Pear-bodied, carved from a single block of wood — the fingers never press the strings, they touch them from the side with the nail.
The classical kemençe (also called kemençe-i rumî or armudî kemençe) is a three-stringed, pear-shaped bowed instrument whose body, neck and oval pegbox are carved from a single piece of wood. It shares only its name with the Black Sea kemençe — a different instrument with a different build and technique.
The three strings are traditionally gut, except the yegâh string, which is silver-wound. The soundboard carries two D-shaped sound holes about 25 mm apart. Luxury instruments show ivory, mother-of-pearl or tortoiseshell inlay.
The instrument is always held upright, resting between the knees or on one knee — never under the chin like a violin. Its defining technique is that the fingers stop the strings by touching them from the side with the fingernail rather than pressing down, which allows for subtle pitch-bending — a genuine microtonal expressive tool.
It has been the principal bowed instrument of Ottoman/Turkish classical music since the mid-19th century, appearing in the fasıl ensemble for both taksim and accompaniment.
Performance: Cüneyd Orhon — "Rast Taksim" (Kalan Müzik, © 2005). Shown via YouTube's own player under its embed licence. Watch on YouTube →
Instruments from the same family, sharing a similar way of making sound:
The classical kemençe (also called kemençe-i rumî or armudî kemençe) is a three-stringed, pear-shaped bowed instrument whose body, neck and oval pegbox are carved from a single piece of wood. It shares only its name with the Black Sea kemençe — a different instrument with a different build and technique.
The instrument is always held upright, resting between the knees or on one knee — never under the chin like a violin. Its defining technique is that the fingers stop the strings by touching them from the side with the fingernail rather than pressing down, which allows for subtle pitch-bending — a genuine microtonal expressive tool.
It has been the principal bowed instrument of Ottoman/Turkish classical music since the mid-19th century, appearing in the fasıl ensemble for both taksim and accompaniment.
Listen for a nasal, slightly rough, very vocal-like bowed tone, with audible pitch-bends from the side-touch fingering technique — the giveaway that separates it from a violin's cleaner stopped pitch.
This page is written from more than one source; where sources disagreed or a technical detail (an exact string count, an exact tuning) had only a single unconfirmed figure behind it, we left it out or described it in general terms rather than publish a number we could not confirm.
Back to the Turkish Instruments tool for all instruments; for the melodic side of Turkish music see the Makam tool, and for rhythm the Usul tool.