MONGOLIAN

SOUND WORLDS
2022. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except fair uses permitted under U.S. or applicable copyright law.

EDITED BY
Jennifer C. Post, Sunmin Yoon, and Charlotte D’Evelyn
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 Mongolian Sound Worlds

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 Mongolian
Sound Worlds
Edited by
JENNIFER C. POST, SUNMIN YOON,
AND CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN

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 © 2022 by the Board of Trustees
of the University of Illinois
All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Post, Jennifer C, editor. | Yoon, Sunmin,
editor. | D’Evelyn, Charlotte, editor.
Title: Mongolian sound worlds / edited by Jennifer
C Post, Sunmin Yoon, and Charlotte D’Evelyn.
Description: Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2022.
| Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021042966 (print) | LCCN
2021042967 (ebook) | ISBN 9780252044373
(hardback) | ISBN 9780252086441 (paperback) |
ISBN 9780252053368 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Music—Social aspects—Mongolia.
| Music—Social aspects—China—Inner
Mongolia. | Music—Mongolia—History and
criticism. | Music—China—Inner Mongolia—
History and criticism. | Mongols—Music—
History and criticism.
Classification: LCC ML3917.M66 M66 2022 (print) |
LCC ML3917.M66 (ebook) | DDC 780.9517—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021042966
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021042967

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 Contents

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii

Transliteration, Naming, and Place Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Companion Website . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

Introduction: Mongolian Sound Worlds:

Opening Snapshots
SUNMIN YOON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

PART ONE: L ANDSCAPES AND SOUNDSCAPES

Interlude: Song about the Steppe

K. OKTYABR AND JENNIFER C. POST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1. Sound, Music, Pastoralism, and Nature in
Mongolian Sound Worlds
JENNIFER C. POST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

PART T WO: ETHNICIT Y AND DIVERSIT Y

Interlude: Musical Journeys in Inner Mongolia

and Beyond
TAMIR HARGANA AND CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

2. Music and Ethnic Identity in Inner Mongolia

CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

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 3. The Politics of Regional and Ethnic Identities in
Contemporary Mongolian Urtyn Duu
SUNMIN YOON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

4. Gendered Musicality in the Altai Mountains

REBEKAH PLUECKHAHN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

PART THREE: MATERIAL AND SOCIAL HISTORY

Interlude: Consistency, Patience, and Perseverance:

Maintaining the Fiddle-Making Tradition
BAYARSAIKHAN BADAMSÜREN AND PETER K. MARSH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
5. The Horsehead Fiddle: A Biographical History
PETER K. MARSH AND CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

6. The Tovshuur and Oirad Identity in Mongolia’s

Western Provinces
OTGONBAYAR CHULUUNBAATAR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

7. Social Lives of the Dombyra and Its Makers

in Western Mongolia
JENNIFER C. POST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

PART FOUR: HERITAGE AND GLOBALIZATION

Interlude: Everything Has Two Sides: An Interview

ANDREW COLWELL AND D. TSERENDAVAA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

8. Chandman’ and Beyond: Heritage-making of

Mongolian Khöömii in Past and Present
JOHANNI CURTET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

9. Mongolian Music, Globalization, and Nomadism

ANDREW COLWELL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

10. “We Were Born with Global Ambition”:

Continuity, Innovation, and a New Chapter in
the Development of Mongolian Popular Music
PETER K. MARSH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250

Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

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 Acknowledgments

This work would not have been possible without the contributions of the
many Mongolian and Inner Mongolian musicians and musical instrument
makers we have collaborated with over the years. We are indebted also to their
families who opened their homes and included us in their daily life activities. We
also acknowledge the scholars and teachers we have worked with in Mongolia
and China, in North America, Europe, Australia, and other locations. Many
people have generously shared their knowledge and we are ever grateful for all
their support.
Each of us owes a debt of gratitude to home institutional and granting or-
ganizations that made the research for this volume possible. We offer a special
thanks to the American Center for Mongolian Studies (ACMS) and Skidmore
College for financial contributions toward the costs associated with bringing
this volume to press.

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 Transliteration, Naming,
and Place Names

Transliteration
The transliteration of Mongolian words follows the Tibetan and Himalayan
Library Mongolian-Cyrillic Transliteration system (THL system) with a few
exceptions: в, е, ё, ь, ы, ъ, and ю are romanized to v, ye, yö’, y, ”, and yu, respec-
tively. While this system is consistently used here, there are a few words that
elicit varying opinions due to their popular use. For example, we use khöömii,
although khöömei is also widely used in Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and other
regions where throat singing is practiced. We also use Gov’, a place name often
written as Gobi. Similarly, names of ethnic groups used in scholarly and popular
literature spelled in various ways follow the THL system. For example, we use
Buriad (for Buryat), Tuva (for Tyva), and Oirad (for Oirat). Readers may note
that we make exceptions to the system and adopt earlier transliterated names of
toponyms and individuals. Mongolian terms and place names in Inner Mongolia
(Chapter 2) follow a modified THL system with conventions adopted by the
author. Kazakh terms (Interlude, Chapters 1 and 7) follow a slightly modified
BGN/PCGN transliteration system; и and у are Romanized to i and u, respec-
tively. Chinese terms (Chapter 2) follow the Hanyu pinyin system.

Names
When writing Mongolian names, the convention in Mongolia is for the family
name (ovog ner) to precede the given name. A family name may be written in
full or as a single initial. For example, in the case of Erdenetsetseg, whose father
is called Münkherdene, Mongolians may use the full name as Mönkherdengiin
Erdenetsetseg (using the genitive form of the patronymic), or M. ­Erdenetsetseg.

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 Mongolian Kazakhs also use the Mongolian system, although increasingly they
follow the system in which a father’s name follows the given name. This is es-
pecially apparent in Kazakh scholarship. With this complication, Mongolian
names in the bibliography follow the Mongolian convention: the given name is
presented first followed by family name (so Erdenetsetseg, M. or Erdenetsetseg,
Mönkherdene), and Kazakh names are presented with family name followed
by given name (as in Ulugpan, Beket).

Administrative Divisions in Mongolia:

Aimag and Sum
We follow the convention of using Mongolian terms for province and district
in Mongolia. The term aimag was used as early as the seventeenth century for
social and administrative units and then adopted for provincial units in the early
twentieth century. The term sum, used for smaller administrative units (often
translated simply as district) can similarly be traced to seventeenth century use
for a social division, but began to be used for administrative divisions within
each aimag by the early twentieth century.

x Transliteration, Naming, and Place Names

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 Mongolia. Map designed by Brooke Marston (used with permission).
MAP 1.

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 MAP 2. Inner Mongolia. Map designed by Brooke Marston (used with permission).

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 Companion Website

Readers of Mongolian Sound Worlds are invited to visit the book’s companion
website. See: mongoliansoundworlds.org.
The site is populated with links to web-based video sources, supplementary
images and color versions of some of the photographs in the volume, selected
audio and video clips, and other data that will help interested readers learn more
about the musical practices discussed in the volume.
We view the Mongolian Sound Worlds website as an information source that
not only supports the articles in the volume but provides additional information
on Mongolian music and musical events, organizations, and projects that may
be of interest to the reader. As new research emerges we will direct users to ad-
ditional web sources, news stories, podcasts, audio and video recordings, and
provide citations for some of the latest literature on Mongolian sound worlds.

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 Mongolian Sound Worlds

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 INTRODUCTION

Mongolian Sound Worlds

Opening Snapshots
SUNMIN YOON

Mongolia is a sounding land, its history rooted in pre-revolutionary times

(before 1921) and shaped during the Soviet-inspired socialist period (1921–1990).
Today it resonates with the effects of its rapidly changing contemporary soci-
ety. Mongols, along with other ethnic groups, find themselves surrounded by
sound in their daily lives as a part of their nomadic lifeways in rural regions
and in urban centers such as Mongolia’s capital Ulaanbaatar or the capital of
Inner Mongolia, Hohhot (Höhhot, Khökhkhot). The physical territory of the
Mongols once stretched over great distances under the Mongol Empire but is
now situated within modern geographical borders and administrative and po-
litical divisions. Their cultures have moved across these boundaries, and they
have also been preserved, diversified, shared, and assimilated with neighboring
Turkic peoples and nations. In the western part of the Mongolian territories,
close contact with Kazakhs, Tuvans, and other Oirad ethnic groups on the
border between Bayan-Ölgii and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of
China has produced unique and distinctive cultural forms. On the other hand,
the people at the far eastern and northern borders of Mongolia, such as the
Buriad1 and Kalmyk, have merged their customs more generally with Mon-
golia’s cultural landscape, and the stories of survival and adaptation that have
characterized the cultural diversity of Inner Mongolia add further dimensions
to this complex picture. Regardless of how all these micro-cultural features have
been historically processed, one thing remains clear in their myriad cultural
practices and identities: Mongolians have lived their lives in constant dialogue
with musicking and sounding.
Mongolian in this volume is rather broadly defined. Mongolness and Mongo-
lian culture are not simply built upon a monolithic and homogenous unity, but
they have rather been strengthened through a constant process of exchange and

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 mixing among neighboring cultures. On a single trip in Uvs aimag (province), I
saw how Mongol singers who are pursuing professional work in nearby Khovd
aimag also “commuted” to work in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Re-
gion. The collapse of the Soviet Union and its impact on Soviet Central Asia has
complicated the Mongolian Kazakhs’ recent migration and counter-migration,
and this has affected their cultural practices as well as their expressions of identity.
Taking into consideration these dynamic exchanges, and the fluidity of national
and cultural boundaries, the term Mongol here indicates the ethnically Mongol
peoples of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, while Mongolian indicates all people
living in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, including the Mongolian Kazakhs and
the Mongolian Tuvans who hold citizenship in the country of Mongolia.
During the socialist period in Mongolia, and over the course of sinicization
in the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region of China, Mongolian traditional
nomadic culture and widely varying musical practices became ideologized and
remade according to more formulaic music-making processes. Despite these
changes, they survived, both implicitly and explicitly, as part of a new twentieth-
century cultural identity. As more Western musical genres were imported, tradi-
tional musical practices came to be seen as more professional and less connected
to nomadic pastoralism, and in this way they became the basis of the current
traditional music scene. Mongolian culture in the twenty-first century is thus
being built upon two powerful frameworks of the past: the nomadic traditions
maintained for centuries in rural regions, and the modernized remnants left be-
hind by the twentieth century’s political transitions in both Mongolia and China.
This has left Mongolians with the task of creating a much more complex amalgam
of different forms of musicking through unique sonic elements, fluid genres,
social and spatial performativity, and sounding objects. Some music-making
processes have stayed in tune with the powerful ideologies of communism and
socialism, while others are still tied tightly to their deep past. At the same time,
they look toward a future, impacted by modernity and the global world.
With all these dynamics in mind, Mongolian Sound Worlds embraces the
complex predicament of early twenty-first century Mongolian sonic cultures,
understood through the unique perspectives, positioning, and approaches of-
fered by all the contributors to its chapters and interludes. The aim is to share
information on a broad range of genres and musical landscapes in present-day
Mongolian culture, from vocal traditions such as throat-singing (khöömii),
long-song (urtyn duu), other folk song genres (zokhiolyn duu, bogino duu),
and epic practices (tuul’), instruments such as tovshuur, dombyra, and morin
khuur, combined fusion band culture (khamtlag), and urban popular music.
The thematic framework likewise ranges from remote rural herders’ nomadic
music-making and instrument-building to the politics of ethnic boundaries and
heritage-making, ideological influence, nationalism, and global circulation.

2 Introduction

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 Each contributor to this volume carries stories from geographically different
locations, engages with distinct communities as well as musical materials, and
captures unique musical moments. Whether studying in Inner Mongolia, the
western, central, or southern regions of Mongolia, one place through which
most researchers pass on their journey is Ulaanbaatar, the country’s capital.
While visitors may imagine that their first sight in Mongolia will be a seem-
ingly endless steppe in the countryside, and their first sound the unique styles
of Mongolian folk music, a bustling city filled with traffic and people is in fact
what visitors first encounter. Ulaanbaatar encapsulates historical and contem-
porary, local and global, disappearing and emerging musical forms, styles, and
social scenes along with a vibrant mix of hybrid musical forms, as well as an
established Western classical musical scene.
So it is in Ulaanbaatar that I start, drawing from my own experience in the
city. In a series of three musical snapshots, I explain how these urban music
scenes reveal Mongolia’s complex musical history, from Mongolian Western
art music scenes to the traditional and folk musical landscapes in order also to
shed light on some of the musical practices that are mentioned throughout the
text. I first show how one of the most respected classically trained composers
in contemporary Mongolia reflects in his works not only the European values
of his training but the traditional values of Mongolia’s embodied nomadic life
learned in his homeland. I then share the historical journey of Mongolia’s staged
performance, traced from the country’s first opera and the continuing legacy
of its opera singers on the world stage in the decades since. Finally, I discuss
Mongolia’s constantly changing musical culture seen in the vibrant fluidity of
Ulaanbaatar’s cityscapes experienced by visitors attending the performances of
the national folk ensemble in the state theater.2

The Traditional Voice of a Modern Composer:

B. Sharav
The death, on July 15, 2019, of one of Mongolia’s most popular and beloved
composers saddened the whole country. The documentaries, appreciations,
and biographical articles that were published hastily in the media all recalled
his contributions to Mongolia’s musical landscape. Weeks before his death, he
had been recognized, along with another composer, N. Jantsannorov, as one
of Mongolia’s central cultural figures, with the State award of “Hero of Labor”
(khödölmöriin baatar). Born in 1952 in Khentii, a province northeast of Ulaan-
baatar, Sharav grew up in a nomadic family and trained in European art music
as a pianist and composer in the Soviet Union during the late 1970s and early
1980s. His most famous piece, Sersen Tal (Awakened steppe), composed in
1984, is one of the most frequently performed compositions at national events,

Opening Snapshots 3

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 such as the opening ceremony of the State Naadam, Mongolia’s annual summer
festival. In his obituary, his friend, the poet, G. Mend-Ooyo, wrote:
B. Sharav was an artist who herded the calves and lambs all across the steppe
in his bare feet, he sang the gingoo at the horse races, he grew tired from no-
madic travel, he was a child of the countryside, a nomad who became a hero
of the livestock markets. The hidden gifts which nature bestowed upon him
were encouraged by the melodies of the urtyn duu and of the morin khuur,
he was nourished by the best of western musical education, and became an
artist famous in the modern world, and at the root of this was his Mongolian
homeland and nomadic culture. (July 17, 2019, Öglöögiin Sonin).

A particularly valuable insight from Mend-Ooyo’s obituary is Sharav’s coun-

tryside childhood, a common enough feature of Mongolian lives, but one with
particular resonance among the generation of Mongolian musicians and com-
posers with European classical training. While these artists received a Soviet-
style music education in Ulaanbaatar under the Soviet music teachers who had
been sent to Mongolia, or by government-supported study-abroad programs to
the Soviet Union or elsewhere in the Eastern Bloc, their musical expressions are
closely reflective of the pastoralism they experienced in their youth. A good por-
tion of Sharav’s compositions, for example, incorporate folk tunes, particularly
in his works written between the 1980s and the early 2000s. He used examples
from folk songs such as “Zambuu tiviin naran” (The sun over the world) in
his symphonies and cantatas, while his extensive piano repertoire adapts folk
songs such as “Tümen ekh” (The best of the many) and “Önchiin tsagaan botgo”
(Orphaned white camel), as well as lullabies (buuvei), ethnic Oirad folk songs
such as “Torguud nutag” (Torguud homeland), and the song “Gooj Nanaa,”
which is often performed as the melody in khöömii (throat singing). Sharav
also composed new pieces based specifically on folk literature such as ülger and
domog, and even when he did not incorporate Mongolian traditional musical
idioms directly into his scores, he infused their performance with stories and
narrative devices.
Mongols and Turkic-speaking people living in Mongolian territories are
well-known for living mainly as nomadic pastoralists, a lifestyle upon which
their traditional customs are built and which is also shaped by their ecological
environments. Mongolians’ values are, then, deeply connected to their nomadic
lifeways and understanding of their local natural resources (see Chapter 1 in this
volume). For this reason, it is common in contemporary Mongolia to find people
who reveal a vast range of traditional pastoral local knowledge and experience,
not only among herders and musical practitioners in the countryside, but also
among professional urban artists, writers, and musicians, with their memories
and their embodied worldviews. It is surprising how often pastoral backgrounds

4 Introduction

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 are illustrated in the artistic work of some of the contemporary composers, no
matter what genres or artistic products they create. Sharav’s collaboration with
Yo-Yo Ma on the latter’s album The Silk Road: A Musical Caravan (2002) is a
symphonic piece based upon an urtyn duu (long-song), “Kherlengiin bar’ya”
(The banks of the Kherlen river), whose lyrics begin:
Тhe banks of the Kherlen is my elder brother’s homeland.
Do you see a bluish mist there?
The river called Kherlen is my beloved.
Where in Khentii is the source of the river?3

The River Kherlen flows from Khentii aimag across to the far east of Dornod
aimag, and into the Hulunbuir (Khölönbuir) region of Inner Mongolia. Some-
times it seems to be hidden, but then it reappears as it journeys eastward. Two
professional long-song singers, Ch. Sharkhüükhen (1939-) and G. Khongorzol
(1974-), who had been employed as musicians in their respective hometowns
in Khentii, often presented this song as the focal point of their repertoire. The
younger singer, G. Khongorzol, played in Sharav’s piece Kherlengiin bar’ya and,
while the shared connection between composer and singer to their homeland
(nutag) of Khentii might be happenstance, it represents a recurring practice in
Mongolian music overall, reflecting and connecting performers (or composers
with other collaborating artists) with their roots (yazguur), the places where
they spent their childhoods, and which they think of as home.
These concepts of origin (yazguur) and tradition (ulamjlal) have been of
critical interest among Mongols, particularly in the changing urban space of
contemporary Mongolia. The negotiation between traditional values and newly
introduced musical languages has sometimes been conflicted, but there remain
places in which they can be presented, whether for nationalistic reasons or
due to ideological reinvention. However, it is certainly true that this musical
expression of Mongolia’s pastoral and nomadic connection is essential, regard-
less of time, place, or who is participating, whether human or nonhuman. On
Mongolia’s endless steppe, in the desert (gov’) where one finds only low shrubs,
stiffened in the sun, and in the forested and mountainous regions, Mongolians’
herding lives and related traditions (ulamjlalt zanshil) offer a way of surviving
using the ecological resources available, but also a way of finding comfort in
and showing gratitude for what is given. Pastoralists ritualize these lifeways
with sound and music in seasonal activities, not only for humans but also for
nonhuman actors, such as coaxing a camel to nurse, milking cows and horses,
branding horses, or raising their ger tents. For example, the coaxing ceremony
is performed when a mother camel gives birth to a calf of a color different from
her own. The song heard in this ceremony is not only about the camel, but it
speaks also to a particular relationship: the strong bond between mother and

Opening Snapshots 5

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 child. When Sharav recalls this coaxing practice in a piano composition, Önchiin
tsagaan botgo (Orphaned white camel calf), not only does he use the melody
of the urtyn duu of the same name, but he also incorporates into his music his
lived experience of such livestock practices from his childhood in a nomadic
family. In modern musical compositions, even when composers do not directly
reference such folk musical idioms, there still remains an awareness of environ-
mental contexts. Therefore, it appears to be an indispensable part of becoming
a musician or composer in Mongolia, even if the genre is Western art music,
to be aware of traditional musical practice and to embody the environmental
settings in which legends are born.
As was the case with Sharav and other composers in Mongolia, modern
Mongolian composers in China have also written music according to the West-
ern art music idiom, building bridges between the experiences of their native
musical culture and their training in the language of Western art music. The
a cappella choral piece “Naiman sharga” (Eight chestnut horses) composed in
1998, which has been performed frequently by choirs around the world, is a
good example of this phenomenon in its relationship to the Inner Mongolian
musical landscape. The work’s composer, Se. Enkhbayar (b. 1956), was a herder
when young, and a long-song singer; he was also a member of a traveling troupe
during the Cultural Revolution. However, his formal education in Western art
music came in Ulaanbaatar at the Mongolian State University of Culture and
Arts (Soyol Urlagiin Ikh Surguul’) (Lin 2018). His longing for and sensibility
toward the pastoral landscape is presented through his harmonized European
choral music. In this way, the mixture of two different sources—the traditional
and the contemporary—mirrors Inner Mongolia’s process of modernization as
it emerged from the external influence of twentieth-century musical culture. For
Mongolia as much as for Inner Mongolia, the absorption of Western art music
into the Mongol musical world between the 1920s and 1990s was more ideologi-
cal; yet such a process made it possible for Mongolia to establish an array of new
genres, such as composed songs (zokhiolyn duu), film music (kinoni khögjim)
(Rees 2018), and opera (duur’). These genres continue to thrive, even after the
waning of ideological power, and with the syncretic aspects borrowed from
Mongolia’s traditional and nomadic background periodically gaining strength.

Mongolia’s First Opera and Its Continuing Legacy

In July 2015, a few days before Naadam, I went to Sükhbaatar Square, a large
public gathering space that acts as Ulaanbaatar’s center. At the center of the
square there is a statue of the revolutionary hero Sükhbaatar, mounted on a
horse, and another nearby of Chinggis Khan, at the entrance to the Mongolian
parliament building to his north. An outdoor opera stage had been set up on

6 Introduction

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 FIGURE 0.1. Temporary outdoor theatre for the opera Uchirtai Gurvan Tolgoi in
Sükhbaatar Square, Ulaanbaatar. Photo by S. Yoon.

the southern side of the square. I arrived just before 10:00 p.m. on this charac-
teristically cool summer night and found my assigned seat, mindful that there
would be a large audience, since this was the first time the opera Uchirtai gurvan
tolgoi (Three fateful hills) had been performed in the square (see figure 0.1).
The opera site was located at a dynamic performance hub, directly between
Mongolia’s two most vibrant theaters, the National Academic Drama Theatre
(Ulsyn dramyn erdmiin teatr) and the State Opera and Ballet Academic Theater
(Ulsyn duur’ büjgiin erdmiin teatr).4 The National Academic Drama Theatre is a
venue for regular performances by the State Folk Ensemble, as well as for other
music and theater genres (including pop music), while the State Opera and Ballet
Academic Theatre is the main venue for performances of opera and Western art
music. The National Academic Drama Theater was built in the 1940s, but the
theater’s history started with an earlier building, nicknamed Nogoon Bömbögöör
(The green dome), that burned down during the 1930s, before the other theaters
were built around the center.
The opera, Uchirtai Gurvan Tolgoi (1934), was originally a play by D. Nat-
sagdorj (1906–1937), one of the founders of modern Mongolian literature. It

Opening Snapshots 7

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 was performed not as a composed opera, but with narrative dialogues set to
folk tunes (ayalguud jüjig). However, in 1944, B. Damdinsüren composed an
opera loosely based on the play, although the orchestration was arranged by
the Soviet composer, folklorist, and music pedagogue Boris F. Smirnov (1912–
1971).5 Damdinsüren (1919–1992), along with L. Mördorj (1919–1996) and M.
Dugarjav (1893–1946), was one of the most important representatives of Mon-
golia’s Western art music during the second quarter of the twentieth century.
Damdinsüren and Mördorj received their training in the Soviet Union, and
while Damdinsüren is known for Mongolia’s first opera, Uchirtai Gurvan Tolgoi,
Mördorj composed the first Mongolian symphony, Minii Ikh Ornoo (My great
country), as his graduation piece from the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in 1956
(B. Bold and Ch. Bold 2011). The composer of the Mongolian Internationale, M.
Dugarjav, had not directly been influenced by Soviet musical training but, as
the first state-sanctioned composer, he was active in composing revolutionary
songs (ibid.). Moreover, all three composers, at various times, played a role in
the composing and reworking of Mongolia’s national anthem.
B. Damdinsüren’s musical transformation of Uchirtai Gurvan Tolgoi from
musical play into opera brought a change in the perception of actors, from
being stage actors who could sing to opera singers.6 The opera’s principal char-
acters, Yünden and his lover Nasalmaa, are portrayed as members of the poor
working class (ard). In the first performance in 1944, Yünden was played by A.
Tserendendev (1912–1986) and Nasalmaa by L. Tsogzolmaa (b. 1924-). Since
then, to perform in Uchirtai Gurvan Tolgoi has become an honor for a male or
female actor, and since 2009, Mongolia has held a competition to cast the lead-
ing roles. In the performance I saw in 2015, Yünden was played by Ariunbaatar
Ganbaatar, who had won first prize in the male-vocalist category in both the
XV International Tchaikovsky Competition and the European Grand Prix in
2014. As has happened with Ganbaatar, a few of Mongolia’s leading opera sing-
ers have recently become national treasures after winning awards in prestigious
international competitions outside Mongolia, and their fame and fanbase have
spread across social media.
Like Ganbaatar, another opera singer, A. Enkhbat, has won numerous inter-
national competitions including the Tchaikovsky Competition (2011); B. Bayar-
saikhan has also become famous for his operatic performances in Mongolia and
abroad. The strength that Mongolia’s Western art musicians have developed in
the vocal genres is particularly noteworthy. In my conversations with several
Mongolian musicians about this—whether traditional musicians or Western
art musicians—they frequently expressed how these opera singers’ powerful
vocality has developed through their traditional nomadic lifestyles and diets.
Many Mongolians have mentioned to me that traditional long-song singers or
other folk song singers could sing Western opera, but not the other way around.

8 Introduction

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 When The Guardian journalist Kate Mollesen (2018) interviewed the Mongo-
lian musicologist K. Bayandelger about why Mongolians make talented opera
singers, Bayandelger explained that it comes from how their “physical stature”
embodies their “landscape, food, clean air, even historical narratives.” When
Western-style theater began in Mongolia, there was not so much distinction
between folk music and opera. Actors were called jüjigchin (with no gender
distinction), but this term referred not only to actors, but also to musicians,
acrobats, and singers of revolutionary songs, as well as to folk song (including
long-song) singers. This holistic and familiar quality of artistic identity seems
to be one reason why the theatrical genres of opera, plays, and film have been
so popular since the early period.
My experience that night watching the opera in the square, with the densely
packed crowd, and with an audience watching on TV, was a simple example of
how much the classical pieces composed under Soviet influence continue to be
performed and appreciated in post-socialist Mongolia. The audience’s interest in
opera was not based solely on the musical styles, the performance, and staging,
but also on the work’s nostalgia and historical significance as a piece of Soviet-
influenced art. Moreover, as I watched the story unfold, I noticed how many
folk customs and traditional elements were also used to convey the narrative
even though the plot itself was, both implicitly and explicitly, “revolutionary.”

Fluidity and Movement: Ulaanbaatar—July 2019

The National Academic State Ensemble has established itself as an important
venue for professional folk music performances in Ulaanbaatar, with an in-house
folk ensemble consisting of professional musicians selected through national
competitions. Since its creation under State sponsorship during the socialist era,
it has continued until today as Mongolia’s primary folk music performance en-
semble. While other venues for folk performance have lost ground, disappeared,
or been revived, the National Academic State Ensemble—housed in a theater
across from the National Library—has been a staple of the capital’s entertain-
ment scene since I first arrived in Mongolia in 2006. During the summer months
it is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the city. Recently, however,
the building—like others such as the National History Museum that was built,
and subsequently thrived, with State funding during the socialist era—has been
threatened with demolition due to old age, as taller, more modern buildings
come to dominate Ulaanbaatar’s skyline.
I have attended one of these evening performances in the theater almost
every year I have visited Mongolia, just to see if there have been any changes to
the program or the singers. The first year I went, 2006, I saw a program full of
traditional musics, mainly central Khalkh long-songs, one or two short-songs

Opening Snapshots 9

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 from western ethnic groups commonly performed in Ulaanbaatar, khöömii, and
morin khuur (horsehead fiddle)—including the State Morin Khuur Ensemble
playing orchestral pieces composed by Mongolian composers. Between 2011
and 2015, however, I noticed a surge in diverse regional styles of music and
dance, although the changes were subtle, and with a few additional pieces in
regional styles.
In July of 2019, however, attending a performance on the same day that B.
Sharav died, I found a dramatic change in the program. The show started, as
always, at 6:00 p.m., and the theater looked the same, with its characteristic
Soviet style architecture and decorations, except in that year there was an ex-
hibition of huge tsam7 dance masks and costumes in the lobby. The concert
still presented a long-song first in the program, but very briefly, and this was
followed by a composition that featured khöömii. As the program continued,
it focused more on regional songs and traditional dance styles as well as con-
tortionists and pieces in symphonic styles played by the National Morin Khuur
Ensemble, including B. Sharav’s Selenge Tal. The most notable change was the
inclusion of abstract dance and music based on traditional Mongolian music
and dance that incorporated other aspects of world music and dance, imply-
ing possible connections between Mongolia’s sound world and India and other
Southeast Asian cultures. A Buddhist tsam dance had been added, and a dance
that had been newly choreographed from the imagined lifeways of prerevo-
lutionary nobles, quite different from the “nomadic/pastoral” images that had
been frequently used in the past to describe the Mongols and Mongolians. This
whole performance appeared to be searching for more traditional and religious
elements beyond folk and nomadism, which had been lost during the peak
of twentieth-century modernism. It seemed to suggest that Mongolia was no
longer looking to the West—which in the early 1990s had meant either Rus-
sia or Europe—but to a greater breadth of world cultures. I felt that Mongolia
might have been leaving Sharav’s Western art music legacy behind, and that
this quite different arrangement of the National Academic State Ensemble’s
concert program was pointing ahead to another, as yet uncertain, departure
for Mongolia’s sound worlds.
With the National State Ensemble changing its performance in this way, I
have also noted that the streets of Ulaanbaatar outside of the theater are also
increasingly filled with the movement of visitors, particularly at the peak of
the season during the national Naadam in mid-July. They flock to tourist gift
shops and visit noted sites such as Sükhbaatar Square and Gandan Monastery;
some look for interesting art exhibitions or musical events such as the National
Academic State Ensemble’s performance. Some visitors seek adventure in the
countryside, and some are travelers who stop by Ulaanbaatar on the way to
Central Asia or Siberia on the Trans-Siberian Express. Tourists from Inner

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 Mongolia may also be searching for their “unchanged” homeland. When I travel
to the countryside with Inner Mongolians, as we look out at the endless steppe
with clear streams passing nearby they often say to me, “There is no open land
like this in Inner Mongolia anymore. The Han Chinese have fenced off our land
into enclosures [khashaa].” Some Inner Mongolians come to Ulaanbaatar to
look for what they believe are “real Mongolian musical skills.” T. Narantuya, a
singer whom I met in 2009, had been the very last student of the great singer
N. Norovbanzad and was then finishing up her doctoral study in Ulaanbaatar.
Narantuya had been one among the early waves of Inner Mongolian singers
who came to learn the techniques in Mongolia, considerably before the current
stream of traffic between Mongolia and Inner Mongolia. Mongolians living and
working overseas come back in the summer to accompany visitors—from the
United States, Europe, India, S. Korea, and other locations—who are interested
in Mongolia’s cultural life, or to visit their families and relatives back home.
Mongolians come back from China, too, including some musicians who travel
to Inner Mongolia as music teachers. In 2018, I met with a singer who said she
had been teaching at a school in Inner Mongolia, since they paid her well for her
work, but that she would always come back to Ulaanbaatar. For such travelers,
summer in Ulaanbaatar becomes a vibrant space until the end of August when
the air grows chilly, and then when the city starts coming back to normal, the
reflection of what this traffic of visitors has brought to Ulaanbaatar remains as
a vestige of change.
The current shape of Ulaanbaatar and its culture is the result of a long-term
process of historical transformation, yet it is not necessarily excluded from the
rural lifeways of pastoral and nomadic Mongolians seen in the previous snap-
shots. How Mongolia now sees its own urban modernity, and how it regards itself
in relation to outside influence, is essentially ambiguous, but Mongolians have
always generally welcomed such changes without much resistance, in keeping
with the adaptability that defines their nomadic instincts. Similarly, Mongolia’s
character as a sounding land does not exist within a single fixed environment; it
has been created at different times and in different parts of the country. Just as
nomadic cycles define the people’s changing approaches to survival, as the ebb
and flow of people through Ulaanbaatar and the influx of new cultures, so can all
act as critical sources of Mongolia’s sound worlds. And just like what remains of
pastoralism in the work of Mongolia’s modern composers of Western art music,
so can the contemporary traditional music ensemble reflect the uncertain future
of Mongolia’s musical world, and the Soviet-developed musical phenomena,
such as opera, still continue as a part of today’s cultural experience. Mongolia’s
serendipitous discoveries in its music-making journey, and its searches for the
future of its musical culture, will continue to absorb and transform an abundant
flow of uncertain and unexpected influences.

