Mike's Oud Forums

If the Nahat family are the masters of oud building, is there any famous Qanun builders?

Iskandar - 10-25-2023 at 05:34 PM

I was looking online at kanuns held by the MET museum and they look very nice but no indication of maker labels. As for Modern day luither's I've seen great work by Mr. Avci but I havent heard of the predecessors from the past.

maraoud108 - 10-26-2023 at 06:29 AM

I don't know about kanun builders, but the kemence luthier Muratyer Den recently posted a restoration video of a kemence. The most important luthier (equivalent to a Stradivarius of violins) for kemences was an Armenian who never signed his name, and only signed the name Baron, or ?????.

Given the time that he built (1850s-1900s) and the occurrence of the Hamidian massacres in the mid-1890s, it is likely that he anonymized his name for political reasons.

Here is a video of one his kemences:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0Lp3Fwd2W8&ab_channel=MuratYerd...

So perhaps the reason why there is no name is political.

Last year I was in the shop of Cengiz Sarikus in Istanbul and the entire back room of his shop is filled with old ouds built by Armenian luthiers from the late 19th and early 20th century before the genocide. So its fair to say that the majority of these instruments were built by Armenians and Greek (as in the case of Manol and Kanakis) luthiers.

Iskandar - 10-27-2023 at 08:45 PM

That's interesting info but also sad. I know alot of famous Kanun players of the golden age were Armenians, mostly from the Aleppo region. I knew that the Kanun is still alive and well in Armenia proper. In Armenia they've even invented a bass kanun that uses steel strings. Fun fact is that on their kanuns they dont use mandals for quarter tones

maraoud108 - 10-28-2023 at 02:37 PM

Quote: Originally posted by Iskandar  
That's interesting info but also sad. I know alot of famous Kanun players of the golden age were Armenians, mostly from the Aleppo region. I knew that the Kanun is still alive and well in Armenia proper. In Armenia they've even invented a bass kanun that uses steel strings. Fun fact is that on their kanuns they dont use mandals for quarter tones


Yes, and this may also be political, or a rejection of "Turkish" sound microtones, though in truth I don't know the history, as in Armenia (as it's borders are today) it may also be influenced by the Persian santor.

Duduk players definitely play microtones, as do Armenian oud players in North America.