The bouzouki is a musical instrument commonly used in Greece. It belongs to the long-necked lute family and has a round body with a long neck that has a fretted fingerboard. The instrument has steel strings and is played using a small tool called a plectrum. Its sound is sharp and metallic, similar to a mandolin but slightly lower in pitch.

The Irish bouzouki is an instrument that developed from the Greek bouzouki. It is used in Celtic, English, and North American folk music. Other instruments similar to the bouzouki, such as the buzuq and Balkan tambura, are also found in regions like West Asia (Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Cyprus), the Balkans, and Turkey.

The bouzouki was introduced to Greece in the early 1900s by Greek refugees from Anatolia. It became a central instrument in the rebetiko music genre and its related styles. Today, it is an important part of modern Laïko pop music in Greece.

Etymology

The word "bouzouki" comes from the Turkish word "bozuk," which means "broken" or "modified." It is connected to a special tuning method called "bozuk düzen," which was often used on the Turkish instrument called "saz-bozuk." The bouzouki belongs to the same family of instruments as the mandolin and the lute.

At first, the bouzouki's body was made from a single block of wood, like the saz. However, when it arrived in Greece in the early 1910s, it was changed. A back made of multiple pieces, similar to the Neapolitan mandola, was added. The top was also shaped like a Neapolitan mandolin to make the body stronger so it could handle thicker steel strings.

The version of the bouzouki used in rebetiko music had three pairs of strings, called a three-course instrument. In the 1950s, a four-course version was created and became popular because of musician Manolis Chiotis.

Construction

From a construction perspective, the bouzouki can differ in several ways, including the number of strings and other features such as the length, width, height, and depth of the instrument’s bowl or main body. The width of the staves (the wooden slices that make up the bowl) also varies. These differences are decided by the manufacturer, who uses their experience and knowledge of sound to adjust parts of the instrument to create a clearer, deeper, or richer tone.

The size and shape of the resonating body greatly influence the instrument’s sound quality, while the length of the neck and the strings it holds affect the range of pitches the bouzouki can play. The neck length can vary between instruments, but most bouzoukis have 27 frets (the raised sections on the neck that help play notes) spaced evenly to allow all the notes in the musical scale. On modern instruments, the frets are made of metal and fixed in place on the neck. Earlier versions, like the baglama, used gut or cord tied to the neck, which could be moved.

The type of wood used is important for the sound. For the bowl, the best woods are mulberry, apricot, cherry, acacia, and elm. Walnut, plane, and chestnut are slightly less preferred. The wood must be solid and come from trees that grew slowly. The top of the instrument, called the soundboard, should be made of cedar or spruce (spruce is better if possible) and cut from a single piece. This part is crucial because it helps the sound from the strings travel farther and last longer.

Another factor affecting sound quality is the varnish used. The best varnish is natural shellac, applied by hand in many layers using traditional methods. This improves both the sound and the appearance of the instrument. The neck must be made of very dry hardwood to prevent it from bending, which could raise the height of the strings above the fretboard (called the action), making the instrument harder to play. Manufacturers use different methods to achieve this, keeping their techniques private. Many modern bouzoukis include a metal rod (called a truss-rod) inside the neck to add strength and allow adjustments if the neck begins to warp.

History

The Greek bouzouki is a stringed instrument played by plucking, belonging to the lute family, also called the thabouras or tambouras family. The tambouras was present in ancient Greece as the pandura and comes in many sizes, shapes, body depths, neck lengths, and string numbers. The bouzouki and the baglamas are direct descendants of this instrument. A Greek marble relief called the Mantineia Base (now displayed at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens) from 330–320 BC shows a muse playing a version of the pandoura.

During Byzantine times, the instrument was first called pandoura and later named tambouras. The National Historical Museum of Greece displays the tambouras used by General Makriyiannis, a hero of the 1821 Greek revolution.

Other sizes of the instrument have developed, including the tzouras, a smaller version of the bouzouki.

The bouzouki came to Greece after the 1919–1922 war in Asia Minor and the population exchange between Greece and Turkey. Early bouzoukia had three courses (six strings in three pairs, called trichordo) and were tuned differently depending on the musical scale. By the late 1950s, four-course (tetrachordo) bouzoukia became popular. Manolis Chiotis helped make the four-course bouzouki widely used by tuning it similarly to a guitar, which made it easier for guitarists to play. This change upset some traditionalists but allowed for more skilled playing and increased the instrument’s popularity. Recently, the three-course bouzouki has become popular again. The first recording using the four-course bouzouki was made in 1956.