Opening Snapshots 11

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 The Structure of This Volume
This volume offers ten chapters and four interludes on a wide range of topics
related to Mongolian sound worlds. Discussions about developing this collection
began at the “Mongolian Sound Worlds” conference in 2017 at the Institute of
East Asian Studies, University of California at Berkeley, attended by six of the
authors in this volume. Our discussions at the event, and later in Mongolia, at
conferences, and online helped the group identify the diverse practices main-
tained in contemporary rural and urban settings that would become this volume.
Along the way we brought in additional authors who have contributed chapters
and Interludes to offer a broader view of Mongolian musical practices. Each
chapter’s unique material and approach is drawn from field research in specific
locations. We include what we have termed Interludes to bridge sections while
also introducing new material from the point of view of local practitioners,
each an artist with life experience as musician or musical instrument maker in
Mongolia and Inner Mongolia.
Following this Introduction, Part One: Landscapes and Soundscapes, of-
fers the first Interlude, a song about the steppe that Mongolian Kazakh herder
Oktyabr shared with Jennifer Post. Oktyabr’s lyrics reflect his abundant pastoral
experience and knowledge of local resources. In Chapter One, Post introduces
sound, music, pastoralism, and nature in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, to
address the significance of the land, sociality, spirituality, and sonic practices,
and soundscapes. She also includes a case study on the sound and musical
practices of Kazakh pastoralists who live in the far-western Mongolian province
of Bayan-Ölgii.
Part Two: Ethnicity and Diversity includes an Interlude and three chapters.
Interlude Two contains a life story that Tamir Hargana, from the Barga region
of Inner Mongolia, shared with Charlotte D’Evelyn. Tamir’s dynamic musical
biography recounts his young life as a Mongolian musician in both his home
country and the United States. In Chapter Two, D’Evelyn investigates ethnic
politics and expressions of identity by Mongol peoples who live inside China’s
national boundary, focusing on two axes: the historical lens of the Mao era and
the case study of Anda Union, an internationally successful Inner Mongolian
folk ensemble supported by the Chinese government. Addressing ethnic politics
and representation in Chapter Three, Sunmin Yoon uses ethnographic research
on urtyn duu styles from various ethnic groups in the western provinces of
Mongolia to challenge and rethink the concept of ethnicity and regionality. She
argues that it has been politicized in part, not as an explicit political agenda, but
as a process of Othering through singing techniques and musical discourses.
In Chapter 4, Rebekah Plueckhahn provides a unique case study on music in a
small Altai-Uriankhai settlement in western Mongolia. The author places herself

12 Introduction

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 among the people in the town to look at the role of gender and local musical
knowledge, especially in the context of community dynamics.
Part Three: Material and Social History introduces musical instruments from
different regions in performance and production—the Mongol morin khuur,
the Altai Uriankhai tovshuur, and the Kazakh dombyra. In Interlude Three, the
morin khuur maker, Bayarsaikhan Badamsüren, collaborated with Peter Marsh
to offer his own musical life story, addressing through images and narrative the
process of instrument-making and his thoughts about his musical experience. In
Chapter 5, Peter Marsh and Charlotte D’Evelyn describe the historical narratives
of the morin khuur tradition. They investigate the lives and contributions of three
legendary fiddlers from both Mongolia and Inner Mongolia and discuss two
contemporary fiddle players who have made further technical advances through
their performance. In Chapter Six, Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar introduces the
characteristics, meaning, and performance practices of the plucked two-stringed
tovshuur. Presenting the deep ties between the tovshuur and the Oriad ethnic
group, the author illustrates how this instrument has expressed Oirad identity
through its association with local epic traditions. In Chapter Seven, Jennifer
Post unfolds ethnographic narratives of four Kazakh dombyra makers in two
western provinces of Mongolia. She explores the social lives of the instrument
reflected in its materials, tools, processes, practices, and changes over time. She
also demonstrates that, while makers and musicians have connections outside
of Bayan-Ölgii in Xinjiang in China and Kazakhstan, the region has been able
to produce a unique Mongolian Kazakh dombyra.
Part Four: Heritage and Globalization considers Mongolian music-making
at home and abroad, how music was mobilized, and some of the ways music
is now returning to its source. To begin, in Interlude Four Andrew Colwell
reconstructs a conversation about sound he had with Tserendavaa Dashdorj.
Colwell’s description of the land and their discussion of vocalizations reveal
relationships between sound and music as well as pathways that the vocal arts
have taken in Mongolia in recent years. In Chapter Eight, Johanni Curtet in-
troduces the musical techniques of khöömii, and its important practitioners,
illustrating how the transmission of this genre has shifted from a nomadic
sonic practice to a heritage product. Using a case study of khöömii traditions in
Chandman’ sum (an administrative unit smaller than an aimag), Khovd aimag,
Curtet explains the process of Soviet-influenced institutionalization and the
current situation and policies of the district (sum)’s heritage center. In Chapter
Nine, Andrew Colwell also draws from khöömii to consider tradition (yazguur),
globalization (dayaarshil), internationalism, tourism, and concert culture as it
relates to khöömii and ensembles (khamtlag), such as the German-based Mon-
golian music ensemble and Egschiglen within and beyond Mongolia. In the final
chapter, Chapter Ten, Peter Marsh discusses Mongolia’s most recent popular

Opening Snapshots 13

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 music sensation, the folk metal group The Hu. Using The Hu as his main prism,
Marsh explores Mongolia’s earlier popular music history, Mongolia’s response
to the global popular industry, and the syncretic sounds of the country’s unique
popular music.

Notes
1. Buriad can also be spelled Buryaad and Buryat.
2. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
3. This version of the lyrics is found in Kh. Sampildendev and K. N. Yatskovskai
(1984:223).
4. The official names of these two venues have changed over the course of the
nation’s political transitions.
5. In an interview with the poet and journalist B. Lkhagvasüren, the actress, L.
Tsogzolmaa, who performed the lead female role in the first performance of this
opera, said that Smirnov’s precise involvement in the musical arrangement is de-
batable, and that the music, including the orchestration, was written entirely by B.
Damdinsüren (Mongol Tulgatny 100 Erkhem 2015).
6. The opera’s libretto, moreover, was adapted by the writer Ts. Damdinsüren
(1907–1986) (Natsagdorj having died in 1937) from the original playscript to reflect
the new ideology of Socialist Realism.
7. Ritual masked dance performed as part of Mongolian and Tibetan Buddhist
ceremonies.

References
Bold, B., and Ch. Bold. 2011. Cultural Figures of the Golden Age [Soyol urlagagiin altan
üyeiinkhen]. Ulaanbaatar: Sodpress.
Dashdavaa, Ch. 1987. “The Studies in the Development of the People’s Arts, 1945–1960”
[Ardyn uran büteeliin khögjiin assudald]. Studia Historica, Studia Historica Instituti
Historiae Academiae Scientiarum Reipublicae Populi Mongolici 21:108–113. N.P.
Lin, Pei Chi. 2018. “A Performance Guide to Se. Enkhabayar’s Choral Tone Poem Önchin
Botgo (A lonely baby camel) for SATB soloists and SATB Chorus (with Divisions)
Acapella.” DMA diss., University of North Texas.
Mend-Ooyo, Gombojiin. 2019. “B.Sharavyn ‘Nuuts Tovchoo’” (B.Sharav’s secret history).
Öglöögiin Sonin [17 07/17/ 2019].
Molleson, Kate. 2020. “How Mongolia Went Wild for Opera.” The Guardian. 01/02/2018.
Mongol Tulgatny 100 Erkhen—L. Tsogzolmaa. 2015. YouTube video, 54:21, posted by Mon-
gol Tulgatan, June 28, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VD5QhTYKUTA.
Natsagdorj, Sh. ed. 1981. Cultural History of the Mongolian People’s Republic [BNMAU-yn
Soyolyn Tüükh]. Ulaanbaatar: Ulsyn Hevleliin Gazar.
Sharav, Byambasuren. 2013. Works for Piano I: Piece, Prelude Sonatina Composition of
Folk Songs. Ulaanbaatar: (n.p).
Yavuuhulan, B., ed. 1961. Anthology of Mongolian Poetry [Mongolyn shildeg yaruu nai-
rag]. Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.

14 Introduction

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 PART ONE

Landscapes and
Soundscapes

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 INTERLUDE

Song about the Steppe

K. OKT YABR AND JENNIFER C. POST

In July 2007, I waited in the wide field below a ger nestled in a shallow hollow
as Oktyabr carried a small notebook and his dombyra down to the steppe. The
summer grazing site where his family was settled in Deluun sum, Bayan Ölgii
aimag (province) is in the Altai Mountains along the Chinese border where
Kazakh families have herded for generations. Located nearby is a small arasan1
or mineral spring, where local residents value the “healing waters.” Settling
himself on the ground, Oktyabr opened his notebook and lay it on the ground
in front of him. I could see that he had carefully written out the Kazakh verses
of his songs. The musical form he assigned to the song he sang, tolghau, com-
memorates people and places, records local histories, and expresses emotional
responses to place and to change. Such songs are valued in the countryside
where they are often shared in social gatherings among Kazakh residents in
this province.
In his song, Oktyabr refers to Zhalghyz aghash and to Mongolia as homeland
(tughan el). The region in far western Mongolia where he was settled for the
summer is valued for its nutritious grasses for livestock grazing in spring, sum-
mer, and autumn seasons. Some herders remain there throughout the winter,
moving their animals and families to mud-clay winter homes that are tucked
in depressions in the land that protect them from wind and cold. In his song,
Oktyabr names his relatives and describes personal responses to place, indicating
his long history in this location. He also names sites that have significance not
only to his family but to the community of Kazakh herders who return to these
lands each season. Many of the names he uses for sites are local Kazakh names
shared by herders; they were established over time as Kazakhs settled in this
region beginning in the mid-nineteenth century. As they name places they also
claim them for Kazakhs. Many place names refer to landforms or natural sites,

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 1.1. Oktyabr near his settlement at Zhalghyz aghash, Deluun
sum, Bayan Ölgii aimag, 2007. Photo by J. C. Post.

such as a dala (field), quyis (hollow), shoqy (hill), tau (mountain), say (valley),
and dara (ravine, gorge). Sites and their characteristics are also described in
well-known place names. Zhalghyz aghash means “solitary tree,” it is a location
with few trees; Ayu dara is a place where bears (ayu) were often found histori-
cally; Qaskyr uya is a wolf ’s “nest”—they are animals that both fascinate and
scare herders since they can ravage their sheep and goat herds during the night;
and Burkit tau means eagle mountain—the landform is located on the way to
Zhalghyz aghash and its silhouette reminds people of an eagle—and of the Ka-
zakh’s continuing heritage as eagle hunters. The song also references common
herding practices in the region, including maintaining mal, their five kinds of
livestock (sheep, goats, yaks, camels, and horses); keeping tethering places for
animals (zheli); practicing otar during which a single or small group of herders
takes a group of livestock to another location, such as an isolated pasture where
grasses are rich in nutrition; and the valuing of medicinal resources, such as
the ular (snowcock)—these mobile pastoralists use the meat of the bird to treat
burns and heal stomach ailments.

18 Part One: Landscapes and Soundscapes

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 ZHALGHY Z AGHASH ARASAN SONG ABOUT ZHALGHY Z AGHASH
TOLGHAU MINERAL SPRING 2

Armysyng altyn besik, asqar belim Greetings my golden motherland, my high plateau
Armysyng ayauly zhurt tughan elim Greetings my dear people and my homeland
Öteyin el zherimdi tanystyryp Let me introduce my place
Barsha zhurt qulaq turgey tughan elim Everyone in my homeland, listen to me
Zhyr qylyp Zhalghyz aghash arasanyn I created a zhyr about Zhalhyz aghash mineral spring
Du qylyp ortangyzgha ala keldim And I offer it to you for your approval
Arnaghan arasangha syylyghym bul This is my gift to my mineral spring
Tu qylyp ortangyzgha än sala keldim The song I sing will be like a flag among you
Dombyra alyp ortangyzgha tolghanayyn I’ll take my dombyra and offer my thoughts to you
Zhasymnan öner qughan balang edim I was your child chasing after art
Bürkit tau tulep ösip asqar shyngdy Raised and then molted on high peaked Burkit tau
Qiyngha qanat qaghu arman etip I stretched my wings to meet difficulties
Bastayyn Qarasumen Üyirtiden Let me start with Qarasu and Üyirt
Zher eken shöbi shüygin örisi keng The land has a wide pasture and fertile grasses
Qoy baqqan Qonshay atam sanglaq bop My grandfather Qonshai was a noted herder who
raised sheep here
Baylaghan asau qulyn zhelisimen He tied his frisky colts, filling his zheli
Toghasbay Aqtas qora zherding säni Toghas and Aqtas qora are gems of this land
Öredi Qara qaqta tülik maly Five kinds of livestock graze in Qara qaq
Sholaq quys Keng quys Orta quys Sholakh quys, Kheng quys, Orta quys
Zhäne bar Balta sappen Qara zhaly We also have Balta sap and Qara zhal
Aqsaydyng gül boraghan zhan zhaghasy Flowers blow on the edges of Aqsay
Kümistey Zharqyraghan taudan tasy Stones from the mountain shine like silver
Ataqty Ülken buyra Shungyr qora Ülken buyra and Shunkir qora are famous
Ezhelden meken bolghan Qaraqasy Since olden days they were Qaraqas’s place
Ömirding basy ghuzyr shyngyrau zhar Life is like a high rocky cliff
Shyghugha qanat qaghyp bolacyng zar That you rush about and flap your wings to climb
Uly atam baqyt qonghan Zhengsikbay My great grandfather Zhengsikbai became rich here
Bul zherde sol kisining ziraty bar His grave is in this place
Tögiler er zhigtting elge teri Zhigit (boys) work hard for their people
Bul zherde ötti talay örenderi Many passed through this place
Babalar bir aunasyn aruaghy Let the spirit of our ancestors move us
Zharyqtyq torqa bolsyn zhatqan zheri Let this place of rest be as soft as silk
Darasay, beles caymen Baruun sala Darasay, Beles say and Baruun sala
Köldi dara, Zhurtqa äygili Ayu dara Köldi dara and the well-known Ayu dara
Taldysay Zhalghyz aghash arasanym Taldy sai and Zhalghyz aghash, my mineral spring
Usyndym bul zyrymdy saghan arnap I offer this zhyr to you

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 Aynaldym qasietingnen arasanym My beloved holy mineral spring
Keshegi umytylmas balashaghym It is impossible to forget my childhood
Tolqyghan balalyqtyng zhas däureni The playful times of childhood were exciting
Älide sol zhastyqqa talasamyn Even now I try to reach for my youth
Degende Sary qabyrgha Dara sayym My Sary Qabyrgha and Dara say
Köngilim bir tolghanady körgen sayyn When I see you I am filled with emotion
Qayqayyp qasqa qummen shygha kelsem As I come bending back from Qasqa qum
Aldymda sulap zhatyr Myktybayym My Mykhtybai lies on its side in front of me
Zhanasqan Tölengitke Tary dara Tary dara is joined with Tölengit
Ulary qoysha örgen Ayu dara Ayu dara, your mountain grouse are grazing like sheep
Köktemey zherding keni ketip qaldy au Yet it doesn’t turn green and our resources are gone
Yapyrau ne bolasyng bara Oh what will happen over time?
Tüye say basy töskey Qasqyr Uya Tüye say at the top of Qasqyr uya is a sunny slope
Bolady Qara shaghyl tasty qiya Qara shaghyl is a mountain pass with large rocks
Däm tartyp otarmenen munda keldim This is where I came for otar
Zhyrlay ber aq qaghazgha qara siya My black ink, write a zhyr on white paper
Qyrqyndap Örteng saygha men keleyin Whenever I come to Örteng say
Kaptaldap Kök tuyyqty kenerleyin I go along the edge to Kök tuiyq
Ushatyn ular qonyp Sary teriske Ular land and fly from Sary teris
Ularyn qiqu salghan bir köreyin Let me see your crying ular once more
Tölengit zhatangymen qiyp ötip Passing through Tölengit gorge
Kök shoqy töbesine örmeleyin I will climb over Kök shoqy hill
Qolyma qalam alyp zhazdym khatqa Taking my pen and paper I write
Tängirim cözdi berdi tilmen zhaqqa Tängir (God) has given words to my tongue
Basymen Sholaq quys zhygha kelsem When I come out at the beginning of Sholaq quys
Dangyrap körinedi Äbzhäng taqta I see Äbzhäng taqta in every direction
Engkeyip Fermgede kelip qaldym I came downhill to Ferma
Aq qaghaz qolyma aldym And took my white paper
Auyzyna Qyzyl esik zhetip kelip Arriving at the mouth of Qyzyl esik
Aynalyp Töngirekke közim saldym I turned and looked at Töngirek
Demeymin qara sözding dauylymyn I do not have a “storm of prose”
Khalqymnyng arqaladym auyr zhügin Yet I carry my people’s heavy load
Qaratqan eldi auyzyma ölengmenen I will draw my country’s attention with my song
Ataqty Bodauqanyng bauyrymyn I am the well-known Bodaukhan’s brother

Notes
1. The language referenced in this section—including the song—is Kazakh, widely
shared by the majority of Kazakh residents of Bayan Ölgii province.
2. Local residents Almagul Soltan and Janbolat Khurmarhan contributed to the
translation of this song.

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 CHAPTER 1

Sound, Music, Pastoralism,

and Nature in Mongolian
Sound Worlds
JENNIFER C. POST

Images of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia often feature scenes of expansive

grasslands with gers dotting the landscape and their animals grazing in unfenced
fields. Some mobile pastoralists thrive in these locations and move seasonally
across the steppes with their livestock, relying heavily on local resources. In
recent years in Mongolia, though, there has been great movement of peoples
from rural to urban locations that began most intensely at the end of the so-
cialist period when state support for nature-based systems and lifeways was
inadequate, infrastructure in rural and remote regions was poor, and herders felt
the pull—and promise—of a market economy (Bruun and Narangoa 2006). In
Inner Mongolia, the government has enacted comprehensive urban relocation
projects as they repurpose large portions of the countryside for mining and
industrial agriculture to suit the nation’s economic needs, impacting the mobil-
ity and opportunity found in the Mongol pastoral way of life. As a result, Inner
Mongolian urban populations are swelling, and in rural regions the growth of
agricultural districts and land privatization have rendered pastoralists immobile
(Rogers and Wang 2006).
The sound worlds of pastoral lands in both Mongolia and Inner Mongolia,
even in the face of change, continue to provide ecological, economic, and spiri-
tual support for residents. Despite diminishing numbers of rural residents, the
long history of mobile pastoralism and its links to domestic animals, wildlife,
grasslands, forests, and other resources, are embedded in the minds, values,
sounds, and musics of many people, whether they live in rural or urban locations.
Relationships to nature maintained in rural regions can be heard in herders’
animal calls, melodies expressing the contours of a landscape, lyrics describing

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 FIGURE 1.1. Mongolian landscape, Bayankhongor aimag, 2012. Photo by S. Yoon.

the character of the steppe, timbres reflecting the sound qualities of natural
resources, and other practices linking humans and nonhumans as well as ani-
mate and inanimate beings. References to place, practice, identity and heritage
contribute to relationships between past and present lifeways and values, and
shared concerns about sustainability and environmental responsibility contribute
to interest in engagement and reengagement with nature through unique styles
and forms of cultural production in each social group. The sonic practices that
pastoralists maintain, often to benefit local human and ecological well-being,
resonate in the lives of many non-pastoralists now living in urban or semi-urban
settings, and this reinforces a shared nature-based Mongolian heritage.
How do pastoralists, with access to large tracts of rural land used to support
livelihoods and lifeways, use sound and music to interact with and respond
to nature and place? What shared social and spiritual values and beliefs are in
place that support herders’ sonic practices? What cultural impact do changes to
climate and industrial growth, along with greater mobility, have on pastoralists
and non-pastoralists in the countryside and city? This chapter explores sounds,
soundscapes, and music and their connections to pastoralism and nature in
Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, concluding with a case study from Bayan-Ölgii,

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 the westernmost province in Mongolia. Addressing lands, lifeways, and sound
worlds generally, the in-depth focus is on rural pastoral relationships to sound,
soundscapes, and music, with more limited attention on urban scenes, a topic
that will be taken up in later chapters in this volume in greater detail.1

The Lands and Lifeways

Mongolia and Inner Mongolia are located at the eastern end of the vast
Eurasian steppe, a landmass known for its temperate grasslands that support a
variety of plant and animal species. For centuries the steppes also played a role
in sustaining mobile pastoral lifeways for residents representing different ethnic
groups in various ecosystem settings. The grasslands, as well as forest and desert
zones, offer habitats not only for humans and their domestic animals, but for
various species of wildlife and plant life as well.

Mongolia
In Mongolia the lands and their ecosystems are diverse. The alpine systems
in the Altai, Khangai, and Khentii Mountains maintain perpetual snow, glaciers,
and a cold climate that are home to argali (wild mountain sheep), Siberian
ibex, and snow leopards. The mountain forest steppe zone includes parts of the
Altai and Khangai Mountains; the northern facing slopes are richly forested,
while the southern slopes have distinct plant species for livestock grazing. The
different habitats are home to rare animals and birds including Pallas’s cat and
black grouse. The cold and relatively humid mountain taiga of Khövsgöl and
northern portions of the Khentii Mountains is rich in forests. Musk deer, elk,
and lynx are found in this region. The expanding arid steppe zone in eastern and
central Mongolia, comprising about twenty-five percent of Mongolia’s land, is
a flat plain that extends into the northwestern edge of the Khangai Mountains
to Uvs aimag (province) where Mongolian gazelles are found. The desert steppe
is also a habitat for unique species, including saiga antelope, and black-tailed
gazelle. It is huge, spanning from the Great Lakes Depression in the western
aimags, the Valley of Lakes between the Khangai and Altai Mountains in the
central southern region, and the lowlands in the central and eastern regions. The
desert in the south, with hills, shrubland, and sand dunes also hold rare animals
and plants, such as the wild camel and Gov’ bear (Batjargal et al. 1998). Twenty
different ethnic groups maintain settlements in Mongolian lands. Among them,
the Bayad, Dörvöd, Zakhchin, Ööld, Torguud, Myangad, and Altai Uriankhai
peoples live in the western aimags and share land with the Turkic language
speaking Kazakh and Tuvan residents. In the central north the Darkhad, Buriad,
and Dukha people live in both Mongolia and south Siberia, and the Dariganga

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 live in the east. The Khalkh people, the dominant population, are concentrated
in the central, east, and southern regions (Sneath 2010).
Mongolian residents in the twenty-first century in rural and urban locations
express relationships to nature and pastoralism as a way of life, a memory, or
as imagined history. In recent years ongoing interest in nationalist values often
linked to homeland (nutag) have reinforced these connections while new chal-
lenges have emerged that are affecting rural herders, urban markets, and the
country’s economy (Sneath 2010; Upton 2010).
Mongolia’s recent history as a socialist country played a critical role in its
urban and industrial growth. Soviet-inspired focus on collectivization and in-
dustrialization encouraged expanding industries and urban lifeways. Following
the dissolution of old systems at the end of the socialist era in the early 1990s,
relationships of Mongolian residents to urban and rural, industrial and pastoral
ways underwent many changes (Sneath 2006). By the second decade of the
twenty-first century, herders in many regions were experiencing the effects of
the new market economy along with the impact of industrial development on
the land they were stewarding. At the same time, climate change and its un-
predictable weather patterns discouraged many pastoralists; they were unable
to manage the extreme environmental and economic changes that were con-
fronting them. The resulting exodus from the countryside caused exponential
population increases not only in Ulaanbaatar (population 1.5 million), but even
in provincial capital cities and other industrial cities such as Erdenet (popula-
tion 100,000) and Darkhan (population 100,000). By 2018, sixty-two percent
of the population of 3.1 million people in Mongolia were living in urban areas
(MSIS 2019). Urban locations offer modern lifeways for some residents, but for
too many, large cities such as Ulaanbaatar present extreme divisions between
wealth and poverty for their residents.
Mining activities in Mongolia have also had significant effects on lifeways.
The gold, copper, and coal mining industries—and others—promise economic
benefits, although they have not always delivered. They provide instead a dev-
astating impact on lifeways and culture in regions where businesses are located
(Jackson 2015a; 2015b; Post 2020). The inevitably shrinking pastoral land is in-
creasingly crisscrossed with new roads, upgraded and planned railway networks,
and mines near rural and urban sites. Many of these projects have international
contractors, and funding support for Mongolia includes substantial loans from
international banks. The rail lines and roads in the north pass through the
Erdenet copper mine, to coal and silver mines in the west of the country, and
into Russia. In the South Gov’ Desert, the huge Oyu Tolgoi gold-copper mine,
along with Tavan Tolgoi coking coal mine and its nearby Ukhaa Khudag open
coal mine are linked to China. These sites and many others throughout the
country have had considerable impact on the health and well-being of local
pastoral residents (Gunchinsuren et al. 2011; Pfeiffer et al. 2017).

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 FIGURE 1.2. Grassland in Hulunbuir, Inner Mongolia. Photo by Sodhuu Ormis
Gunbilig (used with permission).

Inner Mongolia
Inner Mongolia is dominated by grasslands in its central region, desert in
the east, and forests, forest steppes, grasslands, and wetlands in the northwest
(see figure 1.2). In general, valued lands in Inner Mongolia have not been suf-
ficiently protected from agriculture, mining, and livestock overgrazing causing
considerable biodiversity loss (Ma et al. 2016; Xu and Wu 2016). The temperate
grasslands, which comprise sixty-seven percent of the land, include meadow
steppe, steppe, and desert steppe (Han et al. 2009). The Inner Mongolian Plateau
holds vast temperate grasslands with lakes that sustained these pasturelands
for livestock grazing for generations. In recent years, many lakes in the plateau
have been shrinking and the grasslands are degrading. Near this region the Yin
Mountains stretch across the north, and their sedimentary rock holds coal beds
that are heavily mined. To the east, the Alashan Plateau ecoregion in both the
Gov’ (Gobi) desert in Mongolia and the westernmost desert of Inner Mongolia,
bounded in both countries by mountain ranges, has generally arid conditions.
Here many of the same wildlife found in Mongolia once thrived, but today in
China they are gone. In the southwestern part of the ecoregion the Anxi Nature

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 Reserve offers the potential for conservation, but most wildlife there has also
been decimated. There are plans to reintroduce the Saiga antelope although
much of the Alashan Plateau region is now also being used for human popula-
tion resettlement. A significant natural area, the Amur-Heilong ecoregion spans
three countries: Russia, Mongolia, and China, and includes the Amur-Heilong
River Basin that provides habitats for many species of fish and rare migratory
water birds, such as the red-crowned crane and the hooded crane. Portions of
the northern part of the North Da Xing’anling (Hinggan) Mountains that feed
the Amur River are known for their coniferous forests that include evergreens,
such as Manchurian or needle fir and Siberian spruce, and deciduous trees,
such as Manchurian elm, Manchurian ash, and Mongolian oak. At the lowest
elevations, the land becomes grassland (Simonov and Dahmer 2008). Mongol,
Daur, Evenki, Nanai and Orochen peoples live in parts of Inner Mongolia,
but heavy investment in mining and urbanization has impacted the residents’
lifeways (ibid).
Mongol relationships to pastoralism and nature in Inner Mongolia have
undergone extreme changes during the last century. Some of the biggest come
from land use restructuring, expanding urbanization, and the growth of min-
ing and other industries. The relationships Inner Mongolians have to the land
varies by region, but state policy that impacts how land is managed mediates
their experiences with pastoralism and nature, discounting or manipulating
herders’ knowledge and skills developed through local practice.2 Lifeways for
many have been altered by relocating residents or by changing the character of
the land as it is repurposed. A key action that began to affect pastoralists in the
1970s was a grasslands contract policy in which the government divided the land
and then monitored it to maintain focus on production, although the carrying
capacity of land was often exceeded (Dickinson and Webber 2007). Addressing
a Mongol dominant region such as Uxin Ju in the central western drylands, in
the early 2000s, Hong Jiang (2005:643) suggested that grasslands in Mao and
Post-Mao eras were treated “primarily as a political or economic instrument”
thus “weakening ties between Mongolian identity and nomadic grazing.” These
changes have been responsible for a shift in Mongol identity from pastoralism
“toward symbolic features of language and heritage” (ibid:651). Other land re-
structuring involved expanding agriculture into grasslands and development
of privatization of once collectively managed grassland, discouragement of
seasonal migration, and development of fencing strategies to indicate owner-
ship and use of land by family. This, in conjunction with climate change, has
led to widespread land degradation and the collapse of mobile grazing practices
that play a critical role in maintaining biodiversity in Inner Mongolia (Li and
Huntsinger 2011; Conte 2015).
Growing urbanization in Inner Mongolia offers commercial, industrial, po-
litical, and cultural opportunities that radiate from the capital city of Hohhot

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 (population 3.1 million), an economic, political, and cultural center, to other
cities such as the industrial and transport city of Baotou (population 2 million);
the south central city of Ulaanchab (population 2.1 million), a transportation
hub; the southeastern city of Chifeng (population 4.3 million), a commercial
center; and the small northeastern city of Hulunbuir (population 250,000).
While rapid urbanization plans during the last two decades were partially es-
tablished to benefit rural residents economically, they have devastated the land
ecologically in Inner Mongolia as well as other regions in China (Fang et al.
2015). The cities provide centers for new economic and social opportunities
and at the same time cause Mongol language and culture loss largely because
the Han Chinese are now dominant in the cities (Hohhot city is ninety per-
cent Han).3 As in Mongolia, grasslands are being repurposed for mining coal,
natural gas and gold. The mining industries have played a role in displacement
and loss of essential resources such as water, and have caused “deforestation,
desertification, and dust storms” (Sanchez 2013). Socially and culturally, herders
have experienced even greater marginalization due to the economic power the
mining companies wield, the arrival of more Han Chinese into many regions,
and additional aggressive land seizures from the Mongols (Baranovitch 2016).

Social Spaces
In Mongolia, rural family settlements continue to display historically es-
tablished social divisions of labor and responsibility. The heart of many rural
settlement spaces is the ger (see figures 1.1 and 1.3), the portable tent-like struc-
ture made of wood, felt, animal hair, and cotton that holds a household and
reinforces social relationships both inside the structure and in the surround-
ing land (Humphrey 1974; Braae 2017). The ger is a home and social space for
pastoralists, a symbol of belonging for rural and urban residents, and a “brand”
for the nation (Krebs 2012). The way the ger is configured—its size, height, and
how interior space is decorated and used in daily life—differs among Khalkh,
Uriankhai, Kazakh, and Tuvan peoples in Mongolia, yet there are broad simi-
larities that indicate common types of social relationships and responsibilities
reflected in lifeways and cultural production. The customary actions that take
place inside the ger come from a long history of the use of the yurt throughout
the geographical region, from Central Asia to Mongolia, including Inner Mon-
golia, and they reflect similarities in pastoral lifeways, including different types
of relationships with natural resources (Braae 2017).
While the portable ger itself has an identity and holds family practices and
histories, the ger can also be considered just a segment of a larger social space,
encompassing lifeways both inside and outside this moveable structure. Each
seasonal site where the ger is set up becomes part of a family’s social and acous-
tic living space that enables herders to maintain their multispecies lives. The

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 herders coexist with the landscape to accommodate the social needs of animals,
humans, plants, landforms, weather, and other entities. The acoustically porous
walls of the ger allow sounds to travel in and out so families can hear their herds
and potential threats, such as wolves. Similarly, what happens inside the ger can
also be heard outside. The realm of the ger that extends beyond the structure
forms a multispecies community made up of humans, their animals, and other
resources they rely on (see Figure 1.3).4 Natasha Fijn (2011:201) in her research
in the Mongolian Khangai region says simply that “herd animals are seen as
part of the extended family.”
Stepping into a ger in the countryside, regardless of the ethnic group, there is
an order to daily life practice that reinforces well-established gendered relation-
ships among its residents and visitors (Benwell 2006). The different contribu-
tions women and men make to assure economic success in pastoral households,
as they manage domestic animals and other resources, include customary prac-
tices that have been maintained for generations. In Mongolia especially, rural
family settlements continue to display these historically established social divi-
sions of labor and responsibility.
The prominent social and cultural roles that men play in families and herd-
ing communities is balanced by a powerful social role that women play in the
realm of the ger. Men are said to be “in charge of the success or failure of the
household to ensure their livelihood” (Agarin and Rudzīte 2018:169) as they
manage decisions about the location of herding sites and when each move will
take place; they dominate decisions about their domestic animals, travel more
frequently to maintain relationships in neighborhoods and to gather supplies
in a nearby sum center, and play leadership roles in their community. With the
internal space in and around the ger as their base, rural women generally are
entangled more fully with family responsibilities where they maintain relation-
ships with and support for actors in this spatial realm, especially their spouses,
children, relatives, visitors, and domestic animals.
The ger and the social roles it holds is today undergoing change that impacts
family members in various ways. Since the end of socialism, the ongoing adjust-
ments to local populations, available products, and access to conveniences have
directly affected the inhabited space in and around the ger. More rural children
are sent to school where they board for the winter, and as they grow many do
not return to the settlements where they were raised, creating an absence in
this space. The increasing use of electronics, from televisions to smartphones,
has altered activities and soundscapes in the ger. Greater mobility also changes
women’s roles; for example, new economic opportunities that international or-
ganizations offer provide greater independence and more mobility for women.
Despite all this, the ger and its social and cultural significance still remains a
central component in the economic and ecological success of a rural herding
family’s existence and continues to be looked to as a significant Mongolian icon.

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 Values and Beliefs about Nature
To the Mongols the term “environmental protection” has the connotation of
being governed by and to live in harmony with nature, respecting the soil
and earth as one does their own mother, having compassion towards both
the earth and its creatures, and to behave ethically when using ecological
resources (Batbold 2015:10).

The long history of pastoralism and rural lifeways in the Eurasian steppe has
reinforced connections between humans and their ecological environment and
established active human nonhuman relationships in communities for many.
The people, animals, plants, and landforms, as well as behaviors that sustain
relationships among them, are part of networks in complex social-ecological
systems that are linked to interactions of people and the natural world. Rural
residents demonstrate that they value abundant grasslands and rare flora and
fauna. Many people identify aspects of their heritage and/or family history with
pastoralism, whether they live in the countryside or city. National themes in the
post-socialist era in Mongolia have reinforced connections to nature by high-
lighting pastoralism as a nation-building tool used for “practicing Mongolian-
ness” (Agarin and Rudzīte 2018).
Spiritual beliefs and ways of knowing have also helped shape values related
to natural resources. In fact, many beliefs and practices promoted today linked
to relationships with nature come from pre-socialist times; they are designed
around reemergent, renewed, as well as invented beliefs identified with ani-
mism and Buddhism (Humphrey et al. 1993; Tseren 1996; Upton 2010; Sneath
2001:2014). Spiritual well-being—pathways to spiritual health expressed in dif-
ferent communities—is also often connected to nature. In fact, for Mongols,
spiritual entities (gazryn ezed) are “land masters” “held responsible for the gen-
eral conditions (rainfall, diseases, fertility etc.) upon which human and animal
life depend” (Pedersen 2006:100).
Such spirits were, and still are, propitiated in annual ceremonies held at ritual
cairns made of stones and/or branches, called oboo. These ceremonies reflect
the notion that humans do not hold land as they do other mundane pos-
sessions, but enter into relations with the spiritual powers of the locality to
ensure favourable conditions. The spirits associated with a given oboo and
locality have different preferences with respect to offerings (Sneath 2001:45).

