3 - E3E3), the re-entrant tuning is still a characteristic of the Cretan laouto (or lagouto ( el, λαγούτο)), because D2D3 is a fourth lower than G2G3. In Cyprus, Cypriot laouto is tuned C - G - D - A. The role of the laouto in Greek traditional music is primarily that of accompaniment. The laouto is often played in a duo (the one laouto tuned more bass than the other) with the

Cretan lyra ) * Lira da braccio * Rabāb (Arabic الرباب) * Lijerica * Violin , musicians = * Andreas Rodinos * Alekos Karavitis * Antonis Papadakis (Kareklas) * Kostas Mountakis * Nikos Xilouris * Psarantonis * Ross Daly * Yiorgos ...

or with the violin (in Cyprus).

Notable players

Giannis Haroulis Giannis Haroulis ( el, Γιάννης Χαρούλης; born January 13, 1981) is a Greeks, Greek singer, songwriter and lute player. He plays a mixture of Greek folk music, folk and traditional Cretan music infused with rock elements and modern ...

*Evagoras Karageorgis *Vasilis Kostas * Thanasis Papakonstantinou * Yiannis Xylouris, also known as Psaroyiannis * Giorgos Xylouris *Christos Zotos *Thor Algren

References

Literature

External links