In 1896, a student of Vasily Vasilievich Andreyev found a broken instrument in a stable in rural Russia.

Īfter the pious Tsar Alexis of Russia issued an edict ordering the persecution of Russian folk musicians and destruction of their instruments (1648), domra gradually came into disuse and was replaced by balalaika, which was much easier to make and play. Judging by those images, late medieval Russian domras can be divided into two types: lute-shaped, which had five to six strings, a large body and а pegbox angled back, and tanbur-shaped, which had three to four strings, a small body and a straight pegbox. In addition, medieval Russian illuminated manuscripts of the Psalter contain images of musicians with necked plucked-string instruments, and some of those miniatures are clearly captioned «depiction of domras». There are numerous mentions of domra in historic documents of this period. This musical instrument gained great popularity in the 16th–17th centuries, replacing gusli. The first known mention of domra is in Admonitions of Metropolitan Daniel (1530). The domra (Cyrillic: до́мра, ) is a long-necked Belarusian, Russian, and Ukrainian folk string instrument of the lute family with a round body and three or four metal strings.

JSTOR ( April 2021) ( template removal help).

Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. There are balalaika orchestras which consist solely of different balalaikas these ensembles typically play Classical music that has been arranged for balalaikas.This article needs additional citations for verification. The balalaika family of instruments includes instruments of various sizes, from the highest-pitched to the lowest: the piccolo balalaika, prima balalaika, secunda balalaika, alto balalaika, bass balalaika, and contrabass balalaika. The characteristic size, known as the prime or treble, is normally tuned E-E-A in the octave above middle C. Higher-pitched balalaikas have a short sustain which lends itself to rapid strumming or plucking used to play melodies.īalalaikas were used in folk music and dancing as well as large balalaika orchestras formed in the 20th century. Melodies and chords are usually played on the higher-pitched balalaikas. Two strings are typically tuned to the same note, with the third string a perfect fourther higher. It has a flat back and triangle table, or belly, which tapers to a fretted neck, and the three strings can either be plucked with the fingers, or if they are metal, with a leather plectrum. The balalaika comes in six sizes, ranging from piccolo to double bass.

It is possible that the emergence and evolution of the balalaika was a product of interaction with Asian-Oriental cultures. It derived from the dombra, or domra, a three-stringed lute played in Russia and Central Asia. The Balalaika is a Russian stringed instrument developed in the 18th century.

Ukrainian balalaika