Pastoralists in other ethnic groups in Mongolia also maintain older values,

beliefs, and practices that help them connect with the land, engage socially
with human nonhuman entities, and monitor and maintain some control over
human and ecological well-being. For example, Altai Uriankhai epic song (tuul’)
is a “repository of spiritual knowledge” combining shamanism and Buddhist
ideas and expressing relationships of the Altai Uriankhai peoples with their

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 geographic place and its embodied spirits (Plueckhahn 2013:200). The Kazakhs
in Mongolia, who are Muslim, reference ancestors (babalar) and spirits (aruaq)
that are embodied in specific sites. For all pastoralists, their relationships to
place and sense of responsibility “are predicated upon the creation and ongo-
ing maintenance of reciprocal relationships of care for the land, the ancestors
and their descendents” (Dubuisson and Genina 2011:470). In Inner Mongolia,
government policies during the twentieth century challenged spiritual values,
not unlike Soviet-influenced socialist programs in Mongolia. Mongol religious
beliefs and practices were considered unsophisticated and efforts were made
to replace them with scientific thinking (Williams 2002). Today few Mongols
in China have maintained spiritual and ecological knowledge, except in the
most remote areas.

Sound Worlds
Sound worlds in both rural and urban Mongolia and Inner Mongolia show
evidence of values and beliefs that support pastoralism and nature. Their sound-
scapes—ambient sound landscapes—are defined by knowledge built within
their social worlds. In rural regions, sound-making and listening practices prag-
matically and spiritually connect herders with the resources they need and
value. Local sounds, songs, and melodies frequently reflect human lifeways and
the particular configuration of wildlife, plant life, and landforms found locally
(Post 2019). Sound is as fundamental to city life as it is to rural life, and city
soundscapes help to establish a unique character that contributes to an urban
sense of place. Music in urban settings can offer opportunities for residents
to imagine or remember pastoral lifeways. The rural and urban sound worlds
come together most directly in ritual activities: annual naadam celebratory
events where “physical strength, precision and horsemanship are exhibited, and
praised,” ovoo, or sacred cairns, where offerings are made to spirits of the land,
and travel to shrines such as mineral springs are all closely linked to pastoralism
and nature (Lindskog 2016:21).
In rural regions, vocalizing is often tied to herding practices and interspecies
communication. Herders listen to sounds of livestock, wildlife, trees, grasses,
and people, and sounds of winds, rain, and thunder at different sites and times
of day, the men more often in relation to grazing sites and women in and near
the ger. They use what they hear to make decisions about safety and secu-
rity, human and animal health and well-being, and seasonal movement (Pegg
2001; Levin and Süzükei 2006). Both women and men also vocalize to direct
or control livestock while herding and to placate and communicate with their
animals while milking (Fijn 2011; Yoon 2018a; Hutchins 2019). Documenting
relationships between humans and domestic animals in the Khangai mountain

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 region in central Mongolia, Fijn (2008) shows how herders communicate using
sounds and body language. She identifies specific vocalizations for each domestic
animal in her descriptive and visual information. “The herder communicates to
the horse that is being ridden, mainly through body language, but the herder
also vocalises to the goats, sheep, and, in a removed sense, to potential wolves
to warn them away from the flock through yells and whistles: This is a complex
system of multispecies communication” (2011:105). In the northern Altai-Sayan
region, which includes parts of Mongolia and nearby south Siberia in Russia,
scholars have documented sound customs of Turkic reindeer herders, the Dukha
in Khövsgöl in Mongolia and in south Siberia among the Turkic Tozhu in Tuva
and the Tofa in Irkutsk.5 Charles Stépanoff (2012:296) suggests the Tozhu vocal
cries to reindeer to get their attention, “are neither human nor reindeer lan-
guage” but, as Natasha Fijn (2011) also notes, they use a unique language that
humans adopt to communicate with their domestic animals. The Tofa, who
are both herders and hunters, maintain similarly specialized sonic practices by
“mimicking and stylizing the natural acoustic environment.” David Harrison
(2003:47) in his work with Turkic language and sound mimesis in Russia and
Mongolia suggests, “These skills may confer an adaptive advantage by provid-
ing herders and hunter-gatherers a tool to manage wild animals, plants, and
reindeer. Sound mimesis is manifested in hunting calls, animal-sound imitation,
and more structured song and spoken forms.”
The widely referenced practice of throat singing or khöömii is used through-
out these regions to reference natural sounds, sometimes symbolically or meta-
phorically. Theodore Levin and Valentina Süzükei (2006:77) suggest that Tuvan
throat singers’ sounds that represent nature “are the sonic embodiments of
landscapes, birds, and animals along with the spirits that inhabit them.” When
performed in rural western Mongolia, khöömii is said to mimic the sounds of
winds whistling and rushing through local mountain crevices or water moving
over rocks in brooks and streams (Pegg 1992). Johanni Curtet (2010:6) describes
the practice not only as a way for pastoralists to mimic sounds, but also to “com-
municate with nature, as well to pass the time watching their herds or to enliven
an evening in the ger.” In its modern form, developed for the stage in Mongolia
during the socialist period, khöömii can still play a role for some performers and
audience members as a tool to draw and recall a landscape, thus khöömii lives as
a musical form both inside and outside the pastoral environment (see Chapter
8 in this volume). In Inner Mongolia khöömii was imported from Mongolia
during the 1990s through the efforts of Mongolian teachers (see Chapter 2 in
this volume). Urban popular musicians also draw from Tuvan throat singing
practices to enhance their style and mark their identity (D’Evelyn 2013; Wu
2019), and urban listeners in both countries enjoy not only the mimetic char-
acteristics, but also the virtuosity that has been developed in recent years.

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 Pastoralist-musicians also create and perform compositions that reflect
sounds and soundscapes in their daily lives. The music they perform may ref-
erence animals, birds, and weather with rhythms played on instruments to
represent the gait of a horse or camel, sounds that reference the camel’s cry or a
bird’s call, or melodies that draw a picture of a landscape in sound. The narrative
instrumental form tatlaga, often played on the bowed Khalkh morin khuur, or
the Oirad bowed ikil in western regions, tells stories and imitates sounds and
movements using melody, rhythm, and timbre, and it is associated with the
dance/gestural form bie/biyelgee (Levin and Süzükei 2006). Other narrative
and lyrical forms and styles that link sound and sound quality with herding are
performed on flutes in different regions of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia. End-
blown flute players, such as Mongol and Oirad tsuur, Tuvan shoor, and Kazakh
sybyzghy often produce a low vocal drone that acts as external amplifier for the
sound, and side-blown flute limbe performers of eastern Mongols sometimes
use circular breathing. Their compositions connect sound, sound quality, and
performance with herding practices (Hamayon 1973; Pegg 2001; Chuluunbaatar
2013). Historically the flutes were made using local plants herders gathered near
the fields where their animals grazed. Their music often includes timbrally rich
sounds that—like the morin khuur and ikil—imitate animal sounds and tell
stories about pastoral lifeways (Post forthcoming). Songs performed in rural
settings may also describe shared grazing places or sites, identify spatial relation-
ships to land and resources while herding, recount experiences with animals,
and communicate values related to family, conservation, as well as spirituality
(Post 2017, 2019).
The vocal form urtyn duu (long-song), while performed today in both rural
and urban settings in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, also maintains its roots in
pastoral traditions (see Chapter 3 in this volume). It continues to be used in some
regions, along with vocalization and other song forms, to communicate with
livestock while milking and engaging in other activities (Yoon 2018b; Hutchins
2019). This song form and others, including magtaal (praise-song), may refer-
ence land and resources descriptively, as Carole Pegg (2001:179) identifies in a
song she heard in Khovd aimag performed by an Oirad singer in a Myangad
community. It describes the character of the land during the summer with ref-
erences to rain, grasses, flowers, and the cuckoo, all valued resources in their
daily and seasonal lives.6 Other song forms, that Harrison (2004:208) refers to
as domestication songs, are used by Tuvans in Bayan-Ölgii and Khovd aimags
in western Mongolia (and in Tuva) to “make an animal calm down, stand still,
feed a calf that is not its own, allow [it] to be milked, ridden, shorn, treated for
sickness” and more.
The melodic contours used in some local songs can be linked to local to-
pography (Yoon 2018a, 2019). Liliana Carrizo (2010:13) argues that the melodic

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 contours of urtyn duu sung in Dundgov’ aimag in Mongolia enable interaction
between humans and ezen, the landscape deities. “Indeed, singing urtiin duu
was an important aspect of human-ezen interaction, where individuals utilized
mimesis to sonically interact with the spirits that reside in particular land-
scapes. In the case of urtiin duu, the melodic contours of songs are mimetic of
environmental sounds and topographies unique to the landscapes of the ezen
particular to a specific nutag, or geographical location.”7 Sunmin Yoon (2018b:94)
suggests that urtyn duu practices in Mongolia function “as a critical, sensitive,
and spiritual means to create relationships that regulate environmental balance
in the singers’ nomadic lives.” She says further that songs provide a forum for
humans and their animals to “connect with each other and contribute to the
vitality of Mongolia’s ecosystem.” Conducting research in the western Alshaa
(Alashan) region of Inner Mongolia, Oyuna Weina similarly found there is a
spiritual dimension to urtyn duu in Inner Mongolia linked to relationships
between the genre and the sky. The urtyn duu repertoire is seasonal, and “the
start of the spring symbolizes the origin of urtyn duu, which the Alshaa people
believe comes from the tenger, or sky” (2018:11).
Urban singers in both Mongolia and Inner Mongolia maintain relationships
and develop new connections with rural values in urtyn duu training and per-
formance. Yoon documents urban singers’ growing interest in drawing from
pastoral lifeways in rural locations for songs. Their experiences may be drawn
from a childhood in the countryside and expressed in descriptive lyrics to cre-
ate remembered places, emotions, and sensations for singers, and a virtual or
imagined landscape for others with limited time in the countryside (Yoon 2019).
Weina discusses expressions of nostalgia for nature and argues that artists invoke
old practices, including elements linked to pastoralism, in order to maintain
“consistent relationships with past traditions in the face of significant social
change” (2018:5). Retaining these elements in urtyn duu performances acts to
both “resurrect and reinterpret” original contexts for performance. She argues
that “visual and zoological metaphors” related to lifestyle along with melodic and
timbral characteristics in performance contribute to the expressions of longing
and nostalgia in both rural and urban contexts. Inner Mongolian urtyn duu,
Charlotte D’Evelyn (2018:33) notes, carries a “grassland sensibility, including the
psychological and musical understanding of expansive, vast space” that is criti-
cal to the “proper performance” of long-song repertoire. She says, “When they
study long song, Mongol youth who were raised in the city are often criticized
for their inability to appropriately express the aesthetic of the grassland due to
the fact that they grew up in crowded and fast-paced urban lifestyles” (ibid).
Musical performance can also capture both pastoralism and urban life values.
Hybrid musical forms produced for both local and global markets give artists
opportunities to perform identities and express national heritage, thus drawing

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 from both the past and the present and the rural and urban worlds (Marsh 2006;
Dovchin 2011; Marsh 2018). In urban settings people are separated physically
from daily life in rural spaces and places; some of their songs show respect, and
even entanglements with nature, and as Marsh (2006:134) says, include topics
“such as love for one’s parents, the beauty of the Mongolian landscape, or the
wonders of the Mongolian horse.” Thus, even while globalization contributes to
the creation of new genres and styles, nationalist tropes that embrace pastoralism
continue to emerge in musical forms. Examples include the ongoing promotion
of music and musical instruments identified with pastoralism and nature, such
as khöömii, the song form urtyn duu, and the instrument morin khuur.

Sound, Music, Pastoralism, and Nature

in Bayan-Ölgii
Bayan-Ölgii aimag in western Mongolia offers local residents and visitors
stunning views of mountains, grasslands, and forests in this region bordered
by China and Russia. Most coveted are the Altai Mountains along the Chinese
border and the lands and lakes in the Altai Tavan Bogd National Park (see
figures 1.3 and 1.4).8 Other valued sites include the Tsambagarav Uul National
Park in the east shared with Khovd aimag and the transboundary Siilkhemiin
Nuruu National Park (SNNP)9 in the north along the Russian border, which
offers alpine and mountain steppes, a prime habitat for argali sheep and snow
leopards. Petroglyphs depicting wild and domestic animals in the Altai as well
as Siilkhemiin, Tsambagarav, and other locations indicate that the lands have
been used for pastoralism for thousands of years.10
The majority of the 105,000 Bayan-Ölgii residents who have lived in the re-
gion for generations are Kazakh, Tuvan, or Altai Uriankhai (see figure 1.4). Main-
taining close ties to pastoralism, sixty-four percent of the provincial population
lives in rural settings, in contrast to the Mongolian national rural population
of thirty-two percent (MSIS 2018). This location is therefore particularly suited
for discussing relationships between music, sound, pastoralism, and nature.
Furthermore, the aimag is wholly in the Altai Sayan ecoregion, a conservation
area located at the convergence of Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan, and China that
is home for rare flora and fauna (Uluqpan and Knapp 2012). The Bayan-Ölgii
herders’ seasonal movement in support of their livestock takes some of them
from desert steppe to grasslands to alpine forests. Maintaining herding practices
linked through family values after 1991, the Kazakh, Tuvan, and Uriankhai pas-
toralists in the aimag use sounds, songs, and tunes to express relationships with
the vulnerable resources that are all critical to their ecological and economic
success and well-being.

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 FIGURE 1.3. Tuvan settlement at Tavan Bogd Mountains in western Mongolia, 2011.
Photo by J. C. Post.

FIGURE 1.4. Kazakh summer settlements at Dala köl (Tal nuur in Mongolian) in
Bayan-Ölgii aimag, 2018. Photo by J. C. Post.

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 Ölgii city is an expanding provincial capital, like so many other urban areas
in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, that has grown especially as herders come
in from countryside locations where they have struggled with both economic
difficulties and climate change. In the second decade of the twenty-first century,
the city showed evidence of more wealth and greater poverty than it did just
ten years before. While there is diversity, Altai Uriankhais, Dörvöds, Tuvans,
and Kazakhs share pasturelands and urban spaces; the Kazakhs are the primary
provincial residents. They dominate in the city as they do in the countryside.
On Olgii city streets, Kazakh is the primary language heard, men wear embroi-
dered Kazakh caps, women’s heads are covered with colorful scarves, and it is
not uncommon to see children carrying dombyras on their way to school or the
local theater (where Kazakh music and instruments are also in the majority).11
The Kazakh residents, whose families have lived in the region at least since
the nineteenth century, make up ninety percent of the provincial population.
They began to move into western Mongolia primarily from the Altai region in
western China beginning in the mid-nineteenth century. Some had been settled
in China for generations after fleeing Russian imperial expansionism in Central
Asia beginning in the seventeenth century (Soni 2003). Material indications
of Kazakh long-term residence in the aimag are also seen in the countryside
where not only current structures, but remnants of old winter homes made of
stone, mud-clay, or wood dot the landscape. Other evidence is in the small local
Muslim grave sites that generations of families that settled in each region have
maintained. Even songs that were passed from previous generations reference
the Bayan-Ölgii land over time. Rural residents also access urban soundscapes
and musical traditions when they travel to Ölgii for supplies or to attend a toi
(celebration). Radio, television, commercial recordings, and music shared at
events in the sum centers and Ölgii city introduce new styles, but rural residents
also continue to engage with older musical genres. They offer forums for sharing
knowledge about their histories, the character of the land, and the resources they
experience across wide expanses of land they use in their seasonal practices.

Sound Worlds in Bayan-Ölgii

Kazakh relationships to sounds and soundscapes in Bayan-Ölgii have devel-
oped in the context of local ecosystems and established social patterns. Social
spaces in rural regions are defined by herders’ sonic and other sensory experi-
ences in families and residential communities (auyl) and in their daily lives in
pasturelands and other natural sites. My discussions about sound with Kazakh
herders in different locations in the aimag reveal that they draw on diverse forms
of communication using sound as they care for their livestock (mal). They listen
in different spatial settings not only to their horses, sheep, goats, yaks, and cam-

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 els, but also to gauge the health of wildlife. Birds offer them signals and solace,
insects are indicators of land health, and the sounds of water sources, grasses,
and leaves of trees also provide knowledge about environmental health. Herders
also influence animal behavior with sounds with vocalizations transmitted in
families from generation to generation.
In the Altai Mountain region along the border with China where there is
some forested land, Kazakh herders tell me they listen carefully where their
animals are grazing for the sounds of specific kinds of winds, such as the quyun
zhel, a fast-moving swirling wind dangerous to their livestock that may also
be accompanied by a terrifying sound. The sound and wind signals them to
collect their animals and seek protection in the forests. In contrast to this, the
samal zhel is a soft wind and represents quieter sound, calmer animals, and a
greater sense of well-being. Sounds of specific birds in the Tolbo sum region,
where small lakes and protective rock outcroppings provide seasonal homes
for the ruddy duck and the bar headed goose, offer herders acoustic reminders
to prepare for their own seasonal moves (Post 2019). Many herders also refer
to sounds of wildlife, such as ibex (täueshki), argali (arqar), and deer (bughy),
that they value, yet are a rapidly disappearing part of their soundscape.
The Kazakh ger (kiiz üy) and the lands nearby are also interspecies social
and sonic spaces in rural Bayan-Ölgii. Viewing a ger-dotted landscape from a
distance one can immediately identify the Kazakh settlements: their gers are
taller and often larger in diameter than those of Mongol and Tuvan peoples. Like
other pastoralists in Mongolia, Kazakh indoor and outdoor spaces are carefully
ordered according to the needs of both humans and animals, and herders’ activi-
ties occur in accordance with traditionally maintained social roles, divided not
only by age, but by gender. While men tend to engage with herding in grasslands
and visiting away from their settlement during the daytime, and in the fields
and at home provide care for the health of animals, women maintain relation-
ships with the interior and more immediate space around the ger, interacting
with family members, visitors, and domestic animals that are nearby. In this
ger-centered context, sound is an outcome of the diverse activities supporting
social obligations and interspecies relationships. I engaged with women produc-
ing, evaluating, and acting in relation to sound inside and outside the ger in
settlements throughout the aimag. Day and night, the interior space includes
their sounds of cooking, washing dishes, and making and maintaining a fire,
which also engages women and children with gathering fuel in nearby resonant
fields and forests and water in streams or a lake that is close by. The ger also
includes the sounds of women caretaking children and the elderly along with
very young animals, such as lambs and kids, that are provided shelter in the
ger until a family is confident it will survive. At the same time, women listen
for the arrival of family members and guests, for whom they are expected to

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 FIGURE 1.5. Kazakh women milking yaks in the early morning, Muzdy tau in Bayan-
Ölgii aimag, 2013. Photo by J. C. Post.

prepare tea, and for warnings of trouble and need for action in connection with
nearby livestock or changes in weather. Women are also responsible for milk-
ing (although men help to gather and tie up the animals); their yaks are milked
typically once daily and sheep and goats once or twice daily. During their daily
milking women engage, as men do in their own herding work, using sonically
rich communication practices to call, direct, and calm the animals. Seasonally,
in summer months, women milk horses every few hours, and typically men
will provide a vocalization that calms the horses.
Some sonic relationships that Kazakh herders share with specific animals
indicate spiritual connections and other relationships that provide a sense of
well-being. Kazakhs in Bayan-Ölgii do not vocalize using khöömii (throat sing-
ing), popular in some other western Mongolian communities and developed as
a performance genre throughout Mongolia and Inner Mongolia (see Chapter
9 in this volume), but they maintain beliefs about the timbral power of sound.
Kazakh herders value the unique forms of communication they share with their
animals. Altai Tügelbai, at his summer settlement (zhaylau) at Sary buyra near
Dayan köl (Dayan nuur in Mongolian), described to me behaviors and sounds
his horse makes before travel; they are signals to indicate whether horse and
rider will be safe or may run into difficulty (Interview, June 3, 2014). Accord-

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 ing to Altai, relationships with some animals are also spiritual. He says animals
provide an energy that allows herders to care for them. When Altai needs to
sleep among his horses at night in a remote grazing area, their sounds and
restlessness may keep him from sleeping but he never tires, and instead the
animals’ presence, both day and night, provides him energy. In Tolbo, Delüün,
and Sagsai sums herders shared information on the calls of specific birds, such
as the cuckoo (kukuk) and owl (zhapalaq), indicating that they are linked for
them to both sense of place and to well-being.

Pastoralism and Nature in Mongolian

Kazakh Music
Mongolian Kazakh musical forms and styles of music-making were greatly
influenced by musical practices established during the socialist era. In this pe-
riod, Russian musicians brought European forms to Ölgii city and Kazakh in-
struments were manufactured to specifications set by Russian makers, replacing
styles that once favored locally available materials and skill sets (see Chapter 7
in this volume). The influences quickly reached the rural communities through
cultural centers that were established in each sum, and some local musicians
were drawn from the countryside to join the city theater.
Despite these changes, social gatherings of Kazakh herders in rural regions
continue to contribute to maintaining older styles and ways of sharing music.
Some of their forms (terme, tolghau) are linked historically to the improvised
songs of the poet-singer (aqyn) and epic-singer (zhyrau). They also share social
song forms that include qara öleng (literally black song, sometimes translated
as “simple song”) and khalyq äni (“people’s song” or folk song) along with other
forms, including küi (a narrative instrumental composition) and specific forms
performed at weddings, funerals, and other life-cycle events (Kunanbaeva 2002).
In historical performances in Central Asia, Kazakh terme focused on “topi-
cal or ethical issues,” while tolghau were “meditative poems” that were sung
before the presentation of an epic poem (Reichl 1992:100). Originally connected
to the zhyrau, the lyrical themes using a specific poetic structure were often
improvised. The song forms are also identified with aqyns, or respected poet-
singers, found throughout Central Asia who provided didactic and philosophi-
cal songs for a community. Yet as the revival of these historically valued forms
in post-Soviet Kazakhstan took place through the media, they adopted new
melodies and became more standardized (Kendirbaeva 1994). Songs produced
in Kazakhstan and Kazakh China in the 1990s and the early 2000s were made
widely available commercially on cassette, CD, VCD, and TV, and online in
the new millennium. In rural Bayan-Ölgii, these genres developed somewhat
differently as poetic forms not only of the aqyn, but as narrative songs of herder-

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 musicians shared in small social gatherings. While songs had locally established
characteristics, they were also influenced by performances available through
Kazakhstani- and Chinese-produced media.12 Some herders note down their
songs in school notebooks to preserve them. In the twenty-first century they
continue to be presented to rural residents who listen attentively for the local
place names, settlement histories, commentary on lifeways, and expressions of
herding values. Thus they engage active herders through song with references to
events related to their daily lives in the natural world. The songs carry ecological
knowledge built from their experience with the land and information shared
from generation to generation. In an excerpt from a terme called “Tughan zher”
(Homeland) written by his brother Qadan, Zharkyn Khuspan at his summer
settlement (zhaylau) at Buzau köl (Tugal nuur in Mongolian) describes the land
and seasonal moves they experience as herders (Interview, July 23, 2018). He
names their winter settlement place (qystau) called Qysangbai, and references
other landforms they value using descriptive language. Muzdy tau refers to an
icy mountain, Shatang su to flowing water, Qonyr bel to a brown colored hill,
and Qyzyl sai to a reddish-colored valley. He also sings about the ular, a snow-
cock used medicinally by Kazakhs and other pastoralists in Mongolia, and the
sary ala qaz or ruddy duck, which is valued for its sound that signals seasonal
change for herders. Referencing herding and animals, locations that are used,
and—most importantly—naming places helps the local herders reinforce their
connection to place. When such songs are sung in a community, people listen
carefully and recognize these places as locations they all share, and care for, as
a community of pastoralists.13

Qysangbay qyrgha qonghan quz artym-ay Qysangbai is the place I move to for the winter
Muzdy tau munarlanghan muzartym-ay Muzdy tau is my foggy glacier
Bökterde böri ulyp ilbis zhortyp Wolves howl and snow leopards run down there
Tepsengge zhayilady ular shulay Ulars graze noisily in Tepseng
Kök qiya kökke örlegen zanggharym-ay My Kök qiya scrapes the sky
Shatang su quldan aqqan anggharym-ay Shatang su flows down the valley
Asylyp asau tolqyn Shegirtaygha Its swelling waves at Shegirtay
Alghynyp algha umtylar zhardan qulay Flow easily down the cliff
Malgha zhay zhylghaly say zhaylyghym-ay My livestock at Zhylghaly valley are comfortable
Sayran köl saryala qaz aydynym-ay Sairan köl is homeland for saryalaqaz
Saghyndym qozy zhayghan bala kündi I miss my childhood, I used to graze lambs
Qaydasyng zamandastar tay qulynday? Where are you, my peers who were like foals?
Anamnyng oyulaghan syrmaghynday Like my mother’s handmade rugs
Allaghyng gülge oranghan qyrdabynday Like Allah’s steppes covered with flowers
Alysqa arman quyl attanghanda When I traveled far away to chase my dreams
Artyma qarayladym qimay-qimay I looked back again and again with deep pain

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 Köshkende qozy aydaghan qongyr belim My Qonyr bel, where I drove the lambs when we moved
Qyzyl say kishkene köl mening zherim Qyzyl sai Kishkene köl is my land
Singirgen tal boyyna aqyl ziyn With intelligence and wisdom
Zhigiti er köngildi qyzy kerim The zhigits are brave hearted and the girls are happy
Üsh tizem, üki tasim, zhotalarym Ush tize, Uki tas, and my mountains
Zyrymdy eske ap zhürsin dos adamym Recognize my zhyr, my friends
Zurtym bar äzheng sayda äkem qonghan My zhurt is in Azhen sai where my father lived
Ata-anam süyn ishken osy aranyng My parents drank the water of this place

Qara öleng has been identified in Kazakhstan as a domestic unaccompanied

song, sung by women, that use poetic and melodic formulas to provide oppor-
tunities for the singer to improvise lyrics and embellish melodies. Kunanbaeva
(2016:182) describes the songs as enabling “dialogical interaction” in local gather-
ings. In rural Bayan-Ölgi, the qara öleng I experienced were sung by men with
dombyra (two-string plucked lute) accompaniment at neighborhood gatherings
using locally shared melodies. Visiting Aldanysh Untan from Sagsai sum, settled
for the summer at his zhaylau at Muzdy tau, I asked him about place names
used in social songs in these rural regions where pastoralists share stories about
places they travel and value while herding and moving seasonally (Interview,
July 8, 2018). To communicate about valued sites, he sang a qara öleng using
Kazakh place names, which are descriptive of the geographic characteristics and
embody local history. He sang about a flowing stream (bulaq) near their settle-
ment site: “Taldi bulaq begins from Muzdy tau” (From there Taldi bulaq flows
down). He references a place named by Uriankhai people (Modon khöshöö—a
Mongolian wooden statue) and others shared by different groups such as Böken
tau (Antelope mountain): “There are places called Modyn xöshöö and Böken /
Where Dörvöd, Kazakh, and Uriankhai have lived;” and he discusses the char-
acter of the herding land and the isolated hill (Aral töbe) where he must take
his sheep to graze: “Qorymdy, next to Muzdy tau is so rocky / I herd my sheep
on the top of Aral töbe.” His lyrics indicate his connections to place, landforms,
Kazakh identity, and herding practices (including decisions about locations
for herding). Aldanysh’s song is largely descriptive, and as we traveled to each
site I saw how his lyrics revealed the region’s shared history and his knowledge
about each place. He expressed support for grassland and livestock, revealed
the essential role of water, and shared concern for the well-being of all.
Each settlement location for a herding family provides new forums for en-
gagement with human nonhuman actors. Songs and tunes are used to express
their relationships and to reinforce knowledge and communicate it to members
of their communities. When herders leave their rural lifestyles due to ecological,
social, or political challenges, their musical lives in urban locations are more
fully engaged with national and international repertoires and their local songs

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 (and sound practices) are often left behind (Post 2020). For those who have not
lived in rural regions, but visit as actual or virtual tourists, the songs may be
nostalgic and/or present imagined places. Songs remind listeners of the wealth
of the land, as Altai Tügelbai sang in this family song (Interview, June 3, 2014).

Shopandar änge salar malyn zhayyp Herders sing when grazing their animals
Myng qoyy qaltaghanda zher zhuzdi alyp Thousands of animals are scattered all over the land
Ashysy suyda mol shöbi shüygin Rich in water, the grass is moist
Oynaqtap asyp salar o tughan el My homeland is where I am happy

Herders offer descriptive information and express emotional responses to the

land and its resources, as Minäp Qazanbai did in the midst of a song about
his travels to Zhasyl köl (Green Lake) near the Chinese border on horseback
(Interview, June 17, 2007).

Tireldim bir burylyp Zhasyl kölge I turned to go to Zhasyl köl

Ornaghan Zhasyl kölim asu belde Zhasyl köl is on a hill at the border
Koyghanday qolmen zhasap zher suluy The land is as beautiful as things made by hand
Qazyna baylyq zhatyr osy zherde This place is filled with treasures of the earth
Talsayda aghyp zhatyr muzdan bulaq A spring flows from the Talsay glacier
Iilip zhayqalady tal men quraq The willows bend beautifully
Eriksiz könilingdi sergitedi My energy is refreshed
Quyylghan sarqyrama quzdan qulap By a waterfall running down from the cliff

In Ölgii city, the local Music and Drama Theater, developed during the so-
cialist era, has contributed to a unique Kazakh musical culture in the aimag.
It was shaped in the twentieth century by cross-border relationships between
Mongolian Kazakhs and musicians from the Kazakh Republic before 1991 (Yagi
2019). Musical repertoires, instruments, and practices were uniquely influenced
by Russian-European music, evolving music of the Kazakh Republic, and local
Mongolian Kazakh traditions. The small theater orchestra included musical
instruments developed from the two-string plucked dombyra and two-string
bowed qobyz to play both European and Kazakh repertoires. Both rural and
urban performers were given opportunities to become professional musicians
and these artists also began to teach in the local schools, offering opportunities
for students to learn the russified Kazakh traditions on dombyra (Yagi 2018).
This ongoing practice, emulating both the Soviet educational system and a
new performance aesthetic from post-Soviet Kazakhstan, provides opportuni-
ties for students to develop skills on the dombyra through competition and in
ensembles. With greater global influence, some young musicians in Bayan-
Ölgii are now beginning to become involved in popular music, emulating both

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 popular forms in Ulaanbaatar and in Kazakhstan. Musical interests in Ölgii in
the twenty-first century also reflect their various life experiences. Some new city
dwellers have recently arrived from the countryside; others have spent time for
education or employment in Ulaanbaatar, Kazakhstan, or Turkey, while many
are second or third general urban residents in Ölgii.
For pastoralists who spend much of their lives in rural regions in Bayan-Ölgii,
sound production, listening, and music-making continue to play significant roles
in their lives. Their songs and melodies are well integrated in local landscapes,
and their melodies and lyrics also contribute to memories of nature for those
living in urban or semi-urban areas as well as diaspora communities around
the world. Local ecological knowledge embedded in sounds, melodies and song
lyrics, and in other narrative information such as related discussions or sto-
ries that reference sounds, soundscapes, and places has helped to maintain the
health of the land and the well-being of rural residents (Post 2017). Music that
references these sounds and landscapes performed in urban contexts can also
contribute to conservation of the land and lifeways when city residents use the
memories, nostalgia, and values to support nature-based policies and actions
rather than allowing industrial and technologically rich actions and sounds to
dominate and erase their pastoral history.

Conclusion
Mongolian sound worlds have helped both rural and urban residents main-
tain connections to pastoralism and nature in the twenty-first century. The
long history of mobile pastoralism and its links to domestic animals, wildlife,
grasslands, forests, and other resources herders relied on for human and eco-
logical health and well-being, are embedded in the minds, values, and musics
of both rural and urban residents. They are well-represented in sounds they
value and use and music they create and share. Changes from mid-twentieth
to early-twenty-first centuries brought by social, political, ecological, and eco-
nomic events have affected both urban and rural communities, generating loss
of cultural production in some settings and the growth and development of
new music that is filled with images of past practices.
The rural representations of nature, especially among pastoralists who con-
tinue to engage directly with the sources of valued sounds (their domestic ani-
mals, wildlife, winds, and water) and the entities in their songs and melodies
(nature and social and spiritual relationships in herding contexts), have direct
relationships to their daily lives in each seasonal location. When they abandon
their lifeways because of devastating weather events, changes in the land brought
by industry, or to “improve” their lives by moving to urban or semi-urban set-
tings, the sounds and much of the music are left behind. Yet the ever-increasing

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 mobility of rural and urban peoples in the twenty-first century may mediate
some of these divisions. The actual and imagined movement back and forth
between rural and urban worlds encourages the promotion of sounds, sound-
scapes, and musical practices through media, helping all residents of these two
Mongolian regions to continue to have access to nature and pastoral values.