The Irish bouzouki, which has four courses, a flatter back, and a different tuning than the Greek bouzouki, is a newer version. It was introduced to Irish music by Johnny Moynihan around 1965 and later used by musicians like Andy Irvine and Dónal Lunny. Some Irish musicians, such as Alec Finn, continued to use Greek-style instruments.

Three-course bouzouki (trichordo)

This is the classic style of bouzouki, introduced around 1900, and was the most commonly used instrument in rebetiko music. It has fixed frets and six strings arranged in three pairs. In the lower-pitched (bass) pair, one string is thick and wound, and the other is thin, tuned an octave apart. The standard modern tuning for the trichordo bouzouki is D3 D4 –A3 A3 –D4 D4. This tuning was named the "European tuning" by Markos Vamvakaris, who wrote about several other tunings, or douzenia, in his autobiography. The illustrated bouzouki was made by Karolos Tsakirian of Athens and is a copy of a trichordo bouzouki created by his grandfather for Markos Vamvakaris. These instruments from that time often lacked the heavy mother-of-pearl decorations seen on modern bouzoukia. The instrument has tuners for eight strings, but only six are used because the neck is too narrow for eight. At the time, luthiers often used sets of four tuners on trichordo instruments, as these were more commonly available and also used on mandolins.

Four-course bouzouki (tetrachordo)

This type of bouzouki has 8 metal strings, grouped into 4 pairs called courses. The typical tuning is C3 C4 –F3 F4 –A3 A3 –D4 D4, which is one whole step below the four high strings of a guitar. In the two higher-pitched (treble) courses, both strings in each pair are tuned to the same note. In the two lower-pitched (bass) courses, each pair includes a thick wound string and a thin string tuned an octave apart. On the bouzouki, the lower-pitched string is placed first in these bass courses, opposite to most other instruments with octave-paired courses, such as the 12-string guitar, charango, or bajo sexto. These "octave strings" create a richer sound and are used in chords and bass drones (continuous low notes played throughout the music). The guitar-like tuning was introduced by composer and soloist Manolis Hiotis, who found it better suited for the advanced playing style he was known for. Today, the tetrachordo is the most common bouzouki used in Greek music, though some traditionalists still prefer the trichordo, especially for the older rebetiko style of playing.

Five-course bouzouki (pentachordo)

This bouzouki has 10 strings grouped into 5 pairs. An additional set of two G strings, tuned to G2 and G3, is added to the other 8 strings. This creates a tuning of G2 G3 – C3 C4 – F3 F4 – A3 A3 – D4 D4. This tuning is one whole step lower than the five high strings of a guitar. This design allows for more complex chords and greater versatility. The instrument became widely known due to Antonopoulos Giorgos.

Amplification

Manolis Hiotis helped create the modern tetrachordo bouzouki. He was one of the first people to use devices that make the instrument's sound louder. He might have started using these devices as early as 1945. The first recorded use of amplification for the bouzouki was in a 1952 photo. It shows Vasilis Tsitsanis and Yiannis Papaioannou playing bouzoukis. Each had a device, similar to those on electric guitars, attached in the soundhole. Between 1953 and 1959, many pictures show bands where both singers and bouzouki players used microphones to make their sounds louder. By 1960, special pickups for bouzoukis, like the German "Ideal," were being made and fixed inside the instruments. Today, similar pickups are used by many Greek artists. They come in active and passive versions.

Related instruments

The Greek baglamas (Greek: μπαγλαμάς) or baglamadaki (Greek: μπαγλαμαδάκι) is very different from the Turkish bağlama. It has the same tuning as the trichordo bouzouki but is pitched an octave higher (nominally D–A–D), with unison pairs on the four highest strings and an octave pair on the lower D. Musically, the baglamas is most often used to support the bouzouki in the Piraeus style of rebetiko.

• Tzouras
• Irish bouzouki
• Balkan tambura
• Lute
• Mandolin
• Pandura
• Bağlama
• Šargija