Design Features

Aesthetics

Each tarhu is an individually designed and crafted work of art in which the particular qualities of the piece of timber, the overall form and the carved detail are worked together into an object of great beauty.

One of the most striking visual features of the tarhu is the carving in the upper half of the body. This carved dome both protects the delicate cone suspended inside and provides a rigid support for the edges of the cone.

Sometimes the aesthetic choices in tarhu design tend towards the use of timbers with contrasting colours, sometimes towards an emphasis on form, with the timber choices focusing more on lustre and a homogenous colour.

 

 Structure

The structural concepts used in the tarhu represent a landmark in the design of acoustic instruments. Unlike almost all other acoustic stringed instruments, the tarhu system does not subject the sound-producing components to the destructive forces of string tension. This allows the cone to be constructed on acoustic considerations only.

This situation is achieved by two means:

·        The neck forms a continuous structural beam right across the top of the dome, with the strings being attached to the neck at the head and behind the bridge. All longitudinal string tension is thereby taken by the neck

The angles formed by the strings passing over the bridge are carefully adjusted so that the downward pressure exerted by the strings on each side of the bridge is in a state of balance – the downward pressure on the cone is only just enough to prevent rattling and no more.

 

This advanced structural design has other benefits;

·        There are no glue joints in a tarhu that are under stress.

     Any repairs necessary due to impact damage are facilitated by the fact that a tarhu can be dismantled into it’s component parts with comparative ease in minutes, and require no refinishing after reassembly.

Sound Adjustment

The characteristics of the bridge greatly affect the final sound of a tarhu, and after many years work it has now become possible to make some of the most significant parameters adjustable.

The bridge has two feet: one is active, and is connected directly to the cone; the other is passive, resting on the neck of the instrument where it passes over the body. The passive foot acts as a pivot in a similar way to a soundpost in the violin family.

The way in which the bridge affects the sound of the instrument is determined by a network of proportional relationships, which are all interrelated. Some of these are:

  • The distance between the feet in relation to the spacing of the strings;
  • the height of the bridge in relation to both string spacing and spread of feet;
  • all the above in relation to the amount of down pressure applied by the strings on each side of the bridge.

 

Adjustable Bridge Pin

With recent changes to the bridge and the whole region surrounding it, the passive foot is now adjustable in two ways:

  • The bridge rests on a piece of spring steel wire that can be moved either towards the edge or the middle of the bridge, changing the location of the pivot point
  • The effective length of the spring steel wire can be changed by moving the supports on each end of the wire in or out, changing the degree of flexibility at the pivot point.

While many hours are spent adjusting the final sound of each tarhu for optimum performance, the bridge pin allows each musician a significant amount of personalised tonal adjustment.