Notes
1. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
2. Williams (2002:10) argues that major restructuring of land use in the region is
rooted in Confucian elitist attitudes toward mobile pastoralists and political efforts
drawn from a Marx-Lenin-Mao philosophy to hamper “national growth, scientific
rationalism, and economic development.”
3. Fewer than twenty percent of the twenty-five million residents are Mongol
(Bulag 2010; NBS 2018).
4. For discussions of coexistence with animals and other beings, see Haraway
(2008) and Tsing (2015); and on relationships in pastoral settings, see Fijn (2008;
2011) and Petitt and Hovorka (2020).
5. This region is part of the Altai-Sayan ecoregion that not only stretches across
Russia and Mongolia, and includes parts of Kazakhstan and China as well.
6. The song Pegg cites (2001:179–80) is “Suny Delger Sar—Abundant Month of
Summer.”
7. Other scholars who have documented and discussed relationships between
melody and landscape include Pegg (2001), Legrain (2009), and Yoon (2018b).
8. Unless otherwise noted all non-English words referenced in this section are
Kazakh.
9. In Russia, the range is called Sailugem.
10. Petroglyphs from the middle Holocene (c. 6200–3000 BCE) in this region
show the growth of steppe vegetation and herding as an economic practice. The
petroglyphs from the late Holocene (since c. 2000 BCE) indicate greater dependence
on horses in the daily life of the nomadic peoples in this location (UNESCO 2011).
11. A few Uriankhai artists at the theater play tovshuur and tsuur. The morin
khuur is also sometimes played in ensemble with Kazakh instruments, especially
dombyra.
12. Kazakh Chinese CDs and VCDs were available in Xinjiang cities like Altay
where Kazakhs traveled for trade, and they were then sold at the local market in Ölgii.
13. The author is grateful to Almalgul Soltan and Janbolat Khurmarhan for their
contributions to the translations of songs in this section.

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 PART TWO

Ethnicity and
Diversity

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 INTERLUDE

Musical Journeys in
Inner Mongolia and Beyond
TAMIR HARGANA AND
CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN

The passage below is the product of an informal interview conversation

between Tamir Hargana, an Inner Mongolian musician currently based in
Chicago, Illinois, and Charlotte D’Evelyn. The text is not an exact tran-
script of the conversation, but it is a collaborative rendering of Tamir’s
musical life story. The Old Barga and New Barga Banners mentioned
in this passage refer to the regional subdivisions that still exist in Inner
Mongolia, historical relics of the administrative military divisions set up
during the Manchu Qing Dynasty (1644–1911).

My name is Tamir Hargana and I am a member of the group of Mongols

known as the Barga clan. I was born in 1991 in New Barga East Banner and spent
most of my childhood in Old Barga Banner.1
My parents, Sugur Hargana (1960–present, raised in New Barga East Banner)
and Erdengua Duulagchin (1965–present, raised in Old Barga Banner), began
learning long-song from the age of thirteen or fourteen from a famous teacher by
the name of Badmaa (1929–1999). Badmaa is one of the earliest great long-song
teachers in Inner Mongolia and taught many prominent singers, including the
famous married singers Buren Bayar (1960–2018) and Urnaa (~1960–present).
My parents met in Badmaa’s studio and eventually ended up getting married.
After they finished art school, my parents went back to their own villages and
then eventually found positions together in his mother’s home region of Old
Barga Banner. I was already three or four years old at this point. I remember
the time before we moved when we lived in my dad’s village in New Barga East
Banner, where my dad was employed at the local ulaanmöchir, a type of arts
troupe in Inner Mongolia.2 My parents were considered official government

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 2.1. Tamir Hargana. Photo by Jim Wilkinson (used
with permission).

workers and had secure employment for life, which included food and housing
and a living salary. We stayed in the dormitory that was set up for the arts troupe
performers that functioned as both a living and rehearsal space. Even though
I was very young at the time, I remember hearing music coming at all times
of the day from the second-floor dancing studio and the first-floor ensemble
rehearsal room.
Today, my father is professor of long-song at Hulunbuir University, but is
still a member of his old ulaanmöchir. He is well-known in Hulunbuir music
circles for his work as a performer, teacher, and song collector. He personally

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 transcribed and notated three thousand Barga long-songs, many of which he
published in a collection. This work earned him recognition as an official inheri-
tor of Barga long-songs in China. He also carries the title of “National Performer
of the First Rank” (C: guojia yiji yanyuan).
My parents spent most of their time traveling with the ulaanmöchir out in
remote grassland areas and only occasionally came back to visit me. My maternal
grandmother was my primary caregiver at this time, so I had a lot of freedom
to roam around in our local grassland with other neighboring kids. We rode
horses a lot, practically every day. Once I made it to elementary school age, my
parents realized that I could use some more attention and guidance, including
musical education, so they tried to stay behind more often to look after my
studies. After some limited success learning the electric keyboard from my dad,
I decided I wanted to learn the horsehead fiddle.
When I first saw the horsehead fiddle, it immediately sparked my attention.
I had already developed a closeness with horses and the instrument seemed to
somehow magically channel the sound and spirit of a horse. That sound just hit
me. I tried casually picking up the fiddle a few times and played around with
it when I was young, but never learned formally until I was in late elementary
school. Seeing my interest, my father sent me to take weekly lessons with his
co-worker Daruu, a young fiddle player of the Daur ethnic group. It was not
long before I gained enough musical skill to start performing publicly at local
events and school shows.
For high school, I moved from my small banner town to the city center of
Hailar, the capital of the Hulunbuir region in Inner Mongolia. One of the ben-
efits of living in Hailar was continuing my music studies from a fiddle instruc-
tor at Hulunbuir Art Institute named Nachin. I started performing regularly
throughout my high school years and began to think about music as a college
major and career.
My teacher Nachin told me that I would need to move to Hohhot if I wanted
to have a shot at getting into college. He introduced me to his own teacher,
Erdenbökh, and encouraged me to attend his private horsehead fiddle boarding
school in Hohhot, the capital city of Inner Mongolia. Over the phone, Erden-
bökh warned my parents that this road would be rough and would require
extreme discipline and many hours of daily practice. My parents, appreciating
the seriousness of this program and satisfied that it would push me to work
hard, signed me up immediately.
For my third year in high school, I moved all the way to Hohhot to attend
Erdenbökh’s fiddle school. This was a huge transition. Hailar had already seemed
like a big city for me, so Hohhot (1,500 km away from Hailar) was on a whole
different level. This was a completely new life for me and changed everything
about my musical perspective. Erdenbökh challenged me to think carefully

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 about my purpose and intention for music and made me realize that playing
music is something that requires extreme discipline, but also artistry and internal
enjoyment. I felt that everything I had done up to this point in my life was just
a prelude to this moment.
Every year there are nearly five or six hundred horsehead fiddle students who
audition for only a handful of spots at the top universities in Inner Mongolia.
The prestigious Inner Mongolia Art College (IMAC, known at the time as Inner
Mongolia University Art College) accepts only eight horsehead fiddle students
each year. Inner Mongolia Normal University, which requires higher academic
ability than IMAC, recruits ten or fewer students each year. The competition
is intense and students from all ages and very high skill levels apply, including
students who began training for college starting at age ten or professional per-
forming artists who want to go back to school to get a college degree. Students
like myself who only began their training in high school had no chance to get in.
It just so happened that the year I was applying for college was also the
year that the Inner Mongolia Art College opened up a new major: the study of
horsehead fiddle with a concentration in throat-singing (khöömii). This major
was the result of a successful petition to the college, initiated by Erdenbökh
in 2009 and signed by three hundred students. At this time, throat-singing
was in an early state of revival in Inner Mongolia and there were only a few
teachers from Mongolia living and teaching throat-singing in Hohhot. One
of those teachers was Mendbayar, a young performer from Mongolia with a
clear and powerful isgeree khöömii (whistle-style of throat-singing). Mendbayar
was initially invited to Hohhot by Erdenbökh to join a seven-member musical
group called Ayin Ensemble and later became the first full-time throat-singing
teacher at the Inner Mongolia Art College. Many of us in Erdenbökh’s studio
began studying throat-singing with Mendbayar while continuing to improve
our horsehead fiddle skills.
I was lucky enough to join the inaugural class of “horsehead fiddle and throat-
singing” majors at Inner Mongolia Art College in the fall of 2010, through a
combination of my horsehead fiddle ability and my new abilities with throat-
singing. We were an experimental class for sure and had different mentors
working with us during each of their four years in the program. We spent the
first year under the tutelage of Mendbayar to learn isgeree khöömii (whistle
throat-singing) and shakhaa (the tense vocal technique that is the foundation
for isgeree). The second year, we studied with Nars, the leader of Anda Union,
who formed us into an ensemble called Zamch Band and taught us to combine
throat-singing together with traditional instruments. Anda Union was the earli-
est and most well-respected ensemble in Inner Mongolia to incorporate throat-
singing with traditional folk songs and there were similar ensembles springing
up all over the place at that time. Nars was the first teacher who introduced me

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 to Tyvan throat-singing styles such as ezengileer (a style that sounds like horse
trotting) and the Tyvan doshpuluur plucked lute (the three-stringed version of
the Mongolian two-string tovshuur). I immediately fell in love with the bluesy
sound of the doshpuluur and we all enthusiastically embraced Tyvan styles and
sounds that year. During the third year of our studies, the college, recognizing
the growing enthusiasm for Tyvan throat-singing, invited a Tyvan singer named
Nachin to come teach at IMAC. Nachin is a specialist in kargyraa (the chest style
of Tyvan throat-singing) and master of the igil (skin-faced, two-string fiddle
from Tuva). He taught us a variety of Tyvan folk songs that year and introduced
us to the meaning of these songs, both culturally and linguistically (since Tyvan
is a foreign language for us). Our fourth year was spent studying with another
professor from Mongolia, an expert in Altai styles of throat-singing, who taught
us songs and styles from this region.
The summer before our graduation, a group of us participated in the 2013
International Throat-Singing Competition in Kyzyl, Tyva. This event was the
first time that Inner Mongolians and Mongolians were invited to Tyva. We had
a full delegation from Inner Mongolia, including students and members of
the Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Theater (Neimenggu Gewujuyuan). Inner
Mongolian performers took home many prizes that year, including the first
prize for ensemble performance and first prize for kargyraa. For the all-around
category (which included solo and ensemble singing, as well as technical and
stylistic versatility), I received second place.
This competition was an important turning point for throat-singing in Inner
Mongolia. Resources began pouring in from all directions. It was only a few years
prior that not many people in China really knew much about throat-singing at
all. It was relatively hard to find a throat-singing teacher in the early 2000s, but
by the year 2013 there were many instructors teaching throat-singing and even
many ways to study online. We started hearing a saying that if a tree fell on ten
musicians in Inner Mongolia, nine out of ten would be horsehead fiddlers, eight
of those fiddlers would be able to throat-sing, and seven would be named Nars.
Our inaugural class of throat-singing majors graduated in 2014, right at the
peak of this energy for throat-singing in Inner Mongolia. That summer our
performance together as Zamch Band gained first prize in the ensemble category
at the annual International Throat-Singing Competition, held for the first time
that year in China instead of Tyva. Managers from the Inner Mongolia Song
and Dance Theater, a government-sponsored ensemble, approached us after our
performance and essentially handed us lifetime employment contracts after our
successful performance that day.
At this point, I saw two roads in front of me. One led to a reasonably com-
fortable life as a salaried government performer, developing my work with my
classmates as part of Zamch Band. The other road—pursuing my studies in

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 the United States—was more unknown, but somehow stood out to me as the
right choice. In the summer of 2014, I quit my job at the Inner Mongolia Song
and Dance Theater, packed my bags, and left for the United States. Everyone
thought I was completely crazy.
I had already been to the United States twice during my college years and the
experiences were unforgettable. My first trip was part of an ongoing exchange
program that IMAC has with Leland and Gray High School in Vermont. The
second trip was a delegation from Inner Mongolia that included a tour of the
southern and western U.S. and an invited performance at a year-of-the-horse
festival in the state of Kentucky. I had my first introduction to American jazz
on these trips and even had an opportunity to play with a jazz ensemble. It was
experiences like these, which broadened my musical knowledge and continued
to open up my musical world, that made me determined to come back to the
U.S. to continue my studies.
When I arrived back in Lexington, Kentucky, in the fall of 2014, I could
barely speak a word of English. I could not even begin a college degree program
before getting up to speed on my language skills, so I spent that whole first year
learning English. During that year, I had some incredible musical experiences,
including collaborating with bluegrass musicians and even joining a gig with a
death metal band.
I gave a variety of performances and workshops at the University of Kentucky
to introduce Mongolian music to American audiences and started thinking
about what it takes to bridge cultural gaps and to appeal to audience tastes. Our
official government-sponsored tours always filled the seats with audiences, but
when I performed on my own it was hard to fill the seats. I also noticed that the
audiences were intrigued, but not particularly moved by my music or interested
to know more. Some thought my isgeree khöömii (whistle throat-singing) was
a trick or sound effect instead of something with cultural or artistic value. In
contrast, when I was collaborating with bluegrass musicians, listeners had an
easier entry point to appreciate my throat-singing and horsehead fiddle play-
ing. Since Kentucky audiences were familiar with Old-time American music,
we could gradually throw in Mongolian sounds and draw them in that way.
While I was in Kentucky, I met Dr. Han Kuo-Han, the founder of the world
music program at Northern Illinois University (NIU). Dr. Han encouraged me
to apply to the Master’s degree program in World Music Performance at NIU,
where I could add new knowledge and skills and continue learning how to col-
laborate with musicians from different cultural backgrounds.
I enrolled at Northern Illinois University (NIU) in 2015 and received the MA
in World Music Performance in 2017. These two years provided me even more
opportunities for growth as a musician. I had a chance to participate in a variety
of ensembles there, including the Chinese Ensemble, Gamelan Ensemble, and

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 Middle Eastern Ensemble. I even took a short trip to Bali, Indonesia through
a university program to learn gamelan in a rural village. At NIU, a few of us
came together to form a fusion ensemble called Northern Wind Trio, featuring
handpan and jazz guitar together with my Mongolian and Tyvan music.
My time at NIU enabled me to make a smooth transition to living in Chicago
after graduation. I began teaching throat-singing at the Old Town School of
Folk Music and performing on occasion at the University of Chicago or for the
Mongolian community in Chicago (which has one of the largest concentrations
of Mongolian nationals in the U.S.). I have been able to keep up my musical
career through lessons, local performances, invited workshops at university
campuses across the United States, and annual events put on by Mongolian
communities, such as the summer Naadam festival in Bloomington, Indiana,
and the November Chinggis Khan Ceremony in Princeton, New Jersey.
One of the best musical experiences during my time in the United States
was my short time as a member of the folk metal band Tengger Cavalry. This
band was formed in Beijing in 2009 and moved to New York in 2013 under the
leadership of Nature Ganganbaigal, a talented musician and singer with part-
Mongol ancestry. My very first appearance with Tengger Cavalry was a sold-
out performance at Carnegie Hall in September of 2018. After that we took a
two-month tour all across the United States and Canada. Audiences went crazy
about our music! I learned how to lose myself in the heavy metal sound—to
totally forget about playing right or wrong notes and just focus on the energy
exchange between the performers and the audience.
After our concerts, audience members and metalheads came up to me with
enthusiastic comments and questions, wanting to know all about the kargyraa
style (deep, chest style of Tyvan throat-singing that works so well in heavy
metal) and asking me things like, “Hey, your music is so cool. Is it connected
to war or shamanism?” I saw this as a great sign. They were genuinely intrigued
about these sounds and wanted to know more about the history and culture.
Bands like Tengger Cavalry and the Hu Band (a newly formed hard rock band
from Mongolia that went viral on YouTube in 2018) have unexpectedly helped
grow the world’s interest in Mongolian music. Neither of these ensembles really
intended to use Mongolian music in traditional ways, but the Mongolian instru-
ments and throat-singing combined with hard rock and metal gave audiences
something new, but also familiar at the same time.
Unfortunately, Nature passed away in 2019 so we are unsure about the next
steps for Tengger Cavalry at this point. I will never forget my experience touring
with the band, the musical experiences we shared, and friendships we made
together in the American metal community.
I am amazed by the ways that the horsehead fiddle has shaped my life. As
soon as I touched the fiddle it started taking me to bigger places. Each time I

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 needed to advance I had to travel to a bigger and more central location—from
the grassland countryside, to our local banner town, to the capital of Hulunbuir
(Hailar), to the capital city of Inner Mongolia (Hohhot), and later to the United
States (Kentucky and later Chicago). My music background continues to bring
me new opportunities and to meet new people. I consider the horsehead fiddle
like my ticket to the whole world and look forward to seeing where my music
will bring me in the years to come.

Notes
1. These sub-regions of Hulunbuir are across from the Dornod aimag (province)
of Mongolia, not far from the Russian border. The region is home to a number of
ethnic groups, including Barga Mongols.
2. Ulaanmöchir (literally “red branch”) refers to the traveling song and dance
ensembles that were set up in Inner Mongolia during the communist period for
the purpose of putting remote herders and village people in touch with government
messages through the performing arts. Some of these herders did not realize that
their lands were under control of the People’s Republic of China, so one purpose of
the troupes was to “educate” the herders about the new China and the new society
that was being built. The ulaanmöchir continued as a song and dance institution in
Inner Mongolia even after the Mao period, although the tone of the performances
has become less political.

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 CHAPTER 2

Music and Ethnic Identity

in Inner Mongolia
CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN

Until the year 2002, my mental map of China did not include Inner Mon-
golia. That year as an exchange student in Shanghai, I gained my first exposure
to Chinese music and the two-string fiddle (erhu), but also serendipitously had
my first encounters with Mongolian culture and music. My roommate, who
happened to be from the country of Mongolia, held late-night drinking and
singing parties with her Mongolian friends. Far from being a nuisance, these
parties and their music stimulated my interest in Mongolia, and our conversa-
tions introduced me to the existence of an Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
within China, separate from Mongolia. These experiences from 2002 led me
to my current ethnomusicological career and to the fieldwork visits to Inner
Mongolia and Mongolia that inform the subject of this chapter.
Awareness of Inner Mongolia still remains limited largely due to the difficul-
ties of reconciling Inner Mongolia’s position vis a vis Mongolia and its illegibility
using the logic of borders and nation-states.1 This chapter sheds light on this
lesser-known southern half of the Mongolian steppe, focusing on the unique
music and ethnic landscape that sets contemporary Inner Mongolia apart from
Mongolia. The musical ecosystems that I encountered in urban Inner Mongolia
and urban Mongolia, though interconnected, differ in profound ways. Despite an
increasing closeness in institutional ties and connections between musicians in
Hohhot and Ulaanbaatar (the respective capitals and centers of musical activity
in Inner Mongolia and Mongolia, respectively), music in these two regions is
categorized, conceptualized, and regulated in vastly different ways that influ-
ence ideas about music, if not musical sounds themselves. While Mongolia
and Inner Mongolia share many treasured musical practices, particularly urtyn
duu (long-song) and the morin khuur (horsehead fiddle), there are a range of
local, sub-regional genres and practices that are unique to each of these greater

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 FIGURE 2.1. Hohhot-based ensemble, Anda Union (used with permission).

regions. Below I discuss some of the conceptual and political frameworks that
structure musical practice in Inner Mongolia and introduce a small selection
of music styles unique to this region.
This chapter is organized around the following topics: 1) regional diversity,
2) political-artistic movements since the Mao era, and 3) a case study on the
neo-traditional ensemble, Anda Union. My work draws from previous studies of
music in Inner Mongolia in the English language (Pegg 1989, 2001; Baranovitch
2003, 2009; Henochowicz 2008, 2011; Stokes 2013; Weina 2018 ) and landmark
studies in the Chinese language (Ulanji 1998; Khogjilt 2006; Botolt 2015), as well
as six field visits to the region since 2009. I rely on over a decade of data gained
through formal interviews, observations, one-on-one music lessons, listening
sessions, rehearsals, concert attendance, and ongoing social media communica-
tions with hundreds of musicians and local scholars. I recognize my status as a
cultural outsider and am indebted to the many, many people who have trusted
me with their stories, without which this chapter would not be possible.2

Inner Mongolia and the Conundrum

of Ethnic Diversity
The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (IMAR) is the third largest ter-
ritorial region of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and home to six million
registered ethnic Mongols. Established in 1947, two years prior to the founding

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 of the PRC, Inner Mongolia owes its name to divisions that began during the
Qing Dynasty (1644–1911)—between “Inner Mongolia” (Neimenggu in Chinese,
Övör Mongol in Mongolian) and “Outer Mongolia” (Waimenggu in Chinese,
Ar Mongol in Mongolian). These territorial divisions are largely based on geo-
graphic separation between regions north and south of the Gov’ Desert. Due to
its looser administrative ties to the Qing Dynasty, “Outer Mongolia” (henceforth
Mongolia) was able to declare its independence after the fall of the dynasty in
1911, whereas Inner Mongolia became a site of contested sovereignty for thirty-
five years (Atwood 2002; Bulag 2010) and ultimately became incorporated as
an autonomous region of the PRC (Bulag 2002, 2006).
Before the era of nation states, a variety of Turko-Mongolic ethnic groups
migrated across the expansive region to the north and northwest of the central
Chinese plain. While these groups shared commonalities in lifestyle (mobile
pastoralism) and spiritual practices (animism, shamanism, and later Buddhism),
they exhibited—and today still exhibit—a great deal of regional diversity in
linguistic dialect, clothing, diet, and of course, musical practices. Contempo-
rary borders, fixed provincial boundaries, and nationally recognized ethnicity
categories do little to represent premodern communal identities of these mobile
groups.
By the mid-1950s, Mongolians in China became recognized as a single “mi-
nority nationality” (xiaoshu minzu) under the new fifty-six nationalities system
(Mullaney 2010). Far from homogenous, most of these Mongolians (mengguzu)
distinguish themselves from one another based on a wide number of yastan
(literally “bone group,” buluo in Chinese) sub-ethnic or Mongol clan group af-
filiations, such as Barga, Üzemchin, Chakhar, or Torguud. Other more remote
Mongolic groups, such as the Oirad who live in parts of the Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region and the Buriad who straddle areas of northeastern Hu-
lunbuir through Mongolia to southern Siberia, have linguistic and historical
reasons for claiming their own minzu category, but were still categorized as
“Mongolians” by Chinese ethnologists and culture workers during the 1950s.3
Ironically, despite all government efforts to represent Mongols as a homogenous
ethnic minority group subordinate to the Han Chinese, Mongols across Inner
Mongolia, Xinjiang, and other neighboring regions often emphasize more dif-
ferences between one another than similarities.
In Inner Mongolia, sub-ethnic identities are sometimes, but not always linked
to districts and place names. Under the Qing Dynasty, many of yastan labels
became attached to administrative, territorial divisions associated with the mili-
tary banner system (Crossley 2006; Elliott 2001), a system that still lingers in
many of the banner regions (khoshuu in Mongolian; qi in Chinese) in Inner
Mongolia, such as today’s Khorchin (Ke’erqin) Banners, Barga (Ba’erhu) Banners,
and Üzemchin (Wuzhumuqin) Banners. Inner Mongols continue to identify
themselves according to these region-based clan names, even when they have

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 been dislocated from their home regions due to migration or urban resettlement.
Those I met in the music community reinforce a set of features that distinguish
regional music, cuisine, habits, and personality traits connected to these sub-
ethnic clan groups. My first experience doing research in Inner Mongolia left
me overwhelmed with the task of sorting out what musicians meant when they
referred with precision and insistence to the representative musical features and
genres of each recognized region, such as the regional styles of long-song (urtyn
duu) from Shilingol, Hulunbuir, and Alashan; narrative songs (ülger, kholboo)
uniquely varied among the Khorchin, Ar Khorchin, and Ordos regions; and the
varied names given to box fiddles across the western (ikil), central (khiil khuur
and morin khuur), and eastern (choor) regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia.
This localized sense of ethnic and sub-ethnic difference retains a vocabulary of
features, hierarchies, and even stereotypes with which most Mongols in China
are distinctly aware. For instance, the Khorchin and Ar Khorchin Mongols from
the Jirim region of Inner Mongolia are numerically populous and have tended
to hold positions of power, but have been subject to ridicule and marginaliza-
tion in certain settings due to their thick dialect (Borchigud 1996, Bulag 2003).
These northeastern Mongols were some of the first to transition to sedentary
agriculture, to adopt Chinese and Manchu loanwords, and to adopt Chinese
influences into their culture, cuisine, and music.
Further complicating this picture of regional diversity in Inner Mongolia,
individuals’ Mongol identities may be inflected according to urban or rural
upbringings, whether and to what degree they speak the Mongolian language,
whether or not they attended Mongolian language primary schools (minzu
xuexiao in Chinese), and their overall level of assimilation into Chinese culture
(hanhua, Sinicization). My friends and collaborators in Inner Mongolia define
this last point in a variety of ways, including mannerisms as seemingly subtle
as “speaking too loud in restaurants” (a sign of adopting Chinese habits).
The linguistic and dialectical diversity of these Mongols in China challenges
the noticeably more stable notion of “Mongol-ness” that exists in the nation
of Mongolia. For Mongolian nationals, “being Mongol” generally is associated
with traits of the Khalkha majority ethnic group (Bulag 1998) and at its worst, is
defined in opposition to anything associated with Chineseness (being Mongol
means being “not Chinese”) (Billé 2015). Bulag (1998) writes about the Soviet-
era, Khalkh-oriented nationalism that consciously excluded the non-Khalkh
Inner Mongols due to their presumed assimilation into Chinese culture.
Mongols in China have the complex challenge of negotiating their own cul-
tural and linguistic hybridity, their dislocation from mobile pastoralism due
to rapid urbanization and forced “ecological resettlement” (Zhang 2012), and
increasing challenges related to language maintenance (Atwood 2020, Bilik 1998,
Bulag 2003). They are challenged by a decades-long separation and isolation

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 from the nation of Mongolia (particularly during the years of 1956 to 1990 from
the beginning of the Sino-Soviet split until the year of Mongolia’s democratic
revolution), in addition to their status as a diverse group of sub-ethnic Mongol
clans, diverse in aspects of linguistic dialect, cultural customs, and both tradi-
tional and contemporary musical practices (styles, genres, and instruments). My
work investigating the variegated experiences of ethnic inclusion and exclusion
in Inner Mongolia points to the inherent instability of ethnic identity, varied
as it is in different contexts, within a variety of relationships, and from insider
and outsider perspectives. Mongol ethnic identity, like its music, is diverse and
contested; Mongols speak and sing in diverse voices, manifested in dialectical
differences and in musical styles.
Insider understandings of what it means to be Mongol in China are as diverse
as the people themselves. Outsider-oriented representations of Inner Mongols
predominate in the Chinese media, however, offering Han Chinese viewers very
little sense of nuance, complexity, diversity, or internal dissent in how Mongols
choose to express themselves on the stage. National recognition and valuation
of local diversity in Inner Mongolia has appeared only within the past decade
through the lens of national heritage projects. The next section offers a brief
summary of the changing politics of representation that Mongols have experi-
enced in China from the Mao period until today, which contrasts homogenizing
efforts of state policy with the diversity of identities just described.

Minorities on Stage from the Mao Era to Today

During the Mao Zedong era (1949–1976), music in China was used as a tool
to instill national unity and to instill socialist values among the masses, a project
that drew inspiration and guidance from Mao’s famous Yan’an Talks on Literature
and Art (McDougall 1980; Schein 2000; Rees 2000; Baranovitch 2003). Research-
ers were sent to distant locations across China to collect, rearrange, translate, and
disseminate regional folk songs, including songs from China’s ethnic minorities
(Wong 1984, Mackerras 1995). Newly arranged songs and compositions were
performed in elaborate, large-scale concerts of ethnic song and dance (called
huibao yanchu in Chinese) for important occasions and as entertainment for
local work units. In Inner Mongolia, troupes called Ulaanmöchir in Mongolian
(red branch) even traveled to distant grassland locations to perform for local
herders and to continue collecting folk music for future arrangements.
In the 1950s, select Mongol musicians who had enough musical background
and ability in the Chinese language were admitted into newly opened, state-run
conservatories in China. These included Central Conservatory (established in
1949 in Zhangjiakou, the capital of Inner Mongolia at the time, and later moved
to Beijing) and the Inner Mongolia Art Academy (originally established in

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 1951 in Zhangjiakou and moved to Hohhot in 1957). In the process of adapting
minority folk songs, Han and Mongol composers were encouraged to enhance
the mass nature of the songs, to apply party ideologies, and moreover to distill
a set of iconic musical “ethnic qualities” (minzu tese, minzu fengge) that could
be used as a vocabulary for future compositions.
The optimism of the 1950s, including celebration of minority diversity, gave
way during the political campaigns and turmoil of the Great Leap Forward era
(1958–1960) and the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). From the 1960s until the
death of Mao, Chinese policies toward minorities emphasized national confor-
mity and punished expressions of minority culture as signs of ethnic separat-
ism (minzu fenlie). Songs during this period were composed in homophonic
mass-song style, which existed prior to 1958 (e.g., “Song of Mongol-Han Unity”
of 1948), but now dominated the musical landscape and reflected the propa-
gandistic political campaigns of the 1960s and 1970s (e.g., “Building an Iron
and Steel City on the Grassland” of 1958 and “Herders Sing of the Communist
Party” composed in 1972).
At the death of Mao in 1976 and the conclusion of the Cultural Revolution,
China entered a new phase in its history. In the 1980s Deng Xiaoping opened
China to the world after many years of closed-door policies, and economic
liberalization took the place of staunch political ideologies. Since the 1980s,
Mandarin-language songs by Mongol and Han composers have continued to
appear in state song-and-dance troupe performances, but also in media and
commercial settings, the most notable of which is tourism. In the 1980s, the
IMAR government reinvigorated programs to promote Mongol arts, largely as a
way to make up for the devastations of the Cultural Revolution (see Jankowiak
1988, 1993; Baranovitch 2001). The Inner Mongolia Party Committee at this time
declared its decree to “Build a Great Region of Nationality Culture” (jianshe
minzu wenhua daqu), which became the basis for a general policy for the pro-
motion and marketing of Inner Mongolian performing arts through tourism.
The basis for such an arts policy seems to come at a time when many of China’s
interior regions, those largely inhabited by minority peoples, facing a paucity
of support from the central government, needed to market their ethnic culture
in order to survive in Deng-era China (Oakes 2000, Hillman 2003).
Large segments of the Han Chinese population, particularly those in modern-
ized urban areas along the coast, felt and continue to feel strong fascination with
the minority “other.” Organized trips to minority villages, including grassland
ger (yurt) camps in Inner Mongolia, offer opportunities for Han Chinese tourists
to temporarily escape the alienation of modern life and to experience a window
into an imagined past (Gladney 1994). Chinese national and local governments
promote tourism among minority cultures of the northwest and southwest as
a way to stage orthodox representations of these cultures, while appealing to

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 the fantasies of the Han masses at the same time. Thomas Mullaney (2010:125)
writes that the fifty-six minzu paradigm, used as a logic for state unity since 1949,
became a new logic for tourism and commodification of minorities in the 1980s.
Nimrod Baranovitch refers to a broad category of state-sponsored “minor-
ity pop” that rose in popularity as a commodity for Han Chinese and includes
state-sponsored Mandarin-language songs from a range of minority groups in
China.4 Mongol grassland songs (caoyuan gequ), which emerged in the 1980s
and are still being composed by the hundreds every year, closely resemble the
Mandarin-language ballads composed during the Mao era. Songs maintain
minzu fengge (ethnic flavors) features such as arching melodies and vocal or-
naments and contain the now-established grassland features of synthesized
accompaniment and, typically, a smooth vocal timbre with vibrato.
For most young musicians in urban Inner Mongolia today, the grassland song
industry is simply one part of a bigger musical ecosystem, one that tends to be
vastly more saturated in government funding and regulation than in Mongolia.
Musicians in Inner Mongolia have access to a wide variety of musical career
paths, most notably in state-sponsored arts troupes, restaurants, and ger camps,
but also in the recording industry and as music teachers. As most musical ca-
reers are supported in some way by government funds, the industry grows at
a greater rate than it would through market forces in ways that does support
Mongols who seek to be performing artists. During my summer fieldwork, I
found it easy to spend my time attending two to four musical events per day,
including both free-admission concerts and week-long festivals that culminate
in stadium-packed concerts. Aside from many active and independent under-
ground music scenes in Inner Mongolia, the packaged and glamorous musical
experiences that I encountered on the ground level in Inner Mongolia—with
their vibrant colors, flashing stage lights, masters of ceremony, and choruses of
dancers, not to mention government officials in the front rows—might best be
described by the Chinese term daguimo (large-scale or “over-the-top”).

Institutional Trends and Cultural Heritage

Music in Inner Mongolia clearly witnessed profound impacts from Mao-era
political and post-Mao market forces, leading to the loss, change, and abandon-
ment of many pre–PRC-era, grassland-based musical practices and sensibilities.
Although many musicians and institutional forces are concerned with musi-
cal loss and preservation today, the idea that the past has something valuable
and worth preserving did not always exist as a dominant paradigm in Inner
Mongolian music institutions. During the late 1980s and 1990s, a handful of
Mongol musicians worked diligently to develop and “improve” Mongol music,
which they saw as unprofessional, out of tune, and backward. Musical profes-

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 sionalization and “stagification” (wutaihua) operated in a world of hierarchical
musical value in which Mongol music needed to be improved in order to rise
to the level of European classical performance (D’Evelyn 2018). Whereas in-
struments in the pre-PRC period varied widely in construction, tuning, sound
quality, and playing technique according to regional and personal preferences,
modern instruments were altered in order to achieve standardized intonation,
systematized teaching methods, sufficient volume and tuning stability to hold
up in a concert hall, and a body of technically difficult compositions to dem-
onstrate stage virtuosity (see Chapter 5 in this volume). Large-scale composi-
tions continued to be written for Mongolian instruments in the 1980s and ’90s
that called for extended techniques and expressive emotionalism rarely seen in
traditional Mongol musical practices. Those surviving professional musicians
and singers who had their origins in the Mao-era propaganda troupes became
respected as teachers in music academies and universities and developed their
own systematic and structured teaching methods, fostering a new generation
of instrumentalists and vocalists, among which include the members of Anda
Union ensemble discussed later in this chapter.
These attitudes toward concert music and professionalism shifted dramati-
cally in the mid-2000s, making way for a renaissance of interest in local folk
song styles and a slightly more rustic, roots-oriented aesthetic. My first visits
to Inner Mongolia in 2009 coincided with the beginning of this crucial turning
point, just as the roots music movement was beginning to take off in Hohhot.
Even as I observed entrenched ideas about musical hierarchy that sought to
professionalize Mongol music and elevate it to standards they believed were
set by European concert music, I also saw many young people and institutional
forces starting to embrace a counter trend toward folk revival and conscious
rejection of Westernization and Sinification (D’Evelyn 2018). This revival came
in response to a variety of converging forces, including the passing away of great
folk masters, such as the great Shilingol singer Lhajav (Hazhabu), but perhaps
due to even more systemic changes as a result of China’s increasing involvement
with national and international systems of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH).
In the early 2000s, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) launched a series of programs aimed at nominating
and helping to safeguard oral and intangible cultural heritage. The final lists that
emerged, the “List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safe-
guarding” and the “Representative List of the ICH of Humanity,” were designed
both as a way to combat the disappearance of cultural forms due to globaliza-
tion and modernization and as a way to provide geographical balance and op-
portunities for nations currently excluded from the UNESCO World Heritage
Sites list (Aikawa-Faure 2010). As of early 2020, China has forty inscriptions

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 (seven of those are included on the list of items in need of urgent safeguarding),
twelve backlogged nominations, and two ongoing nominations. Of the forty
inscriptions on China’s Representative List, thirteen are cultural heritage prac-
tices from minority groups in China (such as the Mongols, Uyghurs, Tibetans,
Kyrgyz, Dong, and Qiang). Several other items on the list, including Hua’er folk
songs and traditional paper cutting, are practiced by both Han and minority
groups, putting that number potentially even higher. Although minorities com-
prise only about eight percent of China’s population, their overrepresentation
in national displays of Chinese culture (including more than thirty percent of
China’s UNESCO inscriptions) follows a pattern in which government forces
collect and codify minority cultures and determine orthodox systems for how
and when they can be staged (Gorfinkel 2016).
Helen Rees (2016) documents the rapid change from modernization-driven,
conservatory and tourist-style adaptation of folk songs in China in the 1990s to
a frenzy of activity surrounding what are known as “original ecology folk songs”
(yuanshengtai minge) and other “original ecology” (yuanshengtai) cultural prod-
ucts. A bizarre and confusing term when translated to English, “original ecol-
ogy” is intended to evoke a sense of primordial connection to an uninterrupted
past. Yuanshengtai is often used to refer to any product, place, or practice that
is uncontaminated from outside influences, though the term has mostly been
associated with Chinese minority groups and their performing arts practices.
The yuanshengtai movement has had a profound impact on the musical lives
and conceptualization of musical value in Inner Mongolia, including in the
arenas of national and local institutions, the arenas of media and entertainment,
and down to the level of individual musicians and independent ensembles. The
movement is filled with contradiction and hypocrisy (Wong 2019); it continues
to trivialize and misrepresent minority cultures as rooted in the past and has
fueled China’s zeal for ICH applications to UNESCO, but it has also offered
perhaps unexpected benefits to musicians in the process. It is now accepted
practice that Mongols and other ethnic groups in China sing folk songs on
television and on the conservatory stage in their local languages and with local
flavors, rather than singing composed, harmonized, and midi-accompanied folk
songs in Mandarin. It has provided institutional funding for the documentation
and study of disappearing or neglected musical styles that were formerly seen
as backward. The yuanshengtai phenomenon has encouraged and celebrated
ethnic and linguistic diversity in regions like Inner Mongolia rather than em-
phasizing homogenous and simplistic minority ethnic styles (minzu fengge). It
has, furthermore, launched the career of a group of young musicians named
Anda Union who have traveled the world and who proclaim themselves as the
“voice of Inner Mongolia.”

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 Anda Union
In 2006, Anda Union became involved and benefited directly in the yuan­
shengtai movement when they participated and won third place in the National
Young Singer’s Competition, a popular television program that featured a yuan­
shengtai category for the first time in 2006 (Yang 2009). Although the mem-
bers of Anda Union were all trained in music academies and conservatories,
they ironically became the leading voices in developing a staged yuanshengtai
Mongolian sound—a sound that supposedly represented “pure,” original, and
untainted music from the grasslands. The last section of this chapter tracks the
career, contributions, and musical repertoire of this influential group.
Anda Union is by no means alone in the global Mongol music scene. The Hu
Band from Mongolia, an ethno-rock group that went viral on YouTube in 2018,
has become a household name and is bringing Mongolian sounds into living
rooms across the world (through Spotify, YouTube, and vinyl records). Although
much less viral than The Hu, Anda Union has been touring abroad for over a
decade and has dazzled thousands of audience members in North America and
Europe. Their performances have been described as “rousing masterclass in folk
revivalism” by the Guardian (2018) and they have received recognition from
Songlines for their albums Wind Horse (2011) and Homeland (2016), which won
the “Top of the World” (2011) and “Asia & Pacific” (2017) awards, respectively.
Other internationally recognized Mongol ensembles from China include the
folk-rock ensemble Hanggai, the eclectic fusion ensemble Haya, the heavy metal
group Nine Treasures, and the folk band Ikh Tsetsn, all four of which are based
in Beijing.
Anda Union, the earliest neo-traditional ensemble of its kind in Inner Mon-
golia, profoundly impacted the urban music scene. Cities like Hohhot, Baotou,
Tongliao City, and Hailar have seen a sharp rise in Anda Union “look-alike”
ensembles in the last decade, a musical path that enables young people to make
a living after graduation and to reconnect with their roots at the same time.
Interestingly, the ensemble style inherited and developed by Anda Union offers
musicians both a sense of creative agency and a pathway to conform with the
current state-sanctioned yuanshengtai orthodoxy. In a climate where musicians
often have to determine how to remain artistically sincere while still receiving
opportunities for state funding and television air time, a neo-traditional or
Anda-style yuanshengtai ensemble seems to be the pathway to satisfy all of
these concerns at once.
Anda Union received sponsorship from state-run institutions from the very
moment of their founding. The original members of Anda Union graduated as
horsehead fiddle (morin khuur) majors and proceeded directly into careers at
the Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Theater, supporting themselves on the side

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 with evening work at restaurants entertaining Han Chinese tourists. In 2003,
the Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Theater invited the Mongolian teacher
Odsüren Baatar to take up a residency with the troupe in order to teach throat
singing (khöömii) to the state artists. Odsüren had visited Inner Mongolia briefly
around the year 1993 to teach khöömii, which at that time was almost entirely
unknown except among a few individuals who found access to cassette tape
recordings from newly opened Mongolia.
During his residency in the early 2000s, Odsüren taught numerous students
in Hohhot (both within the troupe and privately on the side), but recognized po-
tential in the group of recent Inner Mongolia Art College graduates. In 2003, he
gathered the ten original members into an ensemble arrangement molded after
Transmongolia, a neo-traditional ensemble (khamtlag) from Mongolia (Hadan
Baatar personal communication, July 20, 2009). The members of Anda Union
represent a wide array of sub-ethnic groups and homelands within the 1.2 million
square kilometers that encompass the land mass of Inner Mongolia. Signifying
their unique friendship across the lines of clan identity, the ten-member band
adopted the name Anda Union (anda means “blood siblings”). Not long after,
they began performing arrangements of standard Mongolian folk songs, using a
catchy combination of isgeree khöömii (whistle-style khöömii for singing untexted
syllables) and shakhaa (constricted throat technique for singing texted syllables),
along with smooth, harmonically rich textures of morin khuur (horsehead fiddle),
tovshuur (two-string plucked lute), and percussion accompaniment. The first
Inner Mongolian khamtlag (ensemble, zuhe in Chinese) was born.
After their work with Odsüren, the Anda musicians became keenly attracted
to the sound of neo-traditional Tuvan ensembles such as Huun Huur Tu, Chir-
gilchin, and Yat-Kha, and the troupe subsequently invited the singer Aldar from
Chirgilchin to Hohhot for a residency. They appreciated the relaxed, natural
sound of the Tuvan throat-singing styles (khoomei, sygyt, kargyraa, and oth-
ers; see Beahrs 2019) compared to the professionalized sound of Mongolian
isgeree khöömii. They began to adopt arrangements, styles, instruments (such
as the Tuvan igil fiddle, doshpuluur plucked lute, and skin-faced drum), and
singing techniques from the Tuvan ensembles, adjusting to the “world music”
aesthetic fashioned by Huun Huur Tu in collaboration with Ted Levin in the
1990s (Levin and Süzükei 2006; Beahrs 2014). The Tuvan formula adopted by
Anda Union adapts solo and duet folk practice in a variety of ways—including
contrasts between fast and slow, verse-interlude arrangements with texted and
un-texted throat-singing, limited harmonic movement, and the addition of blue
notes and syncopated rhythms—intended to please global audiences through
short, packaged stage arrangements.
When I interviewed several Anda members for the first time in 2009, they
were painfully aware of the derivative and imitative nature of their work dur-

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 ing the early years of their performance career and had begun the process of
searching for their own sound. With some help and encouragement from their
new British managers, Tim Pearce and his wife Sophie Lascelles, the band real-
ized that they could keep the same ensemble sound but localize their music as
their own and as uniquely Inner Mongol by creating arranged adaptations of
folk songs they grew up with in their respective grassland homes—hometowns
they had left decades prior. Tim and Sophie were captivated by the group’s per-
formance in 2006 at an international expo in Shanghai and proposed that they
film a documentary of the group and include footage of the ensemble members’
lives in the city contrasted with footage shot of each of the members revisiting
their hometowns. The resulting documentary, Anda Union: From the Steppes to
the City (2011), produced by Eye 4 Films, was filmed over the course of thirty-
three days in 2009 and across a distance of over 10,000 kilometers (and as the
credits amusingly mention, involved the slaughter of thirty-seven sheep to feed
the crew over the production time period).
The film depicts the musical and cultural diversity represented by each of
Anda Union’s members and captures the complexities of the urban-rural divide
in Inner Mongolia. It shows the challenges of negotiating a life in the city of
Hohhot, the population of which is more than eighty-seven percent Han Chi-
nese, and the seamlessness with which these city dwellers are able to reconnect
with their families on trips back to their grassland homelands. Through an
observational mode and an absence of narration, the film conveys Anda Union’s
desires to keep the sounds of their grassland past alive even as they adapt those
sounds to the needs of global, urban audiences.
In the section that follows, I offer a brief musical “users’ guide” to several
pieces in Anda Union’s repertoire, including musical selections introduced in
the documentary film and selections from their discography. The musical ex-
amples below5 offer a useful entry point into understanding regional diversity
in Inner Mongolia and the tensions that exist between local, pan-ethnic, and
transnational Mongol identities.

“Sumaro” and “Derlcha”

These two pieces from Anda Union’s repertoire, which appear on their album
Wind Horse (2011), emerged out of the fieldwork experiences the ensemble
members conducted during the filming of their documentary, Anda Union:
From the Steppes to the City (2011). The film traces their visits to their grassland
and village homes, including several regions of northeast Inner Mongolia. At
one point in the film, Nars, the ensemble leader, visits his hometown of Ar
Khorchin in Chifeng (formerly Ju’uda) and sits side-by-side with his father while
he transcribes the lyrics to the song “Sumaro.” The strophic song, about two

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 FIGURE 2.2. Nars and his father transcribe the tune “Sumaro” during Anda Union’s
visit to Ar Khorchin, Nars’s hometown. Screenshot from the film Anda Union: From
the Steppes to the City (2011).

lovers joyfully reunited after a period of separation, features a bouncy metrical

rhythm, minor pentatonic scale, and balanced, arching phrases typical of nar-
rative songs (known in Chinese as “eastern folk songs” dongbei minge) from
this region. “Sumaro” appears repeatedly throughout the film as the musicians
work on it on their journeys and arrive at a final stage arrangement at the end
of the film. This stage arrangement uses a blend of traditional elements from
the original song, as well as creative additions using the horsehead fiddle and
insertion of various throat singing styles.
As mentioned earlier, the southern regions of Inner Mongolia bordering
Chinese territories—such as Ju’uda and Jirem (formerly known as “leagues” or
chuulgan under the Qing system and now retitled as Chifeng and Tongliao Mu-
nicipalities)—were some of the earliest regions of Inner Mongolia to transition
from herding economies to semi-pastoral, semi-agricultural ways of life. This
transition profoundly impacted musical forms. These impacts are beginning to
be seen as not wholly negative, but as a process that involved both loss and gain.
Ju’uda and Jirem developed music cultures that demonstrate evidence of rich
cross-fertilization between Mongol, Manchu, and northern Han Chinese culture.
Borderland Mongols began to face a changing sense of time and space as their
region became organized into smaller, sedentary agricultural units. With the de-
crease in pastoralism, long-songs (a genre intimately connected with the steppe

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 and a feeling of expansiveness) became the first genre of music to transform,
becoming considerably less elongated with shorter vowel melismas compared
with long-song in remote pastoral regions like Hulunbuir and Shilingol. A class
of musicians emerged who specialized in self-accompanied story-singing—
merging Mongol-style melodies with stories from the Chinese narrative song
(shuochang) repertoire (Botolt 2007). These itinerant bards (known as fiddlers,
or khuurch in Mongolian) mastered hours and hours of narrative repertoire,
received in many cases through training in Buddhist temples (ibid).
One khuurch from Inner Mongolia still living today is the master storyteller
Jalasen. Midway through the Anda Union documentary, Nars and Urgen visit
Jalasen for an interview and to hear him play. They ask questions about the so-
cial and historical context for the song “Derlcha,” a song form that Jalasen used
to perform. An arrangement of this song has become a cornerstone of Anda’s
concert repertoire. In the documentary, Jalasen explains to Anda Union mem-
bers Nars and Urgen how the piece “Derlcha” (meaning conversational match)
would often be used alongside wrestling competitions through a dialogue-style
or back-and-forth song competition. Each of the ten neighboring districts would
nominate one singer as a representative, a competition resembling a Mongolian
epic rap battle. Singers were paired off and required to come up with creative
and witty lyrics on the spot in response to their competitor’s sung couplet. The
loser would be the one who couldn’t keep up or respond in time, while the
winner would compete against the rest of the singers until there was no one
left, finally receiving a prize as well as the right to throw insults at the losing
singers. Jalasen’s sparsely accompanied, text-oriented rendition of “Derlcha,”
using a skin-faced box fiddle (choor) and four-stringed tube fiddle (sihu in
Chinese, dörvön chikhtei khuur in Mongolian) differs from the version of the
song that Anda performs on stage with its mix of arranged throat singing styles,
harmonies, sectional form, and dramatic shifts between fast and slow. However,
Nars and Urgen reassure master Jalasen that they maintain the dialogic nature
of the song and sing five whole verses.
Anda’s performance of “Derlcha” opens with a dramatic chant in parallel
fourths sung with heavy shakhaa (constricted throat singing technique) and
exaggerated rolling “r” sounds in their delivery of the Mongolian text. This
section is followed by a horsehead fiddle ostinato and the first presentation of
the folk song melody by Urgen. He sings with flavorful nasal timbre, yodel-like
vocalizations, and ornaments typical of Khorchin and Ar Khorchin songs of
Jirem and Ju’uda. Following this first presentation, the folk song melody gets
passed among the band members with each rendering it with a different khöömii
technique, including various forms of shakhaa, kargyraa, and even an ezingeleer
interlude by Nars. This demonstrates a conscious process of musical hybridiza-

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 tion, as they transform the eastern-region Inner Mongolian folk song with a
variety of western-region throat singing styles and an inventive musical form.

“Jangar” and “Holy Mountain”

Two pieces in Anda Union’s repertoire are informed by instrumental and
vocal music of Oirad Mongols of China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
Scholars (Siriguleng 2009; Botolt pers. comm. July 29, 2009) recognize the
music of these regions—including Xinjiang’s Bortala and Altay Prefectures—as
the western section of three important divisions of Mongol music in China;
the other two are the music of the central and northeast regions. Learning and
performing Mongol music from Xinjiang ironically makes Anda Union a fitting
representative of the “voice of Inner Mongolia,” due to its role in the musical
consciousness of Inner Mongolian musicians and scholars. Their arrangement
of the Jangar epic song genre and use of instruments from this distant region
serve to further amplify the ensemble’s regionally diverse repertoire, while also
performing a complex understanding of sub-ethnic Mongol identities in China.
“Jangar,” Anda’s rousing piece, opens their album Homeland and is a lively
rendering of the traditional Oirad epic song tradition of the western Mongol
regions. Considered a masterwork of folk literature, the Jangar epic is per-
formed by singer-storytellers called janggarch (singers of Janggar) and involves
a story about the hero Jangar Khan and his battles against great opponents and
monsters. Anda Union’s version of this song starts with a gentle solo tovshuur
ostinato, punctuated by the jingle of percussive bells, followed by the entry of
an energetic set of morin khuur and a shout of “Shog!” The group then holds
several long kargyraa and khöömii drone notes before launching into their first
verse, one with an upbeat chorus of voices and texted kargyraa.
Nars (pers. comm. December 17, 2020) described Anda Union’s early exposure
to Xinjiang Mongol music in the early 2000s while they were working in the
Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Theater. Just as Odsüren had come in to teach
Mongolian khöömii to members of the ensemble, a teacher named Yerkesh was
brought from Xinjiang to Hohhot at that time to teach tovshuur and other styles
of music from his hometown in the Bortala Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture
near the Kazakhstan border. In addition to learning from Yerkesh, the group
also learns by close listening to recordings, a form of learning that gave the
member Chinggel his first access to performance on the tsuur (an end-blown
flute known as modyn tsuur in Inner Mongolia).
Chinggel’s solo composition for tsuur called “Holy Mountain,” appears on
their album Wind Horse (2011). An Ongud Mongol from the grasslands of east-
ern Inner Mongolia, Chinggel grew up in the city for most of his life. His tsuur

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 playing and deep kargyraa khöömii style draws more from his individual interest
in music from the distant Altai mountains than it connects to his own ethnic
background. Tsuur and other related instruments (the Tuvan shoor and Kazakh
sybyzgy) are played by Oirad, Tuvan, and Kazakh communities in the greater
Altai-Sayan mountain regions (see Chapter Four in this volume). The tsuur
was largely unknown in Inner Mongolia until a respected Mongol professor,
Mergejikh (Moerjifu; 1931–present), traveled to Altay Prefecture in Xinjiang
in the 1980s and discovered evidence of both tsuur playing and a multiphonic
vocal practice known in the region as khooloin tsuur (literally “throat flute”),
similar to khöömii. He documented his findings in a 1986 essay, which eventu-
ally generated interest among scholars and musicians in Hohhot (Mergejikh
1986). When Chinggel began playing the tsuur there were very few teachers or
practitioners to learn from in Hohhot; today, many ensembles feature a player
of this instrument.
Chinggel’s piece “Holy Mountain,” consists of several unmetered sections,
each of which involves predetermined ornamental motives, and substantial
flexibility in phrasing and embellishment. The unmoving khöömii-like drone
note emitting from the performer’s vocal cavity sets up a rich foundation for
the layered overtone partials and fluttering sounds of the flute. These sounds
set up a drone-overtone sound structure (Süzükei 2021) that evoke the timbral
richness of the Altai mountain region, over two thousand kilometers away from
Hohhot.

“Buriat”
Like Chinggel, Tsetsegmaa contributes to Anda Union’s musical sub-ethnic
diversity, but also reveals the complexities of Mongols’ distribution and classi-
fication in and across the borders of China. Tsetsegmaa is part Buriad,6 a group
whose homeland territories are dotted across China, Russia, and Mongolia.
Tsetsegmaa grew up in Hulunbuir Banner, the far northeast region of Inner
Mongolia on the border with Russia. Reflective of its borderland position, Hu-
lunbuir is the most diverse region of Inner Mongolia and is home to Mongols
(including several sub-ethnic groups), Russians, and three smaller recognized
groups—the Evenk, the Daur, and the Oronchon—that have links to Siberia, but
share many cultural similarities with the Mongols. Although Buriad people have
their own language, customs, and historical identity, the Chinese communists
who led the efforts to classify minority nationalities in Hulunbuir somehow did
not see fit to recognize the Buriads as a separate ethnic group.7
Tsetsegmaa’s song “Buriat” and her rendition of the widely popular Buriad
song “Altargana” are heartfelt evocations of longing for homeland felt by women
who move away from their homeland after marriage. Such sentiments of longing

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 for homeland are now felt by many urban Buriads and Mongols due to their dis-
placement and dislocation from their roots in the grasslands. Tsetsegmaa’s pow-
erful vocal sound projects Buriad flavor in its rich and dense, even grainy, timbre
and in the stylized trills and ornaments distinguishable from vocal ornaments
typical in Mongol folk songs. Tsetsegmaa has received great honors in China
and abroad for her vocal talents, having won prizes at many song competitions
in China and having also been featured on the international album, Between
the Sky and Prairie, of Grammy-award-winning artist Daniel Ho. Her inclusion
as a member of Anda Union fills in the map of Inner Mongolia, offering vocal
musical flavor from the far northeast of the region, while also contributing to
the complex conundrum of what it means to be Mongol in China. Tsetsegmaa,
a professionally trained, half-Mongol, half-Buriad, Chinese passport-holder
and singer of local songs from her home region of Hulunbuir on the border
near Mongolia and Russian Siberia, does not fall easily into one clean ethnicity
or nationality. The longing and raw emotional color she expresses in her music
might therefore be lost upon audiences who are unaware of the challenges she
faces as a minority ethnicity (Buriad) among an already marginalized minority
nationality (Mongols) in China.

“Drinking Song”
Anda Union’s “Drinking Song” (“Jiu Ge” in Chinese), the closing track on
Anda Union’s award-winning album Homeland, is a ubiquitous and often per-
formed song in Inner Mongolia. The tune itself is a cheerful, bouncy melody
with a medium melodic range and an anhemitonic (major-sounding) pentatonic
scale. In their arrangement of this song, Anda Union brings their audiences into
the grasslands with an atmospheric, unmetered section of long tones performed
by Chinggel on the tsuur, Urgen on the morin khuur, Chinggel on the ikh khuur
(bass horsehead fiddle), and Nars on the igil. These long tones are punctuated by
sounds of the aman khuur (jaw harp) played by Saikhannakhaa and improvised
licks by Uni on the tovshuur and then built into a denser texture when Chinggel
switches from tsuur to layering in Tuvan kargyraa (chest-style throat singing).
Uni gradually sets up a rhythmic pattern on the tovshuur and the other Urgen
joins with a gentle rhythmic foundation on the large Tuvan skin-faced drum.
The fiddles start the melody and then the group joins with the texted verses,
alternating between regular-voiced and shakhaa (constricted throat singing
technique) and varying among pairings, solos, and full group singing. The lyr-
ics include toasts to a nobleman or honored guest and shouts of “hey!” when
glasses of alcohol might be raised. The title, “Drinking Song,” refers to a whole
genre of songs, most of which come from the Ordos southwest desert region
of Inner Mongolia bordering China’s Gansu, Ningxia, and Shaanxi provinces.

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 Anda Union’s longtime percussionist and drum maker, Baatar (replaced by the
other Urgen at this performance), hails from the Ordos region of Inner Mongolia
and is featured prominently in the Anda Union documentary film, including
footage shot in his drum workshop.
The close linkage between Mongolians and drinking culture appears to be
a relatively recent phenomenon (Williams 1998:15), but it has become a salient
marker of Mongolness in China today. Traditionally, fermented mare’s milk (ai-
rag) was shared for only the most important celebrations and used as an offering
to bless a new ger or to welcome guests into one’s home. Although a complete
discussion of the codes and meanings of Mongolian drinking culture in China
is beyond the scope of this chapter, it is significant that both Han Chinese and
Mongols in China today consider Mongols to be among the best drinkers of
all fifty-six ethnic groups. This phenomenon both reinforces a particular (and
gendered) stereotype and simultaneously offers Mongols a valuable symbolic
resource to exert their ethnic separateness. The stereotypical linkage of drinking
with Mongol culture means that tourists who visit Inner Mongolia expect to
be served alcohol (usually baijiu, distilled rice liquor of typically forty to fifty
percent alcohol) and to be entertained with songs and a drinking ceremony
upon arrival in the grasslands. Many of the earliest tourist camps were located
in the grasslands of the Ordos region, directly outside the city centers of Hohhot
and Baotou, and Mongol and Han managers of these tourist camps developed a
greeting ritual using local tunes so that tourists coming off the bus could each
be greeted with song, a small bowl of alcohol, and a khadag (colored ceremo-
nial cloth). Ordos folk songs tend to be rhythmically bouncy and melodically
lively, with a wide vocal range and nasal vocal timbre. Proximity to the Chinese
borderland meant that Ordos Mongols mixed and mingled with Han Chinese
immigrants from the Shaanbei region of Shaanxi, resulting in a fascinating site
of musical exchange that can be observed in both Mongol and Han Chinese
vocal and instrumental music across this region (Gibbs 2018).
Such associations with Ordos style, tourism, and the drinking Mongol stereo-
type make the meaning of this song much more loaded than immediately meets
the eye and ear. This particular drinking song is often sung by all-male groups
and sometimes in a highly performative way, with members raising invisible
glasses of alcohol in emulation of an all-night drinking party. Anda Union’s
rendition of this song, however, is much softer and gentler. The inclusion of
Saikhannakhaa’s female voice and the tender, mellow voices of the male group
members (in addition to their smaller body builds) changes the usual macho
masculinity aesthetic that many groups such as the folk-rock group Hanggai
exude in this song. Without knowing the lyrics to this song, it would be difficult
to catch that this is a song about drinking at all. For Anda Union, this musi-
cal selection offers the group a way to represent both the Ordos desert region,

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 hometown of the drummer Bater, and also—due to the song’s ubiquitousness—
Inner Mongolia itself.
SONG OF ARKHI

Inside the bottle,

the pure arkhi is level.
When it’s with you nobles,
the pure arkhi is crazy.
In your cups, it’s good, and
in your actions, it’s good, this carousing.
Inside your thoughts,
the arkhi is warm.
When it’s with you all,
the pure arkhi is crazy.8

Conclusion
Anda Union’s career has spanned, and has been fundamental in leading, a
decade of dramatic cultural and musical transitions in Inner Mongolia. Anda
Union remains an active part of Inner Mongolia’s musical life and represents
Inner Mongolia abroad on tours to the United States. In 2016 the Inner Mon-
golia Art College, the premier institute for the study of Mongol music in China,
opened an “Anda Major” (andaban) for students to study under the tutelage of
the band leaders so that they could form their own groups specializing in the
Anda Union style. This successful style and musical formula, combining local
folk songs with Mongolian khöömii and Tuvan khöömei styles, will continue to
permeate the music scene in Inner Mongolia for some time to come. Although
members have come and gone since the 2010s, the core members of the ensemble
continue to perform, teach, arrange, and promote the local music of China’s
Mongols—including Khorchin, Ar Khorchin, Ordos, Buriad, and Oirad sub-
ethnic groups.
Anda Union realizes its identity as the “voice of Inner Mongolia,” perhaps not
just through repertoire and the members’ own diverse sub-ethnic backgrounds,
but also through a conscious process of musical selection, fieldwork collec-
tion, and arrangement. Nars and other members of Anda Union have become
performer-ethnographers; they are conscientiously researching their musical
past, creatively adapting it to the present, while reckoning their ethnic and
musical diversity and their “Inner Mongolness” in the process. Music provides
a symbolic resource that codes these layers of meanings and contradictions in
a catchy, locally and internationally appealing package. Meanings about sub-
ethnic identity, regional diversity, and transnational borrowing must certainly

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 be lost on most Chinese and foreign audiences—those who are unaware of
the dynamics of yastan identity or the politics of khöömii as heritage in Inner
Mongolia.
This chapter unpacks only a few of the many ways that Mongols make and
experience music in China. Mongol sensibilities in Inner Mongolia exhibit a
variety of gradations—between rural and urban; pastoral and semi-pastoral;
east, west, northeast, and central; assimilated and unassimilated; unified and
regionally unique. The members of Anda Union, like many musicians in Inner
Mongolia today, are uniquely and creatively working to revive and reinterpret
Mongolian music in China, to make it relevant to young audiences around the
world, while also navigating Chinese heritage policy and ethnic orthodoxy
in the process. Music thus continues to enable musicians to work out what it
means to be an Inner Mongol in the twenty-first century and how to exhibit
Inner Mongolian diversity on the national and international stage.

Notes
1. The complexities of Inner Mongolia’s history and ethnic politics recently en-
tered mainstream global conversations in September 2020 when Mongol parents
and school teachers were marching on the streets on Inner Mongolia to protest
changes to the region’s language education policy (see Atwood 2020).
2. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
3. At least four other official Chinese minority groups speak Mongolic languages,
but were classified as separate ethnic groups, notably the Daur (dawa’erzu), Ewenke
(ewenkezu), Oronchon (elunchun), and Monguor (tuzu).
4. See Baranovitch 2003, 2007, and 2009. See also Upton 1996, 2002 for a discus-
sion of minority pop in Tibet and Harris 2000, 2005a, and 2005b for treatment of
Uyghur pop.
5. The songs included here are widely accessible on YouTube, Spotify, Apple
Music, and other streaming services using the Romanized spellings given.
6. The term “Buriad” can be Romanized in a variety of ways, including “Buriat”
as it is spelled here by Anda Union.
7. See Mullaney 2010 and Kaup 2000 for more on the idiosyncrasies of the mi-
nority classification project.
8. Translated by Sunmin Yoon and Simon Wickhamsmith.

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 CHAPTER 3

The Politics of Regional

and Ethnic Identities
in Contemporary
Mongolian Urtyn Duu
SUNMIN YOON

Singers of urtyn duu, a genre whose name is often translated as long-song,

have tended to focus, both in their teaching and learning, on the songs’ elongated
and ornamented phrases. Urtyn duu is a widespread and frequently-practiced
traditional vocal genre, closely associated with Mongolia’s traditional nomadic
culture, and has always been considered by Mongolians as one of their most
important traditions. As I traveled from the far eastern border all the way to the
western regions, close to Bayan-Ölgii aimag (province), I observed that local
variations are significant characteristics of the urtyn duu genre, while certain
traditional customs, technical ideas, and terms around it are commonly shared
by singers throughout Mongolia.
At the earlier stage of my field research, I noted that singers were constantly
using the terms aizam, besreg, baruun, and züün in their conversations. I learned
over time the ideas and knowledge Mongolian singers embedded in the con-
cepts, and the historical background behind their discourses and terminology.
Aizam and besreg indicate certain categories of Mongolian urtyn duu. Aizam is
considered among singers as the most respected category due to the advanced
vocal techniques it requires and, among linguists and folklorists, due to the
philosophical and spiritual content it expresses. In contrast, besreg is musically
simpler and less demanding in terms of musical technique, and is thematically
closer to everyday life. Whenever I asked singers (especially rural herder sing-
ers) to sing certain aizam songs,1 they would say that they would not attempt to
sing them because the songs are too difficult, but that they would happily sing
besreg songs for me. Thus, in conversations with singers, aizam usually implied

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 “difficult” songs that “skillful and professional” urtyn duu singers would sing,
while besreg songs indicated a repertoire of songs that any singer could sing. At
times, then, their discourse about aizam songs made me feel that this constituted
a respected and superior area in the realm of singers.
The Mongolian word baruun indicates the right side, which is also the western
direction in Mongolia, while züün indicates the left side, and thus the eastern
direction.2 I learned that baruun ayalguu (west-melody) often indicates songs
from the culture of the Oirad, who have settled mostly in the western aimags. In
contrast, züün ayalguu (east-melody) indicates songs from the majority ethnic
Khalkh culture and from other ethnic cultures, which are mainly found in the
central and eastern aimags, although songs from certain Khalkh styles are also
distinguished from other eastern ethnic groups such as Dariganga and Üzemchin.
In developing conversations with singers and getting used to these terms as
time passed in the field, I started to get a sense of an invisible division between
the eastern and western cultures, between the “privileged singers” and “less-
privileged singers,” which created a sense of Othering and belonging within this
urtyn duu tradition. The Othering in this case, as Edward Said (1978) showed in
Orientalism, seemed relational, but with one apparently more dominant than
the other; here, the Other is imagined. A great number of singers who mainly
practice the “east-melody” would tell me in our interviews that the western
regions do not have aizam urtyn duu or even urtyn duu. Urtyn duu, as a genre,
is characterized—or reinforced—by long and elongated ornamental techniques,
but aizam duu, even with its more elongated ornaments, could certainly be seen
as not “existing” in the western region where singing practices emphasize the
elongation far less. In my earlier fieldwork, when I worked primarily with sing-
ers in the eastern regions, I somehow inherited this as common knowledge and
practice about urtyn duu among singers, and for a long time did not reconsider
it, until I made two extensive trips to the western aimags and Khövsgöl aimag
in 2013 and 2015.
This chapter presents the various regional (local) and ethnic styles of urtyn
duu in the western region of Mongolia, particularly focusing on the different
singing techniques and song repertories in order to offer a reevaluation of the
discursive fields of current urtyn duu singers. In this way, I explore how the
meaning of ethnicity and regionality has been represented and interpreted,
not only in the urtyn duu tradition, but also as it reflects Mongolia’s culture
as a whole. I start with a brief introduction to the current heightened interest
in ethnic diversity in contemporary Mongolia and continue by exploring the
historical backdrop of the formation of ethnic boundaries, which ultimately
defined the basis of the division between east and west. This is followed by a
discussion of the politicization of ethnicity during the socialist period. I then
illustrate the currently accepted taxonomy of the urtyn duu tradition and its

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 related musical techniques in historical and social terms, which play a significant
role in the construction of singers’ views of what constitutes a skillful singer
and a non-skillful one, accepted and not accepted, us and them. Finally, I share
stories and observations from my ethnographic journeys to the western regions
in 2013 and 2015 during which I had opportunities to learn about the various
styles and practices of urtyn duu existing in this region, as well as how their
ways of life are reflected in their geographical environment.
My findings from these journeys challenge the view, which I sensed in the
central and eastern regions (including Ulaanbaatar), of the impact of ethnic
authority upon certain singing techniques or certain urtyn duu categories. I
suggest instead that the infusion of power dynamics in singers’ understanding
is a socially constructed one derived from the historical settlement of these
ethnic groups and from ideological and political interference. In fact, however,
the dissimilar musical techniques and repertoire unique to the local Mongolian
singers are more of a culturally relative response to their geographical and envi-
ronmental access and needs over time. My discovery process offers a challenge to
long established beliefs that could not have been based on concrete knowledge,
but on social practices that have been historicized, politicized, and Othered,
especially when they have been orally transmitted.

The Rise of Ethnic and Regional Debates

in Post-Socialist Modern Mongolia
Most of my time in Mongolia since 2006 has confirmed the country’s gradual
transition as a post-Socialist democratic nation. This drive for new nation-
building has led to a reevaluation of racial purity and ethnic diversity. While the
well-known Mongolian writer O. Dasbalbar (1957–1999) reinforced the unifica-
tion of Mongols through the historical symbol of Chinggis Khan (Myadar and
Deshaw Rae 2014:567), their coming together as one nation in remembering
this figurehead has evoked among Mongolians a sense of the ethnic diversity
that existed during the Chinggisid period. In 2016, an album called Khamag
Mongol (Every Mongol) by one of Mongolia’s well-known country folk-pop
singers, S. Javkhlan, offered a reflection of the ethnic diversity, which was then
in the ascendant. Javkhlan, who was also famous for his activist work against
government corruption, had won his seat in the Parliament in 2015, in part
through his great popularity among Mongolia’s citizens due to the emphasis
in his music on the importance of national identity. His album’s subtitle, “Gal
duudsan mongol ayalguu” (Mongol melody summoned by fire), reflects the
pre-modern traditional Mongolian image in which three stones support the
brazier (tulga) in the nomadic ger, emphasizing the importance of community,
and of unity through diversity. In the music video for the album’s title song Jav­

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 khlan presents the neighboring ethnic groups—one from Inner Mongolia, and
Kalmyk, Buriad, Tuvan from Russian regions—wearing their own traditional
ethnic clothing and symbolically sitting around a brazier. We see from this that
the search for diverse ethnicity under the umbrella term of Mongol seems to be
a part of Mongolia’s nationalistic ideology in recent years.
Perhaps parallel to the phenomenon described above, it seemed that Mon-
gols might imagine that having ethnic diversity, beyond the ethnic identity of
Khalkh, was in part a turning away from what remained of Soviet influence. The
majority of Mongols believe that the emphasis on Khalkh ethnic identity is the
result of “Soviet modernism” (Sneath 2010:260), and that the rejection of this
modernism through the revival of Mongolia’s traditional cultural roots would
provide the necessary fresh start for a new Mongolia. Orhon Myadar and James
Deshaw Rae (2014:563) point out that bringing back an iconic figure from the
thirteenth century is a rather unique move in the sociohistorical landscape of
post-Soviet countries in Central Asia, where personality cults have tended to
center around contemporary political leaders. Mongolia, though, has traveled
to the distant past to represent the nation, and the distant past is where more
diverse ethnic groups exist.3
In addition to discussions around ethnicity, the close connection to regional
particularity and to their cultural identity are also unique aspects of Mongolia’s
ethnic cultural presentation. David Sneath (2010:260) points out that “many
Mongolians do not think of their ‘ethnic’ designation as particularly important
whereas most are very conscious of their locality identities.” In my fieldwork,
I have consistently observed that singers often mention both their name and
ethnic group when asked, but mainly they describe the topography of the places
where they were born, and ecological markers that distinguish those places—the
dunes, steppes, or valleys, which are part of the “root” (ündes) from which they
come. This seemed to be dependent upon the extent to which ethnic identity
might have been replaced by local identity, as certain ethnic groups have come
to reside in certain locations.
The concept of ethnicity in contemporary and post-socialist Mongolia can be
emotionally complex, intertwined as it is with ideology and both ethnic and local
identity. Anthropologist Zbigniew Szmyt (2012) explains that the complexity of
ethnic cultures and discourses is not limited only to ethnic groups within the
boundary of the Mongolian nation-state, but also to those which lie beyond.
He addresses the discursive scope of “Mongol/Mongolness” among a variety
of ethnic groups such as Mongolian-speaking groups living in the People’s Re-
public of China and the Russian Federation, or the Buriad, Kazakh, and Tuvan
diaspora living in Mongolia. They feel a strong sense of national identity as
Mongolian citizens yet also struggle to locate clearly their ethnic and national

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 identities in relation to the Mongolian state and to other nation states in which
their members live.
The formation of ethnic settlement has thus been constantly fluid, reshaped,
and reconsidered in relation to local contexts and the process of history. In this
way, most of the ideas about ethnicity and regionalism observed in the late
twentieth and early twenty-first centuries provide a helpful framework through
which to understand the premodern period of Mongolia’s ethnic founding.

Khalkh as Mongol and Oriad as Other?

Historical discussions regarding the divisive formation of ethnic/regional cul-
tures in Mongol territory date back to the time of the Qing dynasty (1691–1911),
when Mongolia’s present-day territory consisted of four main states (aimag),
different from the current twenty-one administrative provinces (also called
aimag). Those four states were, from west to east, Zasagt Khan, Sain Noyon
Khan, Tüsheet Khan, and Tsetsen Khan, and there were two additional frontier
regions—Tannu Uriankhai in the north, including the Khövsgöl region,4 and
Khovd in the far west—that were also a part of the Züüngar State (1636–1755),
which includes part of the current Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of
China (see figure 3.1).
While the Uriankhai and Khovd frontiers, as well as part of the western region
of Zasagt Khan aimag, were mainly dominated by the Oirads and their culture,
the Khalkh and Chakar, who make up the majority of the people and culture
of contemporary central and eastern Mongolia and part of Inner Mongolia,
were mainly located in the three eastern aimag—Sain Noyon Khan, Tüsheet
Khan, and Tsetsen Khan. According to Pamela Crossley (2006:64) “The Oyirods
[Oirads] did not call themselves ‘Mongols’ but rather ‘Four Oyirods’ (dörbön
oyirad), but ‘Mongols’ (monggoli) was their term for the eastern alliance under
the Chakar Khaghans.” The Oirads who settled in the western region, as opposed
to the groups in the east of Mongolia, were a combination of diverse ethnic
groups, such as the Altai Uriankhai, Darkhad, Myangad, Bayad, Zakhchin, and
Dörvöd, whom I also encountered during my own fieldwork in Khövsgöl, Uvs,
and Khovd aimags. Some of the ethnic groups, such as Buriad and Kalmyk,
which are currently distributed more in the northeastern region of Mongolia,
were also considered as a part of the Oirad in the earlier period; now they are
distinguished from both the Oirad and Khalkh ethnic groups.
Based on this historical development of ethnic and administrative formation
in the early period, Mongolians largely distinguish their cultures as Oirad and
non-Oirad culture, or as Khalkh and non-Khalkh, or even as Khalkh and Oirad.
They mention Khalkh and Oirad as, respectively, eastern and western cultures

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 FIGURE. 3.1.Mongolia’s administrative aimags and frontiers in 1911. Map drawn by
Youngjin Yoon.

and people: the eastern as Khalkh and other groups in the eastern aimags such
as Dariganga and Üzemchin, Barga, and the western as the Oirad groups I men-
tioned earlier. Within this major division between Oirad and Khalkh cultures,
I often observed that people placed different emphases on different musical
genres as well. For example, genres such as epic (tuul’) (see Chapters 4 and 6 in
this volume), dance forms such as biyelgee, khöömii (see Chapters 8 and 9 in this
volume), flute (tsuur), and string instruments such as tovshuur (see Chapter 6
in this volume) are often mentioned as traditions strong among the Oirads in
the west, while song genres were much more dominant in the eastern regions.
My colleague, A. Alimaa, who often travels with me to the countryside, once
told me that greater numbers of longer urtyn duu had once existed in the west,
but that they had now mainly disappeared. In contrast, some genres such as
epic, which are still performed in the west, had once also existed throughout
the eastern region, but they have been less historically preserved and are now
disappearing (personal communication 2015). The current situation regarding
these musical genres, then, in terms of what has changed and what still remains,
could have arisen in part due to the music-cultural changes during the socialist
era when Soviet folklorists penetrated Mongolian culture, creating a different
dynamic of traditional culture.

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 Several scholars, including Christopher Kaplonski (1998), Uradyn Bulag
(1998), and Carole Pegg (2001) have examined how Mongolia’s premodern
concept of ethnicity was reinforced and transformed under the influence of
the Soviet Union between 1921 and 1990. During this time, the diverse ethnici-
ties that had appeared in Mongolia’s premodern history were suppressed, with
the notion of uniting all the country as a single ethnic group, the “Khalkh.”
Although the Khalkh was the largest ethnic group, before the revolution, as
Kaplonski (38) claims, the Mongols did not recognize themselves as a single
collective nation state. Yet Mongolia formed the sense of itself as the MPR na-
tion state by prioritizing the Khalkh people and Khalkh culture as a response
to national policy, and by a process that artificially omitted any notion of ethnic
sub-categories (Bulag 1998). Bulag refers to this process as ugsaatny tseverlegee
(ethnic cleansing),5 which indicates the suppression of ethnic diversity (1998:36).
To be a Halh [Khalkh] means one is a proper citizen, a real Mongol, and to
be Buryat means to be peripheral. In Dadal, the majority of children of Halh
and Buryat [Buriad] unions have chosen to be Halh. Particularly interesting is
one family: the parents are both Buryat, and they have six children, of whom
two born before 1977 are registered as Buryat, while the four younger ones
are Halh. The pressure to become Halh became stronger from the late 1970s.

Thus, Khalkh is viewed as “the Mongol of Mongols,” which produced the idea
that “Khalkh equals Mongol,” which in turn led to Khalkh being considered
the definition of a genuine Mongol (Bulag 1998:37). According to Bulag, this
phenomenon was based on the perspective of Soviet ethnologists, which was
expected to be strictly evolutionary: small ethnic groups (yastan or sub-ethnic
groups) merged with a bigger group (ündesten or nation),6 and people who were
considered “backward” were to be improved by their assimilation into more
“progressive nationalities,” in this case, the Khalkh.
This evolutionary concept discussed by Bulag runs parallel to Pegg’s discus-
sions in the context of the performing art music scene in Mongolia (2001:256).
Pegg explains that most traditional art musics were “neutralized” and “stabilized”
under socialism, centralizing the standardized song and dance forms according
to the Soviet-inspired policies and “development.” In this process, ethnic mi-
nority musical cultures were discouraged, and merging with Khalkh styles was
encouraged. In contrast, B. Tsetsentsolmon (2015:127) suggests a slightly different
approach to the Soviet impact, based on what might be called “Soviet cosmol-
ogy.” This concept implies a much broader application of Soviet ideology than
the idea of “current Party policy.” She claims that “Soviet cosmology,” therefore,
allowed for Mongols to generate their own musical cultures, permitting them
the space to celebrate their own “national tradition” even if it was in an edited

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 and censored form. Tsetsentsolmon’s statements allow us to understand how dis-
tinctive characteristics of ethnicity might have survived in the oral performance
traditions even during the period of Soviet influence. I found Tsetsentsolmon’s
view confirmed in my interviews with older singers, especially in the case of ur-
tyn duu; the urtyn duu tradition as a whole, including ethnic urtyn duu, was not
encouraged on stage, yet remained alive during the period of Soviet influence.

Singing Techniques, Taxonomy, and Their

Relations to Issues of Ethnicity
The historical basis of the cultural distinction between east and west relates
to singers’ discussions about baruun ayalguu (west-melody) and züün ayalguu
(east-melody) which I learned in the field. However, I also experienced the subtle
awareness and concretization of boundaries between “us and them” among
singers, through particular songs, singing techniques, and certain technical
urtyn duu terms. In our conversations, Khalkh urtyn duu singers from eastern
regions generally seemed reluctant to describe the songs from the western re-
gions as urtyn duu, because the western melodies were not especially elongated
compared to the way of singing in the central and eastern regions. Instead, they
were expressed through the short and segmented phrases of urtyn duu, which
are understood as not being particularly difficult since they require a shorter
breath. Some Khalkh singers accept the existence of urtyn duu among the Oirad
but claim that these are not aizam urtyn duu, but only besreg urtyn duu. Even
urtyn duu singers in the western region also hesitated to call their own songs
“urtyn duu.” Instead, the singers would refer to relatively elongated songs from
the western regions simply as songs (duu), as opposed to urtyn duu, adding the
ethnic group’s name—for example, Darkhad duu and Buriad duu. When I told
the singers from western ethnic groups that their songs sounded like urtyn duu
to me, particularly when I noticed interesting techniques of elongation, they
would say, “Well, it could be besreg urtyn duu.” In an interview with a singer
named B. Darimaa, who is ethnically Darkhad, she also described these songs
as “Darkhad duu” and said they were not urtyn duu because they were not elon-
gated, and they did not present relatively difficult techniques, such as tsokhilt
(tsokhilgo: glottal vibrato) and shurankhai (a falsetto-like technique). She added
that these would only appear in urtyn duu, or aizam urtyn duu, which are the
most respected forms among the taxonomy of urtyn duu.
Kh. Sampildendev and Kh. Yatskovskai in their book Mongol Ardyn Urtyn
duu (Mongolian Long-song) illustrate that the development of urtyn duu’s clas-
sification reflects a long historical discourse among Mongolians themselves, pro-
viding evidence from the Russian folklorist B. Ya. Vladimirtsov, who observed
Mongolian folk songs during the 1920s. Sampildendev and Yatskovskai explain

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 that, first of all, Mongols had their own ways of grouping and distinguishing
the variety of forms of urtyn duu, particularly depending upon their different
content, from religious themes to local heroes, from animals and landscape to
emotions, and using terms such as aizam (or aidam), shashtir (religious), and
jargaa (celebration) (Kh. Sampildendev and Kh. Yatskovskai 1984:4).
In addition to the recognition by Mongols themselves of the different lyrical
meanings, early Soviet researchers such as B. Ya. Vladimirtsov, C. A. Kondratsev,
K. H. Yatskovskai, and D. Maisar seem to have observed different musical styles
in different regions, and among different ethnic groups. Like these earlier Soviet
scholars, I was also able to learn a variety of different songs and singing styles
in different regions and observe the ways urtyn duu are classified from singers
themselves, from contemporary local scholars, and even from lay Mongolians
who were interested in the genre. The classification I learned in the field con-
sisted of aizam urtyn duu, jiriin urtyn duu (or sumun urtyn duu), and besreg
urtyn duu. Later I found that most recent scholars also followed this taxonomy
(Sampildendev and Yatskovskai 1984; Pegg 2001; Rinchensambuu 2011; Alimaa
2012), although Pegg used the term tügeemel (general) urtyn duu instead of jiriin
urtyn duu (or sumun urtyn duu).
Aizam urtyn duu (extended long-song), or aizam duu (extended song), is
the most elongated and ornamented (chimeglelt) style of urtyn duu and is often
regarded as the most technically challenging style among singers. It requires
longer and fuller breathing with specific improvisational vocal techniques in
the articulation of lyrics. Jiriin urtyn duu or suman urtyn duu can be trans-
lated as “ordinary/common long-song” or “local long-song,” in which the word
jir (“regular, normal”) implies the medium length of long-song and the word
sum refers to an administrative unit of Mongolia’s countryside (smaller than
an aimag) and implies “local.” The final category is besreg urtyn duu, which
translates as “simplified long-song,” and is understood among singers as techni-
cally the easiest of the three since the musical phrases are shorter and require
less ornamentation and shorter breath. These three categories of long-song
were clearly identified among singers I met as the expression of different musi-
cal characteristics and different degrees of vocal technique and performance
practice, and this has led to the hierarchical notion that singers who can sing
aizam urtyn duu were the most technically advanced singers. These singers are
inevitably Khalkh, since this taxonomy evolved principally around the Khalkh
urtyn duu styles and repertories that are common in the central and eastern
regions of Mongolia.
Furthermore, singers in the eastern and central regions, and later in the
western region, often explained to me that certain techniques could be employed
as discrete markers in the classification of urtyn duu. Among the most critical
vocal features, two distinctive techniques stand out: shurankhai and tsokhilt

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 (tsokhilgo). The first, shurankhai, is similar to falsetto in Western art music
and often appears—mainly once but sometimes twice—at the highest note of
the song’s melody. This technique is always found in aizam urtyn duu and also
occasionally in some jiriin urtyn duu, but it is never found in besreg urtyn duu.
Having this challenging technique in a song, as well as the fact that singers can
manage this technique only on a full breath, raising their thin head voice to the
highest point of a song’s melodic range, is an indication of a song’s difficulty and
also how accomplished the singer could be within the community of singers.
The second technique, tsokhilt, is a strong laryngeal trill. When discuss-
ing improvisatory ornaments (chimeglel), urtyn duu singers mention several
different kinds. These include a short appoggiatura (nugalaa) and a soft trill
(bönjignökh), which are both very common. Some trills sound like a simple
vibrato, and some sound like a mimicry of sheep’s bleating and range in length
from the very short, stretching across a few notes, to the very long, lasting for
several seconds. As one of the family of ornaments (chimeglel), tsokhilt involves
a strong, elongated, vibrato produced by a forceful movement of air striking the
larynx. I have observed that singers often consider tsokhilt a more advanced
technique than other elongated ornaments such as nugalaa or bönjignökh, and
a singer who mastered tsokhilt and included it in one of the lengthened song
forms such as aizam duu or jiriin duu was likewise considered to be more
technically skilled. For this reason, it seemed, it was through the existence and
presentation of techniques such as shurankhai and tsokhilt that singers seemed
able to identify different levels of songs or technical ability among singers.
The classification of Mongolian urtyn duu might at first seem like a simplistic
folkloric or musicological discussion. However, I often saw that this taxonomy
focused on particular singing techniques and that singers also expressed their
pride or humility or even artistic authority with regard to these techniques.
This led me to rethink the meaning of the discursive field of categorization and
musical techniques, and furthermore the connections with ethnic politics among
Mongolians. What does it mean to talk here about “advanced” and “skillful,”
how do we determine the long-song’s aesthetic values, and who gets to decide
these questions?

A Journey to the Western Aimags

After a great deal of time with singers mainly in the eastern and central
regions and in Ulaanbaatar, I decided to visit the west to explore these tradi-
tions further. Since the journey to the western region, about 1400 km (about
850 miles) from Ulaanbaatar, requires long-distance travel of many days and a
large budget, I had to wait a long time to make the trip. Instead of staying with
one singer for an extended period, I decided to move around to search for as

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 FIGURE 3.2.Travel route to the western aimags in 2013 and 2015. Map designed by
Brooke Marston (used with permission).

many different singing styles as I could find among different ethnic groups
and in different aimags and sums. This mobile ethnographic fieldwork (Yoon
2019) has been useful for comparing many different ethnic and regional styles
of urtyn duu. It has also made it possible for me to observe their singing within
their daily lives and further to experience the ecological environment in which
singers live. In this way, my long journey introduced me to different landscapes
of Mongolia (see Chapter 1 in this volume)—mountains, small and large lakes,
taiga, and bare ridges—especially as I moved toward the western regions and
away from the central and eastern landscape.

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 Through the Taiga to Khövsgöl Aimag:
Darkhad and Khoitgid Singers
In December 2013, accompanied by my colleague and collaborator, linguist
A. Alimaa, and by a driver, Mönkhbayar, who had also traveled with me pre-
viously through other regions, I headed north from Ulaanbaatar and passed
through Erdenet, Mongolia’s third largest city, on my way for the first time to
Khövsgöl aimag. In the freezing winter cold, the rivers which we often en-
countered were frozen solid. The mountain ridges were covered with snow,
their bright white ridges contrasting with the blue-green conifers in this taiga
region. After several hours, we reached Mörön, the aimag center (aimgiin töv)
of Khövsgöl. I had heard that there were Khotgoid and Buriad singers in town,
and that there was also a well-respected theatrical singer from the Khotgoid
ethnic group. Although it was not common for the singers from diverse ethnic
groups to work as state theater singers in the aimag’s cultural center, female
Khotgoid singer, R. Lkhamjav (b. 1947) was at that time the only singer among
non-Khalkh singers bearing the title of gav’yat (lit. talented; a state-sanctioned
singer during the socialist and post-socialist eras). She performed regularly
in the theater and had also traveled to Ulaanbaatar to make a recording with
Mongolian National Broadcasting during the socialist era. In our meeting in an
old Soviet-style elementary school classroom, I had no expectation as to what
kind of songs and voice this rather elderly singer might have. However, once
she started singing, her high volume and fiery, high-pitched voice surprised
me. As with Lkhamjav’s singing, I learned that Khotgoid singing is extended
through the use of undulation, which mimics the landscape of the mountain
ridges. Their singing is particularly strong (khüchtei), making great use of the
vocal cords (see Yoon 2015 for video example). The frequent undulation in
the relatively short-phrased melodies of Khotgoid songs is more memorable
for listeners, and the unique melodies of some of these songs are already well
known in Ulaanbaatar in the form of arranged country pop music.
Each time I traveled through Khövsgöl aimag, I could not help noticing
the landscape that unfolded in front of me, in contrast to the open steppe of
the central Khangai region and the endless open grassland of the east. I saw
steep ridges surrounding the path along which I was moving, and while I was
remembering R. Lkhamjav singing “Deltei tsenkher” (Light grey horse with a
mane). Her strong undulating voice, and the short melodies of the song echoed
in my head as I passed up and over the mountain pass (see figure 3.3).
Leaving Mörön behind, I traveled to northwest Khövsgöl, close to the Rus-
sain border, to visit a small rural district, Ulaan-uul sum. Although I had heard
the characteristics of Darkhad singing from B. Darimaa, whom I had met in
Ulaanbaatar in 2009, I was hoping to hear some Darkhad singers performing

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 FIGURE 3.3. Winter mountain pass in Khövsgöl 2013. Photo by S. Yoon.

in their local geographic environment. According to historian Christopher At-

wood (2004:132), “the origin of the Darkhad appears to be mixed Mongolian
and Tuvan,” and “the Darkhad dialect today is quite close to Khalkha [Khalkh]
but contains forms that indicate it was originally a Kalmyk-Oirat [Oirad] type
dialect later subject to very strong Khalkha influence.” I quickly noticed their
subtle accent when I met with a male Darkhad singer called N. Tsogbadrakh
(b.1961). Hoping to listen to some Darkhad urtyn duu, I sat with Tsogbadrakh.
He first sang mainly short-songs (bogino duu).7 When I asked if he could sing
long-songs, Tsogbadrakh said that urtyn duu style songs had been practiced
in the old days, but they had mostly disappeared. It seemed that, during the
socialist era, the short-song had become much more popular in the theater.
Short-songs with unique styles and tunes from the western region especially,
including Khövsgöl, were more frequently promoted and performed in concert
settings. This process seemed to reinforce the gradual extinction of elongated
Darkhad urtyn duu.
Both Darkhad singers—B. Darimaa, whom I had met in Ulaanbaatar be-
fore this trip, and Tsogbadrakh—were not explicitly singing in the urtyn duu

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 style, and it also seemed to me that they were reluctant to try to sing using
the particular techniques of elongation. However, the CD of her own songs
that Darimaa gave me contained an urtyn duu style of singing. These urtyn
duu-style songs, however, felt similar to Khalkh urtyn duu, except that their
closing phrases often dropped or jumped abruptly to a particular pitch. Even
at the end of the short-songs, I observed that Darkhad singers often include
a performative exclamation of the syllable khoi, on which the pitch usually
descends. Instead of urtyn duu, Tsogbadrakh sang for me the short-song style
of repartee songs, khar’ltsaa duu, that were often performed by singers sitting
together in parallel rows. I later learned from other ethnic singers that the
western region kept more diverse and communal performance styles, rather
than keeping to a strong solo tradition. Later, I discovered that Tsogbadrakh
was making regular visits to older singers in order to learn those songs that
seemed to have remained as urtyn duu. Unfortunately, we could not visit these
older singers together due to the heavy snow and bitterly cold days during my
stay.8 Planning to return to Ulaan-uul sum in the future, and due to the cold
winter weather, I headed back to Ulaanbaatar, spending more time in the south
as I did so, passing through Arkhangai and Övörkhangai aimags where I heard
mainly Khalkh singers.9

Eljigen Khalkh Singers in Eastern Uvs Aimag

I was back on the road again in the summer of 2015, going further into the
west­ern regions, again accompanied by A. Alimaa and Mönkhbayar. Following
the route we had taken to Khövsgöl in 2013, we set off directly toward Zavkhan
aimag, and from there to Uvs aimag. With the excitement of a second trip to
the western region, we had only brief meetings with some Khalkh singers in
the Khövsgöl aimag and in the northern part of Zavkhan aimag. Thus, after
about four days of driving from Ulaanbaatar, we arrived at the eastern border
of Uvs aimag. When we stopped in a district called Züünkhangai sum, the
landscape and the pass around the sum had briefly become less mountainous
and more like the central Khangai region, with more open steppe, just as the
name Züünkhangai might indicate (eastern Khangai; the neighboring sum to
the west was called Öndörkhangai, or “high Khangai”). The singers I met here
were Eljigen Khalkh people.10
According to what I had learned in the field, the Eljigen Khalkh was origi-
nally a Khalkh group living in the eastern region, but they had relocated to the
western region along with other ethnic groups. For that reason, perhaps, Elji-
gen Khalkh singing exhibits similar features to the singing style of the Khalkh,
whose homeland is in the eastern regions. I found that their principal songs

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 consist of the same repertory as that among the Khalkh, but their vocal styles
bore notable Oirad influences, such as singing in shorter phrases just like the
simpler versions of the Khalkh songs. Eljigen Khalkh singing, therefore, does not
employ the shurankhai or the more elongated and complicated ornamentations,
although it does exhibit similar ornamentation techniques, such as bönjignökh
and occasional tsokhilt. One of the female singers, A. Tsagaankhüü (b. 1950)
from Züünkhangai sum, illustrated all the Khalkh styles mentioned earlier
in her singing, but she employed greater volume and a broader vocal timbre,
which is relatively common among other non-Khalkh singers in the western
regions. I noted another example of this when she sang a song called “Zes
guai” (Mr. Zes), incorporating the style of the Khotgoid ethnic group into the
Khalkh style of singing, which places greater emphasis on a strong undulating
melodic contour. Another male Eljigen Khalkh herder-singer, J. Nyamjav (b.
1974), sang with rich emotion a local urtyn duu and showed a vocal skill that
many male Khalkh singers employed, with forceful trilling, striking the larynx
using chest voice/breathing (tseejnii tsokhilt), particularly where the melodic
line became more even. This technique is often found in aizam duu, particularly
in the central Khangai region and the Gov’ region of Khalkh. The mixture of
central Khalkh style, augmented by techniques common to the western regions,
made the Eljigen Khalkh style unique among other western ethnic groups. It
also reflected the historical process by which they had moved away from their
homeland in central Mongolia and, like their songs, had found a new home. The
musical characteristics clearly represented their original homeland and their
historical movement as part of the Khalkh ethnic group, living through their
interactions with other ethnic groups in the western regions.
Similarly, the far eastern side of Uvs aimag, where the three districts of
Züünkhangai sum, Öndörkhangai sum, and Тsagaankhairkhan sum are located,
and where I encountered Eljigen Khalkh people, revealed a far more steppe-like
landscape, rather than mountainous taiga. I was thinking that, perhaps when the
Eljigen Khalkh people settled, they needed to be in similar surroundings, just
like their songs had found a way into the new landscape. As I left these regions,
I reached locations even further to the north, districts called Khyargas sum,
Züüngov’ sum, and Malchin sum. These regions were less grassy, more barren,
and quite close to the Tuvan frontier. Here I encountered the Bayad people.

Bayad and Khoton Singers in Central Uvs Aimag

Interestingly, there are a lot of relatively young Bayad male singers11 in the cen-
tral regions of Uvs aimag, particularly in Ethnic group. Züüngov’ and Malchin
sum, which are much closer—perhaps within 50 km—to Mongolia’s northern

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 border with Russia, and where one of the country’s biggest lakes, Uvs nuur, is
located. As we drove into the region, the natural surroundings became more
barren, and even more open in comparison to the southern part of Uvs aimag
where the Eljigen Khalkh people were living.
In Khyargas sum, the Bayad singers I met were aged between forty and
eighty years old. They sang with rather refined voices, each phrase short, but
moving through a pattern of set intervals using sliding tones. However, Bayad
singing also exhibits small ornaments, such as bönjignökh and nugalaa, and
similar characteristics in its melodic contour to those found in Eljigen Khalkh
singing. Despite seeing the slightly different landscapes of Khyargas sum from
the southeastern part of Uvs aimag where the Eljigen Khalkh had settled, I
recognized how the relative closeness of the neighboring settlements of Bayad
and Eljigen people resulted in their influencing one another and producing
similar styles.
About thirty kilometers south of Ulaangom, the aimag center of Uvs, and
about 100 kilometers from Khyargas sum, I had another interesting encounter
with a Khoton singer near Tarialan sum. The Khoton people in Uvs originate
mainly from the Türkic Khoton, and they are predominantly Muslim. Although
I had a hard time understanding other singers’ language in western regions, I
found it nearly impossible to understand the different intonation and vocabulary
of the Khoton singers, having learned much of my Mongolian in Ulaanbaatar.
I was constantly asking my colleague Alimaa, who had grown up in Ulaan-
baatar, about vocabulary and what they were talking about, and she admitted
that she, too, did not understand some of the words. I found that the Khoton
songs are also short but repetitive, much closer to the singing styles of Dörvöd
and Zakhchin (described in the following sections), but they are distinct from
the particular stylistic characteristics of songs among the Bayad and Eljigen
Khalkh, and Khotgoid, which employ longer phrases than the Dörvöd and
Zakhchin singing styles. The verses of Khoton, Dörvod, and Zakhchin songs,
having shorter musical phrases, are repeated numerous times, so the length of
songs is extended not by elongated vowels in one verse but by repeated verses.
I once heard that western urt duu (that is, urtyn duu) was so called, not because
of the elongated verses, but because each verse is repeated so much, and this
offered a good example.
Coming out of the second Khoton singer’s ger, I saw the mountain in the
distance, but was thinking that I had never seen such high mountains from a
distance in other regions of Mongolia. With that vast mountain behind him
like a screen, the singer pointed in the opposite direction, toward Gov’-Altai in
response to Mönkhbayar’s question about the direction of Khovd aimag, and
so we departed in the direction indicated.

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 Dörvöd and Myangad Singers in
Northern Khovd Aimag
The landscape again opened up as I traveled south from Uvs, with greener
trees, more winding mountain ridges, and small rivers and lakes. With all the
rain in the summer of 2015, I observed the herders taking their cattle across
a river, a process that lasted about four hours. In this area, I saw people from
different ethnic groups living together. I met Dörvöd singers here, but also
Myangad singers. It was at Myangad sum, Khovd aimag, that I met a male
Dörvöd singer, L. Törtogtokh (b. 1962). In our interview, Törtogtokh explained
that despite the fact that people from different ethnic groups now tend to live
together in certain regions, people in earlier times (khuuchin üyed) really didn’t
distinguish between their own and others’ cultures but tried to blend them to-
gether to live harmoniously. When it comes to the musical styles, people were
clearly aware of the different singing characteristics among neighboring ethnic
groups and while they sometimes kept their unique characteristics, they also
mixed them together.
According to the Mongolian scholar Ganbold (2012), the Dörvöd ethnic
group is historically Uigaryn Mongol (Mongols living in the Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region of China) and its people are distinguished from the Muslim
Khotons by their adherence to Tibetan Buddhism. The Dörvöd are famous for
their rich performing culture, including game songs and several other genres
of song, and they make up one of the largest populations among western ethnic
groups. The vocality of the Dörvöd, I observed, includes a plaintive sound and
a lot of sliding tones. M. Dorjdagva (2016) describes Dörvöd singing as being
“like a wolf howling” and identifies this as the region in which urtyn duu was first
practiced. This Dorjdagva’s description of the sound was generally applicable
to the voices of some Khoton singers I met, which also can be characterized by
extended sliding tones and by a highly pressed voice. Songs usually begin with
an accented shout, using a relatively strong, loud voice, and singers emphasize
the end of a phrase when they finish a song.
Pegg (2001:47) mentioned that Dörvöd singing is more ornamented than that
of the Bayad, according to her interviewee, Jargaland Ireedüi, but my observation
in the field, comparing three male and female Dörvöd singers in this southern
Uvs aimag with seven Bayad male singers I met in northern Uvs aimag, provided
some different perspectives. The important differences between Dörvöd and
Bayad singers do not depend upon which group uses more ornamentation but
their melodic contour and timbral quality. The melodies of Bayad songs are
smoother and exhibit a softer timbre, with much smaller interval slides and
gentler trills. In contrast, the Dörvöd songs include more abrupt and larger

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 movement in their melodic contours. They discussed these techniques using
Mongolian terms such as khadgalakh (small intervallic upward slides), gulsakh
(small intervallic downward slides), and örgölgt (some upward emphasis).12 This
indicates that these techniques were consciously practiced and transmitted
among the singers.
After my visit to the Dörvöd Törtogtokh in Myangad sum, I learned that
Törtogtokh’s mother was living in Khovd city, Khovd aimag, south of Myangad
sum, and we decided to go visit her, taking Törtogtokh with us. As we journeyed
south together, we were informed that Törtogtokh knew a good Myangad singer
on the edge of Myangad sum. When we visited the singer’s house, no one was
home and the next door neighbor said that she had gone to Ulaanbaatar to see
her children. Thinking that I would not be able to see her on this trip, we set out
for Khovd city. Driving away from the Myangad sum, we saw a Russian-style
bus coming in the distance, and Törtogtokh shouted with joy, confident that the
singer was on the bus. With such serendipity, soon enough, I was sitting in her
house. This female singer, G. Chuluunbat (b. 1944), used the term besreg duu
in describing where Myangad songs might be musically located in the realm of
urtyn duu. Similar to those of the Eljigen Khalkh and Bayad songs, the musical
styles she sang also were decorated with trills such as bönjignökh, nugalaa, and
tsokhilt. She sang a few very specific regional songs, such as “Sukhaityn chin’
argal’” (Wild sheep among the tamarisk) and “Shild n’ orson tsas” (Snowfall
on the ridges), which I had never heard anywhere else. She sang another song,
“Zunyn delger sar” (In high summer), and explained that this is used as a feast
song (nairyn duu), which in context means that it is more formal and extended
than the two previous songs. In the Khalkh tradition, feast songs were usually
either aizam urtyn duu or jiriin urtyn duu, yet Chuluunbat specifically catego-
rized it as besreg urtyn duu, implying this is typical to feast songs in the region.
The melodic line was similar to the Khalkh melodic contour and more elongated
than that of other ethnic songs.
One Mongolian long-song researcher, M. Dorjdagva (2016:33), mentioned
that someone listening to Myangad urtyn duu might confuse it with western
Khalkh urtyn duu, because Myangad urtyn duu can be mixed with Eljigen
Khalkh. It also can be mixed with other ethnic songs in the Oriad style, which
are stronger in the western regions; this process, though, has been all but for-
gotten. As Dorjdagva notes, I could clearly hear that Chuluunbaatar’s singing
was indeed quite close technically to the Eljigen Khalkh, yet also affected by the
Oirad style. Also, my experience of meeting a Myangad singer and a Dörvöd
singer in the same sum, and noticing that the Dörvöd singing style was similar
to that of Khoton singing, helped me confirm the comments of the Dörvöd
singer, Törtogtokh, about the song “Öndör khökhii” (High and dark). This
song refers to the nearby mountain, Altain Khökhii, to which all three ethnic

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 groups—Myangad, Dörvöd, and Khoton—have access, and the song is also
shared by all three (Yoon 2019:52–54). And the singing practices from different
ethnic groups who are living close by are uniquely captured in their own ways
but have also developed over time certain shared features.

Through Khovd City to Southern Khovd Aimag:

Zakhchin Singers
During our stay in Khovd city, a big competition of epic (tuul’) singers was
going on in the city theater, where I met epic singers who played tovshuur (see
Chapter 6 in this volume) and dancers. I also met an Uriankhai singer who
had also come for the epic competition. This young male Uriankhai singer, E.
Galbadrakh (b. 1992), came from Mönkhkhairkhan sum, which was some way
from the route we were taking, which meant that we could not visit him at his
home. He mentioned a recent drive among Uriankhai singers to revive urtyn
duu, particularly in his home region. He sang a unique Uriankhai urtyn duu
with a great number of sliding tones, a feature also found in the songs of the
Zakhchin people whom I would meet on the next leg of my trip. They lived in
Mankhan sum and Zereg sum, both in the far south of Khovd aimag and close
to the Gov’-Altai aimag. The young Uriankhai singer Galbadrakh’s hometown,
Mönkhkharikhan sum, was even closer to the Altai Mountains and further to
the southwest.
According to Atwood (2004:617), most Zakhchin (lit. “borderlanders”) were
historically guards brought from other regions to protect the regional boundaries
as part of their military duties, and they have become a cultural-ethnic group
formed through the fulfillment of duty and by being in a certain place at a certain
time. They are not formed from ethnic groups that are culturally and biologically
related. They were stationed along the borders shared with other ethnic groups in
the Altai, such as Torguud, Ööld, and Dörvöd (Ganbold 2012). This demonstrates
another good example of how Mongolian ethnicity is closely related to regional
divisions in early history. The Zakhchin possess a strong repertoire of short-songs
(bogino duu) with satirical content, which I heard very frequently, but I was also
lucky to hear some of the Zakhchin urtyn duu in Zereg sum. They were melodic
and heavily ornamented, yet similar in style to those sung among the Dörvöd,
exhibiting sliding tones (gulsakh) and emphatic rise (örgölt). There were some
songs that also existed only among the Zakhchin singers, such as “Khan uulyn
oroi” (The peak of Khan uul), “Tsagaany tsookhor” (White-speckled [horse]),
and “Altan aaruulyn amt” (The golden taste of aaruul [dried curd]).
As we drove away from Zereg sum, I noticed a more desert-like landscape—
more open, but more brown than green (that is, more rocky, figure 3.3), with
the mountainous ridges and the distant topography becoming generally far less

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 undulating. I started finding fewer and fewer non-Khalkh singers as I moved
back to Bayankhongor aimag, and I realized that my “western” journey to learn
about the distinctive western urtyn duu singing styles, their diverse ethnic cul-
tures, and their response to their natural environment was coming to an end.

Discussion and Conclusion

I traveled for just over a month through the western aimags and met with
singers from a diverse pool of younger and older, female and male singers
from different ethnic groups. Throughout my conversations with diverse eth-
nic singers, I made a point of asking them to sing only urtyn duu, or at least
songs that have been understood as “urtyn duu” by their community, and it
became clear to me that this genre exists in the western region in various ways
as part of different ethnic cultures. It was also clear that the emphasis of vocal
styles of urtyn duu in the western aimags is different from that of the Khalkh
styles in the central and eastern regions. The songs in the western regions were
lengthened by the repeating of verses, whereas those in the eastern regions are
lengthened through the elongated words in the lyrics. Among ethnic groups
themselves in the west—the Khotgoid and Darkhad (Khövsgöl aimag), Eljigen
Khalkh, Bayаd and Khoton (Uvs aimag), and Myangad, Dörvöd, Zakhchin, and
Uriankhai (Khovd aimag)—there were also significant differences in intonation
and dialects, as much in their speech as in their singing. The songs of the Zakh-
chin, Dörvöd, and Khotgoid people were characterized by peaks and troughs
in their melodic lines, articulated through sliding tones, whereas the songs of
the Myangad, Bayad, and Eljigen Khalkh were less undulating but expressed
greater melodic phrasing.
The ornaments (chimeglel) frequently found in eastern melodies (züün ayal-
guu), such as soft trills (bönjignökh) and short appoggiaturas (nugalaa), also
appeared frequently in various contexts of the west-melody (baruun ayalguu).
Some techniques such as tsokhilt (a strong laryngeal trill) and shurankhai (the
high falsetto technique), which are considered important in east-melody (züün
ayalguu) due to their frequent inclusion in extended (aizam) songs, appeared
only rarely. Regardless of these unique differences in the emphasis of the vocal
techniques and performance styles between the eastern and western melo-
dies, a majority of singers, not only in the central and eastern aimags but also
in the western aimags, place more importance on certain vocal techniques
such as extended strong laryngeal trills (tsokhilt) and high falsetto techniques
(shurankhai). The west-melody, which lacked those techniques, thus came to
be viewed as less authoritative in this cultural hierarchy. Yet sliding tones, a
greater volume coming from a fuller breath, and undulating melodic contours,
just like the landscape through which I had journeyed, are also, I learned, tech-

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 niques just as difficult to master as those of Khalkh urtyn duu in the central
and eastern regions.
Thinking particularly about the northern high mountain range of Khövsgöl
aimag and the singing of R. Lkhamjav, who had expressed an undulating and
reverberant acoustic in the melodic movement of her singing, I later recalled a
casual conversation with the Mongolian musicologist Kh. Erkhembayar, who
was from Khovd aimag. He had mentioned that the phrases of western urtyn duu
are short because the western songs are not focused on elongation, reflecting the
landscape of the steppe, but more likely respond to the undulating mountains,
which create more echoes (tsuurai). He felt that those echoes would be the core
essence and beauty of the western songs. When I stand outside on the open
steppe of the central Khangai region further to the east, the sound of my own
voice and my auditory senses are both traveling straight into the air and, seem-
ingly without end, blend together with the occasional sounds that emerge from
the livestock in the distance. In the west, on the ridges of the mountains, with
sharp trees on the taiga shooting up into the sky, I had a different sense when
I listened to my speaking voice: it was more resonant (See figure 3.4). Through
my own acoustic experiences of landscape, and after observing various singers,
I have come to the conclusion that the difference between the west-melodies
(züün ayalguu) and the east-melodies (baruun ayalguu) of urtyn duu is the
result of where and in what kind of geographical environment the singing has
been nurtured and developed, along with the relative historical formation and
local knowledge of the ethnic cultures among the Oriad and Khalkh.
Nevertheless, the discourse surrounding the “genuine” form of urtyn duu has
generated more than simply the essential relationship between music-making
and the natural surroundings, which has resulted in a shift in the focal balance
of the musical aesthetic. Singers throughout Mongolia often identify the more
“advanced” or more “challenging” singing techniques, and these have tended
to be centered around the urtyn duu heard among the Khalkh in the central
and eastern regions. This would seem to be a result of how Soviet influence
promoted a centralized Mongolian musical culture through professionalism
centered around Ulaanbaatar during the early twentieth century, as we learned
from Bulag (1998) and Pegg (2001) earlier in this chapter. This process was
strengthened through a particular focus on encouraging singers’ virtuosic me-
chanical or technical complexity and mastery rather than their understanding
of the organic relations sustained by the local performance style and customs
or by the meaning behind the songs. In this way, the traditional and local value
and philosophy became downplayed in the light of Soviet ideology.
This approach by which the tradition of urtyn duu became centralized might
have gained greater traction through the evolutionary concept that emerged
along with the idea of professionalism during the socialist era. This profes-

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 FIGURE 3.4. Leaving Uvs aimag, on the way to Khovd aimag. 2015. Photo by S. Yoon.

sionalism has resulted in a vertical classification of singers and has created the
concept of what is to be preferred, making a boundary between those who belong
and those who do not belong, along with the feeling of being selected and not
selected, and perhaps after all those who are privileged and not privileged. It
is true that aizam duu requires musically more defined techniques than jiriin
urtyn duu or besreg urtyn duu within the Khalkh tradition. However, in the more
traditional performance context of urtyn duu, such as feasts (nair), aizam duu
were selected to be performed and respected not only for their musical style
but also for how their lyrical meaning reflected traditional values. The ethnic
songs from the western regions, though, lacking the extended singing techniques
typically used in aizam urtyn duu, were also incorporated into a variety of feast-
style contexts, regardless of the technical level of the songs, but in the same way
reflecting the social and cultural value from the singers’ own ethnic groups.
Placed alongside what I discovered on my journey to the west, my conversa-
tions with two Khövsgöl singers, a Darkhad singer, B. Darimaa in 2009, and a
Khalkh herder singer, B. Javzandolgor in 2013, offer further insights into the
ethnic and regional dynamics in the singing tradition during the socialist and

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 post-socialist eras. Darimaa, who travels back and forth between Ulaanbaatar
and her hometown, observed that local ethnic songs, such as those among the
Darkhad people, were not considered suitable for performance in Ulaanbaatar,
since the musical elements of those local songs were associated with the local
environment and local cultures and could not be understood and contextualized
on the Ulaanbaatar stage. Also, instead of stating that it had been State policy
that had suppressed their ethnic customs in response to the rise of Ulaanbaatar
culture, as Bulag illustrated earlier (1998), Darimaa pointed out that, with the
central Khalkh becoming more dominant in the traditional musical scene during
the socialist period, ethnic singers in fact did not appear to have felt proud about
presenting their ethnic customs. Javzandolgor, indeed, who is Khalkh but whose
entire life was rooted in the local Khövsgöl aimag as a herder, preferred to sing
the version of the song rendered by professional singers in Ulaanbaatar, even
though she had kept the local version, which she had learned from her mother.
My conversations with these singers leave me with two important points.
First, it is clear that Mongolia’s ethnic communities and local populations have
developed their vocal arts and expressive cultures in close relation to their eco-
logical environment. This shaped their local and ethnic customs along with their
local languages, so that it might have been more suitable for these ethnic styles
of songs to have been performed and understood in their birthplaces, which
required that they remain in their locale. The second important point from these
conversations confirms that there was certainly a centralization of culture in
Ulaanbaatar during the socialist period; this was not only due to Party policy
and political activities, however, but had perhaps been exercised to a greater
extent by the musical practitioners themselves as well as by the participating
audience. This reinforced their own discrete notion separating the privileged
group from the Others. The ethnic and regional dynamics provided in this case
a readily available leverage.
Returning in this context to Said’s notion of “orientalism,” introduced at the
beginning of this chapter, the Other, in the case of urtyn duu—the singing and
singers of the west-melodies—is imagined by dint of its ethnic and cultural dis-
tance, rather than by the actual differences in the singing and performance. The
lack of aizam duu, and of particular techniques such as shurankhai or tsokhilt,
in the Oirad traditions, became a way to create distance, and thereby the means
to imagine at once a distinction between us and them, and an increased sense
of belonging/displacement. The singing techniques of shurankhai and tsokhilt
became, in this case, merely cultural assets that have been used to empower
or disempower. Once such skills acquire value, the singers who can use those
techniques gain an advantage, and the songs marked by such techniques achieve
a greater importance, thus fashioning a power relationship that exists more in
the singers’ minds than anywhere else.

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 As Mongolia stepped into the post-socialist era after 1990, a new cultural
trajectory was instigated, and ethnic diversity faced a new situation, which is
still ongoing. One could argue that the Mongols’ attitude toward their ethnic
cultures has been shifting since 1990, as the country has developed its democ-
racy through a series of political changes. These cultural shifts have sometimes
been contradictory and sometimes complementary. While Mongols are now
in a constant search for their united identity as “Mongol,” and use their diverse
ethnic identity to strengthen their holistic identity, as shown in Javklan’s album
Khamag Mongol, I see this notion of ethnic cultures as once again becoming
imagined through a process of politicization, creating different and nuanced
“us and them” binaries, although now they are focused on new nation-building.
By the same token, the ephemeral and fluid nature of Mongolia’s oral tradi-
tion has made it more accessible in the politicized and ideologized processes.
Singers now use urtyn duu in order to emphasize the nostalgic idea that urtyn
duu has been a continuing and constant feature of Mongol culture since the
Hünnü era and to promote in particular their own unique ethnic urtyn duu.
More Mongol scholars are drawing from the work of local ethnic singers, and
the western (Oirad) culture as a whole is being more actively discussed. And
now these ethnic and cultural issues are again being mentioned in relation to
the current predicament of Mongol identity. In this way, the urtyn duu tradi-
tion—and perhaps orally transmitted traditions in Mongolia—is continuously
shifting and being negotiated through a constant process of cultural transition.
Nevertheless, the fact that Mongolia has a rich ethnic diversity, and that each
ethnic group retains its own distinctive voice, is central to their oral tradition,
no matter how this tradition might be represented, and it is through this process
of establishing who precisely they are that Mongolians recognize themselves.

Notes
1. Mongolian singers often use the term “aizam duu” (extended song) instead
of “aizam urtyn duu” (extended long-song) since aizam is already a well-known
category of long-song. This also applies to besreg and other category names as well.
Thus, besreg urtyn duu (simplified long-song) are often called “besreg duu” (simpli-
fied song).
2. The direction of east and west in the Mongolian worldview is determined by
the fact that Mongolians conceive of the south as being in front of them, and the
north as being behind them. Therefore, Mongolians use the word baruun for the
right-hand side and the west, and züün for both the left-hand side and the east.
3. The Buriad ethnic group occupies part of the Russian Federation and the
northeastern part of Mongolia, while ethnic groups such as the Dariganga and
Üzemchin are found in the southeast. Darkhad and Khotgoid, and some Uriankhai,
are found in Khövsgöl aimag, slightly to the northwest of Ulaanbaatar, while ethnic
groups such as Eljigen (Eljigin) Khalkh, Myangad, Dörvöd, Khoton, Zakhchin, and

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 other Uriankhai are further scattered throughout Uvs aimag, Khovd aimag, and
northern Gob’-Altai aimag in the western region.
4. The current Khövsgöl aimag was originally a part of Tannu Uriankhai Frontier,
and later remained in Mongolia when the rest of Tannu Uriankhai Frontier became
part of the Russian Federation in 1911. For this reason, some Mongolian maps il-
lustrating these regions under the Qing dynasty mostly show two Frontiers: Tannu
Uriankhai and Khovd.
5. Bulag (1998) translates this term as “ethnic process” in his work.
6. Although Mongolian scholars tend to use two terms, ugsaatan and yastan,
interchangeably for the English word “ethnicity,” they have slightly different con-
notations. Atwood (2004) translates yastan as “sub-ethnic group,” and övög (lit. clan)
also as a “tribe” among different ethnic groups, while ündesten (lit. “having a root”)
implies the “nation.” Bulag (1998) references those terms from Russian translations
and claims that the word yastan was a direct translation from the Russian narod-
nost’, which refers to ethnic groups and was commonly used in Mongolia during
the socialist era. However, the word ugsaatan was later used to describe the small
ethnic minorities, or yastan, and ugsaatan has now become the more common word
for an ethnic group.
7. Bogino duu (short-song) is another Mongolian folk song genre that is often
discussed in contrast to urtyn duu because its metric and strophic styles of singing
contrast dramatically with the characteristics of the long-song.
8. His practice of urtyn duu with an older singer was later recorded in a docu-
mentary by an independent Mongolian filmmaker and distributed with the title
“Singer from Taiga” (2013, A Zoljargal and Son Film).
9. During the rest of the trip, I was able to meet singers who sang and explained
religious long-songs (shashtir duu, gür duu), which were mentioned in the earlier
part of this chapter.
10. This term is also frequently spelled “Eljigin.”
11. In this region, I had a chance to sit down with about ten singers at the same
time in the theater of the cultural center. Thus, the information here comes not from
one singer alone: it was gathered from the interactions of a group. For this reason,
I do not provide the individual singers’ names in this section.
12. These Mongolian terms are the words that my interviewee singers used, but
my impression was that they were not widely used, either by these particular singers
or by local singers.

Bibliography
Alimaa, A. 2012. Urtyn duuny töröl züil, tarkhalt, kuvilbaryn ontslog (Special features
in the taxonomy, distribution and variations of long-song). Ulaanbaatar: Academy
of Science.
Atwood, Christopher. P. 2004. Encyclopedia of Mongolia and the Mongol Empire. New
York: Facts on File.
Bulag, Uradyn E. 1998. Nationalism and Hybridity in Mongolia. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Crossley, Pamela Kyle. 2006. “Making Mongols.” In Empire at the Margins: Culture,

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 Ethnicity and Frontier in Early Modern China, edited by Pamela K. Crossley, Helen
F Siu and Donald S Sutton, 58–82. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Dorjdagva, Myagmarsürengiin. 2016. Oirad Mongolchuudyn urtyn uuu: Zan Yil, Övlög-
chid [Oirad Mongol’s long-song]. Ulaanbaatar: Suvarga Buyan Publishing.
Ganbold, Möngönkhüügiin. 2012. Oirad Mongolchuudyn baigali kamgaalakh ulamjlal
[Oirad Mongol’s tradition of protecting nature]. Ulaanbaatar: N.P.
Kaplonski, Christopher. 1998. “Creating National Identity in Socialist Mongolia.” Central
Asia Survey 17(1):35–49.
Myadar, Orhon, and James Deshaw Rae. 2014. “Territorializing National Identity in Post-
Socialist Mongolia: Purity, Authenticity, and Chinggis Khan.” Eurasian Geography
and Economics 55(5):560–577.
Pegg, Carole. 2001. Mongolian Music, Dance and Oral Narrative: Performing Diverse
Identities. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
Rinchensambuu, G. 2011. Mongol Ardyn urtyn duuny tuurvil züi goo saikhan [The beauty
of Mongolian long-song]. Ulaanbaatar: N.P.
Said, Edward. 1978. Orientalism. New York, NY: Pantheon Books.
Sampildendev, K. H. and K.N. Yatskovskai. 1984. Mongol ardyn urtyn duu [Mongolian
long-song]. Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.
Sneath, David. 2010. “Political Mobilization and the Construction of Collective Identity
in Mongolia.” Central Asian Survey 29(3):251–267.
Szmyt, Zbigniew. 2012. “The History of Nation and Ethnicity in Mongolia.” Sensue His-
toriae 8(3):11–28.
Tsetsentsolmon, Baatarnarany. 2015. “Music in Cultural Construction: Nationalisation,
Popularisation, and Commercialisation of Mongolian Music.” Inner Asia 17:118–140.
Yoon, Sunmin. 2015. “Survival of the Fittest: The Urtyn duu Tradition in Changing Mon-
golia.” Smithsonian Folkways Magazine. https://folkways.si.edu/magazine-summer
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smithsonian.
———. 2019. “Mobilities, Experienced and Performed, in Mongolia’s Urtyn Duu Tradi-
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 CHAPTER 4

Gendered Musicality in
the Altai Mountains
REBEK AH PLUECKHAHN

In a remote rural district (sum) fringed by rolling hills within the Altai Moun-
tains in western Mongolia, a concert was held on a cold, clear, icy evening in
February in the early 2010s. The concert, held in the sum cultural center on this
crystal-clear evening in winter, just over a week before Tsagaan Sar—or the Lu-
nar New Year—featured the sum’s cultural center workers. Each of the Soyolyn
Töviin Khamt Olon or cultural center employees, from well-known musicians to
the center staff, all took part in the event. Renowned singers from the sum and
their family members were invited to perform. All were given the opportunity to
perform the genre they knew best, with some singing and others reading poetry
they had written. This concert became a place of veneration, where musical and
moral personhood was recognized and celebrated. Musical and moral person-
hood, and its gendered dimensions were made manifest through performance.
This chapter explores the gendered aspects of performance and musical
practice in a rural district (sum) in Mongolia. People who live in this par-
ticular sum are predominantly Altai Uriankhai people. It is renown as a place
where spiritually significant musical genres are practiced—typically by men
who inherit the rights to do so through patrilineal lines. It is also a place where
people love to sing—on long jeep journeys, at ceremonial occasions such as
weddings and hair-cutting ceremonies, or on the concert stage. The preferred
way of singing is doing so with a loud projected voice, holding a lilting melody
clearly and confidently, as others join in singing along with the first singer or an
audience claps along to a concert performance. Drawing from approximately
fifteen months’ ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2009 and 2012, this
chapter explores the ways in which wider social life, familial roles and ensuing
expected cultivations of moral personhood form an integral part of musical
practice. Doing so reveals how forms of musical sociality are highly gendered.

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 Women’s musical practices, performances and forms of musical sociality in-
nately combine musical knowledge with familial roles and moral personhood.
While within the sum there is the presence of spiritually significant genres prac-
ticed by men, women’s musical practice, discourse and sociality constitute sig-
nificant ways in which musical and moral personhood are cultivated and musical
knowledge transmitted. Through exploring sum concert performance, classifica-
tions of musical ability in ceremonial music performances as well as the transmis-
sion of heroic epics (tuul’), this chapter highlights the gendered dimensions of
Mongolian musical practice. The wider social synthesis made between musical
and moral personhood is not something exclusively experienced by women,
but men too are understood and morally assessed through their actions. Skills
in musical performance provide one of many ways in which moral personhood
can be constituted among those living in the district. Looking at musical sociality
through a gendered lens opens up a wide understanding of the constitution of
moral personhood and musical practice in Mongolia more generally.

Venerating a Musical Exemplar

At the sum concert, Saraa,1 an older woman in her ’60s, entered the stage
dressed in a fine deel (traditional long coat) and hat. She took the microphone
in preparation to sing and waited for the person presiding over the concert to
introduce her. He presented her as an “öndör eej bolson,” or “someone who has
become an esteemed mother.” Saraa sang with a loud projecting voice, deftly
leading the musicians who modified their accompaniment to follow her. Her
song titled, “Alsaas domog duu” (A song of a legend from far away), had a lilt-
ing melody that filled the expansive cultural center. The audience responded
enthusiastically to her commanding stage presence, at one point applauding
her mid-song. Toward the end of her performance, a group of women from
the audience ascended the stage to offer Saraa gifts of money and chocolates.
Typically reserved for the conclusion of a concert as a sign of respect for visiting
performers, several women on this occasion walked up to the stage immediately
after Saraa’s performance even though many performers had yet to ascend the
stage.2 The people gifting the money were younger women, and the gifts formed
an exchange with the singer who had just gifted the audience with her song.3
While it is not necessary or common for every performer to receive a gift, on
this day the gifts given by the young women formed an expression of respect
toward Saraa and an opportunity for the givers to receive auspiciousness as well.
The concert performance illustrates one of the many ways in which gendered
musical roles become apparent through performance. In this discussion, I take
a wide perspective on what constitutes musical practice, drawing from the work
of Anthony Seeger who writes that “music is an emotion that accompanies the

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 production of, the appreciation of, and the participation in a performance. Music
is also . . . the sounds themselves after they are produced. Yet it is intention as
well as realization; it is emotion and value as well as structure and form” (Seeger,
2004[1987]:xiv). Musical engagement among the Altai Uriankhai is far more
than simply the physical act of playing and performing music. Musical practice
includes audience members’ participation in performance and the discussions
and evaluations that occur about musical performance and music’s significance.
It includes research and documentation residents conduct with older family
members; it is listening to and discussing concerts on television, and talking
about musical life during the socialist period. Musical practice is performing
on concert stages and singing songs in ceremonial celebrations (nair) held to
celebrate weddings or children’s first hair-cutting ceremonies. Each of these form
integral parts of musical social life in this area and Mongolia more generally.
Definitions of what constitutes a “musician” (khögjimchin) and a “good singer”
(sain duuchin) form important conceptual frames through which musical prac-
tice takes place in this area. Such definitions are implicated in the cultivation of
officialdom—what is considered “official” musical knowledge and who should
impart it, both within the sum and to visitors. Interwoven throughout this are
complex ways in which musical practice is highly gendered. By gendered, I am
not solely referring to the presence of musical genres typically performed by
men and women. Instead, a gendered analytical lens reveals the roles of women’s
musical sociality within the cultivation of locally official musical knowledge and
ways that performative practice is encouraged. Women are often conduits of
knowledge. They also are recognized and esteemed for musical practice rather
than necessarily being viewed as carriers of spiritually esteemed genres such as
epics (tuul’). While epics are practiced by men, the ongoing practice of these and
other spiritually significant genres and performative contexts such as weddings
are highly dependent on women’s knowledge and social acumen. Women’s wider
social roles are firmly entrenched and interconnected with their musical roles.
The recognition given to Saraa at the concert was an acknowledgment not only
of her performance, but her role as a mother, as a performer and all the genera-
tive possibilities that such performative ability can bring. These wider forms
of musical practice are pivotal ways in which people define themselves—both
personally in relation to each other but also how they situate themselves within
wider Mongolia.

Altai Uriankhai Musical Practice

The Altai Uriankhai are considered to be a branch of the Uriankhai, a group
of Turkic origin connected to a broad area that includes current-day Tuva in
Russia (formerly the area of Tannu Uriankhai) (Baabar, 1999:145–147), parts of

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 Bayan-Ölgii and Khovd aimags (provinces) in western Mongolia, and northern
Xinjiang in China. People often referred to themselves as a yastan (literally
meaning bone-group), referring to a type of sub-ethnic delineation defined
during the socialist period (Bulag 1998). In contemporary Mongolia, the Al-
tai Uriankhai are considered part of the Oirad group of Mongols of western
Mongolia, an area that encompasses the aimags of Bayan-Ölgii, Khovd, Uvs,
and Zavkhan (see Chapters 3 and 6 in this volume). This region is home to
more than fifteen different yastan groups. The western Mongolian region is
often characterized by many Mongolians I spoke to as a place of many older
“traditional” (ulamjlalt) cultural practices. Since the end of socialism in 1990,
there has been an ongoing discovery and articulation by artists, scholars, and
lay people (to name a few) of the importance of Mongolian culture and its his-
torical origins (Humphrey, 1992a; Kaplonski, 2004). Certain Altai Uriankhai
musical genres are now included in national cultural heritage programs and
classifications. Their cultural and musical practices—some of which reference
animist spiritual realms in the surrounding landscape—are regarded as linking
Mongolia to an ancient past.
Musical practice forms a part of the way contemporary Altai Uriankhai iden-
tity can be performatively brought into being. The Altai Uriankhai in western
Mongolia are essentially a Mongolian people. They practice the same kind of
herding transhumance practiced across Mongolia. Many sum residents speak an
Altai Uriankhai dialect of Mongolian. Since the socialist period, many younger
Altai Uriankhai people speak Khalkh Mongolian, the Mongolian spoken in
Ulaanbaatar, in official discourse, and throughout most of Mongolia. Altai
Uriankhai historical narratives form part of wider Mongolian narratives of
movement and group or clan formation.4 Delineations of what practices are
considered typically Altai Uriankhai are extremely important among the Altai
Uriankhai themselves. It was partly through performative action that a form of
difference was created. For example, people were quick to tell me how a certain
food they were preparing, clothing they were wearing, or term they were using
was distinctly Altai Uriankhai. A significant indicator of Altai Uriankhai–ness
was the performance of Altai Uriankhai music.
Doing ethnographic research on musical engagement resulted in me be-
coming well acquainted with people’s love of singing. Whether at a wedding, a
child’s first hair-cutting ceremony, a small reunion of friends, or a journey by
jeep along a winding mountain road, people would not hesitate to break out in
song. A song was usually initiated by a single person in a clear, strong, and pro-
jected voice, after which others would follow their lead until most people were
singing together in a boisterous chorus of voices. During ceremonial contexts
singers would select songs that are ikh uchirtai or songs with ‘great meaning’ or
significance. Singers chose songs that had meaningful lyrics that evoked a love

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 for one’s mother, father, and/or homeland, drawing from a selection of well-
known Altai Uriankhai short-songs (bogino duu) and long-songs (urtyn duu).
They also consisted of Mongolyn ündestnii duu (national songs), a repertoire well
known throughout Mongolia. The musical genres that are passed according to
a custodial tradition of family inheritance include the inherited rights between
males of particular familial lineages to perform heroic epics or tuul’ (Pegg 2000).
This genre allows people to cultivate understanding of and spiritual relationships
with the mountainous environment and land masters (gazryn ezen) that live in
the surrounding landscape. The lyrics of epics are rich in both shamanic and
Buddhist content and often recount a shamanic creation story in which a hero
(baatar) travels through a spiritually imbued, malleable geography.5 The practice
of such spiritually powerful musical genres were restricted and bowdlerized by
successive Mongolian socialist governments during the socialist period (Pegg
2001; Marsh 2009). In the post-socialist context, when restrictions on spiritual,
animist ritual practices were lifted, the practice of these spiritually powerful
musical genres forms a continual process of rediscovery, rearticulation and
discussion. This discussion occurs both among Altai Uriankhai as well as in
the media and government cultural heritage programs.

Becoming Female: Gender and Fluidity

through the Lens of Musical Practice
Framing musical practice through a gendered lens reveals diverse, integral
musical roles. This analytical lens widens our focus away from a focus on inher-
ited genres and the types of officially recognized discourses of knowledge that
surround them (Buyandelger 2013:169), to encapsulate and reveal other kinds
of diverse social activities that form a fundamental part of musical practice. I
argue that musical practice forms a space in which women take on social roles
and thus enact forms of femaleness. Taking such a focus allows the consideration
of several key themes in the anthropological literature on gender in Mongolia.
As I will argue, musical practice forms not only a space in which roles become
enacted and forms of femaleness are constituted. Musical practice also be-
comes a space in which the fluidity of women’s roles is apparent and becomes
utilized. Women’s presence as both insiders and outsiders within a husband’s
familial group forms an integral part of the perpetuation of musical practice
and knowledge.
Such a discussion engages several interrelated phenomena including age,
kinship roles, and gendered hierarchies, each of which can underlie family life in
Mongolia. As noted by Caroline Humphrey (1993), Rebecca Empson (2011:177)
and Manduhai Buyandelger (2013:185), femaleness in Mongolia forms a set of
characteristics and virtues that are obtained and cultivated over the course of

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 one’s life. This unfolds over several significant life stages including girlhood,
the young wife (or more specifically, daughter-in-law), and her emergence as a
mother-in-law with her own descendants (Humphrey 1993). Marriage patterns
typically (but not always) consist of patterns of virilocal residence. In rural
areas, wives often move to live in their husband’s district or in their husband’s
khot ail (encampments).
The experience of new brides (shine ber) forms one of gradual and unfold-
ing separation and integration as they physically and emotionally move away
from their natal household to live with and rear children alongside their hus-
band’s kin (Empson 2011:176–177). The bittersweet emotions that form part
of these unfolding processes of separation and containment form the basis of
some long-songs (urtyn duu) sung at Altai Uriankhai weddings (Plueckhahn
2014). A newly arrived daughter-in-law is often under a lot of pressure from
her mother-in-law to conform and contribute in particular ways while main-
taining a demure and deferential manner (Humphrey 1993:84). This can form
a context that includes considerable challenges. A daughter-in-law may focus
on the rearing of their own children in order to simultaneously improve their
status among their husband’s family, while at the same time, establish a separate
household from their in-laws (Empson 2011:175–176). Humphrey discusses how
women experience a culmination of these two blended ideological aims when
they become mothers-in-law themselves, overseeing the work of their own
daughters-in-law and thus occupying an elevated position in the hierarchy of
female roles (Humphrey 1992b). The lived experience of these unfolding pro-
cesses and the milestones of motherhood and marriage that they involve become
part of a larger expectation of “gender proficiency” that women are expected to
cultivate (Buyandelger 2013:185). Here, motherhood and marriage are viewed as
being “equally important for completing a woman as a moral being” (Ibid:186).
Musical practice forms an action that allows one to cultivate the transition
through these often expected, significant life roles. However, rather than be a
way in which existing sociocultural expectations are merely reinforced, musical
performance is a way in which the fluidity of roles can be not only negotiated,
but indeed cultivated at different points to emphasize one’s subjective position
as a person of esteem and status in her or his own right. Gender is a relational
phenomenon, and one’s relational position changes over the course of a life-
time (Doubleday 2008:6). In the transition between different states of female-
ness over the course of one’s life there emerges a fundamental contradiction:
as a daughter-in-law supports and makes a home for her husband’s kin and
grows his patrilineal line, she herself is in the process of transition, creating
and cultivating her own children and household. What emerges is the mother-
in-law, who is simultaneously now an established person of esteem within her
husband’s familial household and extended relatives, yet at the same time has

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 her own authority and esteem as an “esteemed mother”—something that is
applauded and venerated, as seen in the opening description of Saraa’s concert
performance. I now turn to explore a series of musical practices undertaken by
married women, revealing how they negotiate changing gendered expectations
through musical practice during this life stage.
In order to explore this, I examine the way in which gendered relationships
become manifest through the activity of musical performance and wider musical
practices. In performance choice and actions during performance people both
adhere to and negotiate what is “expected.” As noted by Sally Moore (cited in
Turner 1986:78), “established rules, customs and symbolic frameworks” contain
elements of ambiguity. Performance can be a space where different kinds of
relations become manifest through actions that reveal nuance and ambiguity
surrounding established expectations. Performance reveals interrelatedness
between people and shared concepts of social obligations and connectedness.
The existence of these interrelated factors means that in performance there are
references to several factors occurring at once (Moore 1987:730).

Officialdom and Age: Authorities of Knowledge

When I first arrived in the sum, the first people I was directed to were con-
sidered authoritative wellsprings of musical knowledge and of culturally specific
Altai Uriankhai customs (zan zanshil). This included men and women (but often
men), usually elder people who were considered respected heads of families.
I met with esteemed men and women alike to discuss musical practices and
found these discussions to often reveal gendered authorities of knowledge. Men
often appeared as “mediators of certain types of knowledge” (Empson 2011:35),
where they frequently, publicly detailed significant and important historical
facts and the general knowledge of particular musical genres. While women
and men both had extensive musical knowledges, this type of exegesis formed
part of the cultivation of authoritative musical knowledge.
When I took up other offers to meet with women with a long history of per-
formance practice, their status as a mother and grandmother were features that
were also viewed with high esteem. Early in my research I was encouraged one
morning, with very little warning, to go with my friend to visit the local singer
Pujee in a herding encampment some considerable drive away from the sum
center. At the time, Pujee was in her fifties and known for being a good singer
who had performed in regional theaters in the early 1970s. Upon arriving at her
ger, I was, at first, planning a social visit in order to hear some collective singing,
if it occurred. However, it quickly became clear that people present expected me
to record Pujee. Pujee soon left the ger to get changed into a good deel. Upon
her return she chose to sing the song “Khoyor nutgiin erkh” (The power of two

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 homelands), a well-known Altai Uriankhai song. She sang it along with two of her
daughters and then encouraged her granddaughter to sing another well-known
folk song. Once they finished singing, I played back the recording to everyone;
all family members present exclaimed and laughed when hearing the recording.
This recording session formed a musical encounter that, while more formal-
ized, was nonetheless a familiar and accepted form of musical sociality within
the sum. Such exchanges highlighted performers as esteemed musical exemplars.
In Pujee’s performance, these distinctions of esteem, and forms of hierarchy or
difference, were not fixed, but were fluid and variable. This could be seen in
how the focus often was shifted beyond the “main” singer, often by the sing-
ers themselves. Pujee chose to sing her first song with her daughters and then
encouraged her granddaughter to follow with a solo song. This formed a way
that Pujee not only allowed herself to be recognized, but also brought attention
to the growing musical abilities of her own familial line. Such Altai Uriankhai
specific song knowledge and the ability to sing these songs well, including to
an outside researcher, are part of a wider form of preferred social action, of
being a good person. Singing formed part of “ideas to do with the right way of
doing things” (Empson 2011:95) or a preferred social aesthetic. Such cultiva-
tion of preferred social aesthetic was also deeply implicated with Pujee’s role
as an esteemed mother. As her inclusion of her grandchildren demonstrated,
Pujee’s cultivation of her own musical personhood was bound up in her status
as a grandmother, her role in musical transmission between generations, and
her role as a nurturer of future singers. Through performance, one’s selfhood as
an individual and as a relation were not mutually exclusive but were mutually
reinforced through practice.
This focus on performance as a demonstration of women’s musical knowledge
was a common theme throughout this research. Such performances formed
a fundamental exercising of familial relations that extended into ceremonial
singing, where domestic practices associated with households, and often with
women (Empson 2011:37), were not separate from the ways in which forms
of musical knowledge were defined and practiced in the sum. Indeed, in this
current context, previous socialist era definitions of a removed “cultural” “of-
ficial” practice on a concert stage, and the role of domestic household tasks and
constitutions of personhood were blurred.

Musical Practice and an Emphasis on Actions:

Musicians and Good Singers
In discussions of musical ability, distinctions were often made between musi-
cians (khögjimchin), people who were well known for performing in concerts;
and people with great voices who performed well in ceremonial occasions and

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 are known as good singers (sain duuchid). Singers who have long and ongoing
associations with cultural centers and have won medals for concert perfor-
mances are generally considered “musicians” (khögjimchin). Singers well known
for singing within the sum in ceremonial contexts were described as “knowing
many songs” and described as good singers or sain duuchin, but overall they were
not called musicians. Such singing formed a fundamental part of ceremonial
events such as weddings and hair cutting ceremonies, where people initiated
songs that other attendees joined in and followed. Being a good initiator of
songs and singing well at such ceremonial events within the sum earned par-
ticular people the status of someone who was a sain duuchin. When finding
out about the extensive musical abilities of a familial group, I exclaimed to one
of the extended family members that they are indeed a very musical family.
This person replied to me, “they are not musicians, they are herders,” “ted nar
khögjimchid bish, malchid baina.” Upon speaking to several people who I knew
were known for singing well in nairs (ceremonial occasions including weddings
and children’s hair-cutting ceremonies), some told me that they themselves were
not musicians and that I should talk to someone more knowledgeable about
musical genres. However, during ceremonies these same people would often
sing extremely well.
Emphasis was sometimes placed on musical action and ability over knowl-
edge about music. Older female singers who took the lead at important family
life-cycle ceremonies, such as hair-cutting ceremonies for their grandchildren,
often skillfully initiated the beginning of songs by starting a song with a loud
projected, clear voice. In this instance, the ability to sing the melody in the right
way forms part of the “right way of doing things.” It created the required musi-
cal and also social aesthetic in a ceremonial context and formed a ceremonial
way of “knowing” songs. Singing at a grandchild’s nair formed a way in which a
grandmother, for instance, contributed, through performative, musical action,
to the “social birth” cultivated through a grandchild’s hair-cutting ceremony
(Empson 2011:174).
The ability and willingness to contribute songs in domestic, informal or cer-
emonial situations such as nair was a favored quality and one that correlates
with a person’s overall character. The preferred form of musical, social behavior
included the combined actions of preferred hosting behavior, joking, sharing
of food and drink in a stylized way, and the initiation of a known melody in a
projected clear vocal tone. Just as a person’s willingness to contribute well to one’s
networks earned someone the title sain khün, or good person, contributing to
their social networks by contributing well to inclusive, preferred musical social-
ity resulted in the term sain duuchin, or good singer, a holistic term very much
evocative of the same qualities imbued in the term sain khün, or good person.
Calling someone a good singer was an encompassing and great compliment

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 that conjured up the image of someone who was often willing to participate and
contribute to one’s networks in a positive way.6 While there are many other ways
good moral character can be constituted, and the fact that musical abilities vary
and not everyone is able to be a good singer, singing well in ceremonial contexts
was for some a way in which such moral character can be cultivated.
In this way, categorizations of musical prowess formed part of a larger moral
categorization of both men and women. Musical engagement and demonstra-
tion of good musical skill and musicality formed a powerful act that equated
a melody and performance behavior with the innate character and goodness
of that person. The women I met who were well known as “good singers” were
also often esteemed mothers and grandmothers within extended familial net-
works. This conflation of moral and musical personhood formed an innate
co-constitution of musicality, willingness to contribute through performance,
and preferred female personhood. As seen in the opening description of Saraa’s
concert performance and the gifting of money that she received as a result, this
ability was holistically celebrated and acknowledged in public ways.

Mediation: Women and the Fostering

of Musical Knowledge
Esteemed women’s musical roles in this sum were not only limited to musical
performance, but also extend to the cultivation of musical activity within musical
lineages. This example of gendered musical practice extends into the spiritually
significant genres inherited and performed by men, such as the practice of ep-
ics or tuul’. This musical practice consists of the cultivation of musical activity
that forms part of the role as parent and nurturer of the next generation of epic
performers.
As Humphrey (1993:86) notes, older mothers in Mongolia, who have success-
fully cultivated their own households, are often expected to undertake the role
of mediator between “senior men of the lineage and the incoming junior wives.”
Such a mediatory role reflects first the skill that women need to cultivate over
the course of their lives as married women in negotiating the twofold role of
supporting their husband’s family while growing and raising their own. Second,
this mediatory role is ongoing, as women negotiate unfolding, fluctuating forms
of insider/outsider status at different subjective vantage points within their fa-
milial group (Empson 2011:177). The following musical role I will now describe
does not necessarily reflect a mediation between a husband’s familial group
and a woman’s own household, but it does reflect another kind of mediatory
role that women undertake in relation to spiritually significant musical genres
practiced by men. Their accumulated life experience of gradual incorporation

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 and negotiation of different familial branches make them particularly adept at
these musical mediatory roles.
Altai Uriankhai epics are challenging to learn and perform. Young men of
epic lineages (tuul’chyn udam) are gradually taught epics by an elder epic cus-
todian, or tuul’ch, into adulthood. The lyrics of epics begin with “an account of
the origin of the earth and the creation of people” (Pegg 1995:93). This creation
story describes the formation of the shamanic separation between three sansar,
or realms: the sky, the ground and the underworld. Epic texts are rich in poetic
devices including, “vowel harmony, formal parallelism and line-initial allitera-
tion” (Pegg 2001:51).7 Although knowledge of epic texts is paramount, it is the
ability to perform them with specific musical techniques that denotes someone
who has mastered Altai Uriankhai epic knowledge and performance. As Reichl
writes, what constitutes knowledge of epics can be described in fundamentally
musical terms, “as part of the living performance of epic, music is no mere orna-
ment but an essential element of the communicative event” (Reichl 2000:26).
An epic custodian’s (tuul’ch) identity and status is inextricably bound up in his
skillful epic performance practice and knowledge, a practice that implicates his
wider family. Bolor, the wife of an epic custodian, had considerable knowledge
of who performed musically within the sum—whether they are known as “musi-
cians” or “good singers”—and the familial networks they moved within. She and
her husband encouraged their four children to develop their ability to perform
in multiple musical genres. Due to the complexity of epics and the important
custodial role of epic lineages, members of the wider familial networks of an epic
lineage also play a large part in wider epic performance practice. Bolor herself
was deeply invested in the understanding of and research on Altai Uriankhai
epics. During visits with her and her husband to discuss epics and wider musi-
cal practice, our discussions would be wide ranging—from descriptions of the
history of epic practice to different familial groups that practice epics and wider
spiritual understandings of the surrounding landscapes (see Chapter 6 in this
volume).8 As we continued discussions, Bolor would point out and correct me on
different facts on family genealogy and intricate cultural terms and definitions.
Historically, I was to learn, women have taken on roles in the transmission
of contextual, orally transmitted knowledge about epics and their cultural ref-
erents. Pegg in 1995 wrote that, “women rarely performed epics and when they
did so it was only in intimate gatherings. But often they knew them because of
the frequency with which they had heard them, and they sometimes assisted
in the learning process” (Pegg 1995:90). This familial knowledge has sometimes
formed a fundamental part of continuations of epic custodianship and knowl-
edge transmission at moments where there are no suitable male heirs. One
woman, a relative to Bolor’s husband, is included as a significant person in the

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 same epic lineage. This woman’s father was a renowned epic patriarch who did
not have any sons. Instead, she learned epics from her father and was known as
a good singer herself. Subsequently, while it was said she did not perform, she
assisted her sons in their successful memorization of particular epics, forming
an integral link in the custodianship and transmission of epics of this particular
lineage in the sum.
Throughout my research in this sum, women and wider family members
of the epic lineage played an important part in the transmission and under-
standing of the wider social networks of epic performance practice and musi-
cal knowledge exchange. Bolor held important knowledge of who practiced
what and how, and how they related to wider musical lineages. She often kept
abreast of performance opportunities for her family. She not only was able to
do so as the long-term wife of an epic custodian, but she is the mother of their
son, a young future tuul’ch-in-training. Thus, her cultivation of musical activity
within the lineage formed part of her role as parent and nurturer of the next
generation of epic performers. However, rather than simply reinforce the roles
as daughter-in-law and wife, or solely form part of one’s role as a nurturer of the
next generation, musical practice became a way to cultivate and negotiate the
fluidity between both. Such an ability to cultivate and encourage performance
formed a fundamental part of ongoing epic practice.

Conclusion
Women’s musical practices, performances, and forms of musical sociality
innately combined musical knowledge and ability with familial roles and moral
personhood. They constituted significant ways in which musical and moral per-
sonhood were cultivated and musical knowledge transmitted. This synthesis be-
tween musical and moral personhood was not something exclusively experienced
by women; but men also were understood and morally assessed through their
actions—actions which implicated their musical lives as well. However, taking
the musical lives of women as a perspectival lens opens up a wide understanding
of the constitution of moral personhood and musical practice in Mongolia.
This myriad form of musical practice underpins and perpetuates forms of
authority from the bottom-up, making it difficult to make clear distinctions
between official and unofficial musical practice. While the cultivation of par-
ticular Altai Uriankhai musical genres are significant in their exclusive inherited
rights to practice and their significant spiritual associations, family members of
these lineages also performed other non-spiritual songs on stage. Their family
members recited poetry and initiated songs known as national Mongolian folk
songs at weddings. Taking women’s performance practice as an analytical entry
point reveals the multifaceted nature of contemporary performance practice in

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 Mongolia—in ways that enrich our understandings of “culturally significant”
forms of practice (Buyandelger 2013:154).
This chapter explores musical practice through three themes: age and kin
delineated roles of women; an emphasis on musical action; and women’s roles
as mediators and cultivators of future musical practice. One overarching phe-
nomenon that emerges throughout these three themes is that musical practice
forms an important part in negotiating the fluidity of different roles that women
need to take over the course of their lives—in particular, the way that women
as wives and mothers both support their husband’s kin and, at the same time,
raise and nurture their own households. This gendered focus takes into account
that while there may be genres predominantly practiced by men, many other
people are involved in contributing to their musical practice and its significance
(Doubleday 2008:7). Musical esteem, for men as well as women, is interlinked
with their wider social roles and forms part of the constitution of the “right way
of doing things” and the cultivation of good moral character. Such cultivation is
inextricably linked to one’s age and gender delineated roles within the household
or family. The social knowledge of women forms an inextricable part of the
perpetuation and practice of musical sociality and the ceremonial and musical
life in Mongolia.

Notes
1. Pseudonyms are used throughout this chapter.
2. The amount of money each woman gave, roughly 100–1000 tögrög, was enough
to show respect for the performer but not so much that it would provoke jealousy.
Jealousy can engender misfortune for those to whom it is directed (Empson 2011).
3. As Jagchid and Hyer (1979:160) note, a failure to return a “gift” in rural Mon-
golia is “inauspicious for all involved.”
4. Because of this, some scholars are reluctant to call the Altai Uriankhai a distinct
ethnic group. Atwood (2004:9) writes: “The term Uriangkhai in modern Mongolia
denotes a vaguely defined yastan (subethnic group) in western Mongolia. The Altai
Uriangkhai form a coherent group within this . . . subethnic group” (see Chapter 3
in this volume).
5. See Pedersen (2011) for further description of Mongolian shamanic ontologies
and the interrelationships between shamanism and Buddhism in Mongolia.
6. Portisch (2010:S73) also discusses the links made between Kazakh women’s
embroidery and the evaluation of the embroiderer’s character.
7. Much of this veneration of the literary qualities of epics can also be seen in
recent scholarship through the documentation of complete epic song texts (c.f.
Katuu 2001, 2010; Tsoloo and Mönhtsetseg 2008).
8. In Chapter 6 of this volume Chuluunbaatar provides further details on the
cosmological significance of epic performance, text, and the accompanying instru-
ment.

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 PART THREE

Material and
Social History

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 INTERLUDE

Consistency, Patience,
and Perseverance
Maintaining the Fiddle-
Making Tradition
BAYARSAIKHAN BADAMSÜREN
AND PETER K. MARSH

While there are many workshops and factories in Mongolia today constructing
horsehead fiddles (morin khuur) for domestic and international markets, only a
handful of them construct professional quality or “master” fiddles. Since open-
ing his first instrument-making studio in 1999, Bayarsaikhan Badamsüren has
established a reputation as one of the best master fiddle makers in Mongolia.

FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.1. Carved horse heads in B. Bayarsaikhan’s workshop, 2008.

Photo by J. C. Post.

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.2. B. Bayarsaikhan at work in his workshop, 2008.
Photo by J. C. Post.

I was born on July 15th, 1975. In 1992, after working a few years in a furniture
making factory, I realized I wanted to switch to making horse­head fiddles. I
loved everything about the instrument—its sound, shape and symbolism. My
first teacher was the master fiddle maker Dorj Jugder. He taught me the craft of
fiddle making, showing me not only how to make a good fiddle but also helping
me to understand how deeply rooted this instrument is in our cultural heritage.
I opened my first instrument making workshop in 1999 with my two broth-
ers. It was named Zeebad,1 but I changed this in 2009 to Pegasus, the winged
horse in Greek mythology.
In my opinion, making a good instrument requires consistency, patience,
and perseverance. It can take up to two months to complete the many steps in
making a master fiddle.
I begin by crafting the horse’s head and neck and the front and back of the
soundbox. I then join the pieces together, color and varnish the instrument,
and then attach the strings. The final steps are tuning and the final setting up.
I feel truly happy when I am constructing the horsehead fiddle, and I espe-
cially love to carve the horse’s head. Each head is different. I try to express the
character of each horse I’m carving, and I often think about countryside horses,
especially racehorses, which are powerful and brave.

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.3. B. Bayarsaikhan with his fiddle teacher Dorj Jugder in 1996.
Photo by P. K. Marsh.

FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.4.B. Bayarsaikhan with his brothers in their first instrument-
making workshop in 2000 (used with permission).

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.5. B. Bayarsaikhan at work in his workshop. Photo by S. E.
Morel (used with permission).

FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.6. B. Bayarsaikhan at work in his workshop. Photo by S. E.

Morel (used with permission).

The horsehead fiddle is the national pride of the Mongol people. Because
of this, I really do not like to change the traditional form of the instrument or
the traditional style of making it. But the tradition is changing, in part because
musicians who order my instruments want something unique or different.
I try to mix the traditional and modern styles of fiddle making. In the early
2000s, I studied for several weeks with a famous violin maker in the United

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 3.7. B. Bayarsaikhan with a master fiddle he
constructed (used with permission).

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 Kingdom. He taught me the art of creating a violin by hand and I have incor-
porated many of these ideas into how I make the horsehead fiddle.
To me, it’s very important that my fiddles have the pure Mongolian sound.
I want my fiddles to be both powerful and easy to play.
We must protect the horsehead fiddle’s unique Mongolian characteristics.
The sound and melody of this instrument is not only heard by the ears of each
listener, it also has a special effect upon their heart, too. The art of crafting
horsehead fiddles is part of the invaluable heritage of the Mongolian people that
has been passed down through the generations to the present. It is our respon-
sibility as Mongolians to keep intact the foundation of this precious tradition.

Notes
1. A zeebad is a zoomorphic creature rooted in Hindu legend and closely con-
nected with Tibetan Buddhism. The zeebad is often paired with a horse’s head on
the crown of the horsehead fiddle.

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 CHAPTER 5

The Horsehead Fiddle

A Biographical History
PETER K. MARSH AND
CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN

The horsehead fiddle or morin khuur, a two-stringed bowed lute crowned

with a carved horse’s head, has become one of the most visible symbols of
Mongolian national identity in the twenty-first century. In the socialist period
(1921–1990), the fiddle became a mainstay in performances of folk and folklor-
ized music in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, a province of China. From the
mid-1990s on, it was increasingly used by musicians in a variety of popular
music genres, including rock, “ethno-punk,” and hip-hop. The phenomenal
recent success of the heavy metal rock band The Hu, which has swapped elec-
tric guitars for stylized horsehead fiddles, has exposed many people to the in-
strument throughout Europe, North America, and Australia via the internet,
social media, and concert and festival venues. This has raised the visibility of
the instrument to a level that it has never achieved. In 2019, the Mongolian
government awarded The Hu the Order of Chinggis Khaan, a prestigious state
prize that recognizes the work of Mongolians who promote the values of the
nation. In the award ceremony at the State Palace in Ulaanbaatar, the President
recognized the group for “promoting the name of Mongolia to the world and
glorifying the nation on the international arena” (Baljmaa 2019).
We find, however, that in the first three decades of the twentieth century the
horsehead fiddle occupied a very different place in Mongolian society. This was
a period of social, political, and economic upheaval. Mongols in the People’s
Republic of Mongolia worked to lay the foundations for a new socialist nation
in collaboration with the Soviet Union, following the 1921 People’s Revolu-
tion, while those in Inner Mongolia found themselves in the middle of a larger
battle between the Chinese government and Japanese Imperial forces. Soviet
Marxists deemed the Mongols’ traditional pastoral nomadic ways of life to

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 be at the feudalist stage of historical development, which must make way for
more progressive stages, such as socialism. Mongols in both regions struggled
in this period with the idea that long-held aspects of their traditional culture
and customs had almost overnight become “backward” or “old.” Some chose
to embrace these revolutionary ideologies, others did not.
When the Danish explorer and ethnographer Henning Haslund-Christensen
(hereafter Haslund) visited the banner (i.e., regional subdivision) of Khorchin,
in the Hinggan region of Inner Mongolia, he found a community turned upside
down—one in which Inner Mongolian youths, allied with the Japanese, were
in positions of authority:
On my arrival . . . in 1936 the Khorchin Mongols and other East Mongols
in the Hsingan area had attained the status of an autonomous state under
Japanese control and authority. There were many signs indicating that the
East Mongols were now marching towards a brighter future, for one of the
Japanese interests in Mongolia was to re-create wealthy nomad communities
that could deliver wool, hides and other raw materials of which the industry
of the home-country stood in such pressing need. The ideals that had now
been adopted by the formerly so dispirited Mongol youth had, however, their
roots outside the frontiers of their country, and had nothing in common with
the traditions of their fathers (Haslund 1971:26).

Haslund was particularly intent on finding and recording the singers and musi-
cians of the time before the arrival of the Japanese. When he asked these Mongol
youths where these “fathers” were to be found, he was told that they “had long
since fled to remote valleys where they were now endeavoring to spend the
rest of their lives in conformity with the traditions of the past,” and that those
who chose not to flee, “were incarcerated in the prison of the town for having
been too deeply rooted in the past to be able to understand the message of the
new era” (28).
It was in one of these prisons that Haslund met the elderly fiddle player or
khuurch named Sangrup (“The All-Knowing”), who had been employed as a
court musician for the Khorchin prince Otai. Haslund arranged the release of
Sangrup and spent several weeks traveling with him throughout the region,
searching for and recording the music of other elderly musicians and singers of
the “old” era. For Haslund, Sangrup represented one of the few remaining links
to an earlier age of music-making that he feared was then, in the 1930s, being
suppressed out of existence. Similar stories of suppression in Mongolia exist, as
well. Mongolian musicologist J. Enebish says that he heard stories about Russian
and Mongolian soldiers seizing fiddles from nomadic herders’ gers and burning
them along with their Buddhist sūtras. The ruling Party, he says, was “intent on
destroying all parts of the old order, including anything of great value within it”

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 (Enebish interview, Ulaanbaatar, October 1998). Anthropologist Carole Pegg
writes about some musicians in western Mongolia who hid their traditional
instruments in the mountains and others who “were reduced to living in holes
in the ground” because of political persecution (Pegg 1995:78).
This suppression of, or perhaps ambivalence toward, the Mongol fiddle in this
period of revolution in the 1920s and 1930s is a far cry from the embrace, even
worship, of the instrument we can see today, nearly a century later. Marxist ideas
of progress and “cultural uplift” came to dominate the ideological space in both
Mongolia and Inner Mongolia in the socialist period, but the traditions of “old”
Mongolia never went away, as Haslund had feared might happen. Instead, suc-
cessive generations of Mongol youths from the 1930s on have adapted elements
of the old and new, the traditional and the modern, to continually reimagine
the shape, sound, and importance of the fiddle within Mongolian society. The
Hu’s use of the horsehead fiddle and tovshuur to play heavy metal rock music
is just the latest example of this.
In this chapter, we tell a version of this story of generational reimagination
by focusing on the work of Mongols, from both Mongolia and Inner Mongo-
lia, who have shaped—or are shaping—the horsehead fiddle traditions of the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries. We begin with the fiddler Sangrup, who,
as seen through Haslund’s interpretations, provides us with a window into the
pre-Revolutionary world of the Mongol musician. We then consider the fiddlers
G. Jamiyan from Mongolia and Sangdureng and Chi. Bulag of Inner Mongolia,
all three of whom played important institutional roles in shaping the fiddle
traditions of the twentieth century, and we end by examining the contributions
of several young Mongols who, we argue, represent contemporary trends in the
development of the horsehead fiddle and of Mongolian music in general. With
such a historical scope, we can only provide a snapshot of this larger historical
narrative; many stories will necessarily be left untold. Yet those included here
will highlight the important role that insightful, imaginative, and assertive in-
dividuals can play in shaping a musical tradition.1

The Life of a Pre-Revolutionary Fiddler

The People’s Revolution occurred in Mongolia in 1921, but the process of
uprooting and overturning the social, religious, and political institutions that
had shaped Mongolian life for centuries up to then took years to bring about.
The suppression brought to bear upon this so-called old order in both Mongolia
and Inner Mongolia in the 1920s and 1930s was intense, and at times brutal, given
the depth to which this order was rooted in Mongolian society. The important
elements of pre-Revolutionary society—including the pastoral nomadic ways of
life, the strong influence of Buddhism and shamanism, and a hereditary political

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 structure that favored descendants of Chinggis Khan—have roots that extend
to the Mongol Empire, if not earlier.
Haslund, who lived among the Mongols at various points in the 1920s and
1930s, gives us his understanding of how music and song were entwined with
all aspects of life in pre-Revolutionary Mongolia. His reflections on what he
heard when visiting nomadic herders conveys the close connections that existed
between the Mongolian nomads and their natural and spiritual environment:
For myself, Mongol music and the moods that are evoked by the old folk-
songs are a great personal pleasure, by which I have often been entranced, and
which has always been able to banish the feeling of emptiness that a European
may experience during a prolonged stay among a foreign people in a remote
country. These songs have helped me to an understanding of the aesthetic
values in the often bleak landscapes of their origin. It was the singing milk-
maids and the melancholy tones of the caravan-folk in the dead stillness of
the desert that gave me an insight into the deepest thoughts of the people, and
on the evenings when I have sat at the warming tent-fire while the soughing
wind from the steppe evoked the very atmosphere of what had been sung, it
was the songs and epics of the old men that helped me to glimpse the contours
of the mighty pictures that make up the great and richly changing history of
the nomads (Haslund 1971:23).

Haslund’s focus on Sangrup provides us with a glimpse of how pre-Revolu-

tionary fiddlers learned their art. Sangrup’s talents as a fiddler and epic singer
were recognized and nurtured while he was still young. At a certain age, his
skills were tested by an older epic singer or tuul’ch, which included asking him
“to imitate the clear gurglings of streams, the gentle soughing of the wind in
the rushes of the river-bank and the mystic echoes of eternity issuing from the
invisible interior of the conch [shell]” (29). When the tuul’ch felt assured of San-
grup’s abilities, he began to teach him the texts and melodies of the “old songs,”
including those that sing “the praises of high gods, proud heroes and famous
horses” (30). He was taught what songs were appropriate for which contexts, as
well as the “mysteries of acoustics,” which was achieved “by studying the sound
effects that the wind could coax from the hollow interiors of human and animal
skulls.” He also learned how to construct by hand two string instruments, the
four-stringed khuuchir and the two-stringed fiddle.
Sangrup eventually became the favorite musician and singer of Khorchin
Prince Otai, with whom he traveled to Peking (Beijing) during the last decades of
the Qing dynasty and performed for its “proud princes and romantic princesses”
in the Forbidden City (Haslund 31). When he returned to his homeland, he was
in demand by the common people who wanted him to perform in their gers.
“No festival was in those times regarded as complete by the Khorchin tribe,”
says Haslund, “unless Sangrup Khurchi was present” (ibid).

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 FIGURE 5.1.Sangrup khuurch performing on a khiil khuur.
Photo by Henning Haslund-Christensen. National Museum of
Denmark (used with permission).

During the battles between the Mongols and Chinese that accompanied the
end of Qing dynastic rule, from 1911 to 1913, Sangrup lost everything that he
owned, including his instruments. He constructed a new fiddle (see figure 5.1)
and then set about “consoling and inspiriting the survivors with the mighty
songs of the past” (ibid). But as the older generations passed on, the Mongolian
youths responded to the promises offered by the Japanese. Haslund tells us
that the youth “had become tired of listening to the songs and epics glorifying
the past, and [they] turned their faces resolutely away from the dispirited old

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 men to join their voices enthusiastically in the new marching songs, that were
full of golden promises about the splendid future they themselves would build
up” (29). Sangrup spent the years after the civil war in relative obscurity, often
being “abused by the younger members of his tribe” for not joining with “the
singers and expounders of the new songs” of the Mongol people. His loyalty
to the old songs of his tribe finally landed him in prison, where he sat until
Haslund found him.
Haslund’s story of Sangrup provides us with an example of how the turmoil
that accompanied the coming of the Revolutionary period disrupted deeply
rooted musical traditions. Not all talented artists were suppressed in this period
in the way Sangrup was. Luvsan khuurch and Jigmed khuurch were two famous
Mongolian singer-musicians who chose to reinvent themselves musically in ways
suitable to the new regime, and so continued their careers into the new period
(Marsh 2009:45). But it would be the next generation of Mongolian musicians
that would shape the new musical cultures in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia.

The Life of a Revolutionary Fiddler

Following World War II, the Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party (MPRP)
increasingly turned its attention to bringing about a “cultural revolution” (soyo-
liin khövsgöl) among the Mongolian people, which it envisioned would return
them to the path of national development and the eventual attainment of Com-
munism. The introduction of a book for young cultural workers published by
the Party puts it this way:
Raising the level of cultural and intellectual knowledge of the workers will
not only help direct the work at improving Communist education and raising
the workers’ aesthetics and knowledge, but it will also renew their knowledge
of theory and politics, enrich their forms of work, and strengthen the growth
of the material base of socialist culture (Chuluunbat 1972:12).

For the MPRP, the institutionalization of culture and the arts was as vital to
the development of the nation as was expanding the economy and reforming
the political structure. The Party opened cultural centers (soyolyn tövüüd) in
communities and towns throughout the country. Overseen by Party officials,
they mostly served to disseminate news and Party information, but they also
became locations for educational and cultural activities like the teaching of
literacy and hygiene, theater productions, film screenings, and concert perfor-
mances (Natsagdorj 1981:260). Aside from introducing rural communities to
new forms of entertainment, these centers provided Party officials opportunities
to spread propaganda, keep an eye on local community activities, and identify
young artists who showed potential.

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 Such artists were then often sent to new music schools in Ulaanbaatar. The
Fine Arts School (Uran saikhany surguul’) opened in 1930 and then was ex-
panded into the Music & Dance College (Khögjim büjgiin dund surguul’) in
1958. By the 1960s, it became the largest and most important institution for the
training of the national cadre, many of whom would, in turn, be sent back to
work in the schools and cultural centers in the countryside (Tsendorj 1983:30;
Enebish 1982:30).
Fiddler G. Jamiyan was one of these young students who made the journey
from the countryside to the city. Born into a herding family in Bulgan sum
(the smallest level of land-based division), in the northern Mongolian aimag
of Dornod, Jamiyan learned to play the horsehead fiddle from his father and
performed with him throughout his youth in their family ger, at community
festivals, and in the local cultural center. His family moved to Ulaanbaatar in
1937 and the same year, at age 18, Jamiyan entered the Fine Arts School as a
horsehead fiddle player. By the following year he had secured a position in
the Central Theater in Ulaanbaatar, performing with many other talented folk
musicians, and he quickly established a reputation for his fiddle technique and
sound (Batchuluun 2017:31). In his school, overseen by Mongolian and Russian
teachers, Jamiyan learned to read musical notation for the first time, studied
Western music theory and composition, and began to play Western classical
music on the horsehead fiddle. He also began to study the violoncello, which
he played in the fledgling orchestra in the Central Theater. Jamiyan described
how the paucity of professional players in this period required musicians to
play on both “folk” (ardyn) and “classical” (songodog) musical instruments. On
some days, he said, he performed on the horsehead fiddle and on others, the
violoncello (G. Jamiyan interview, October 1999).
By the mid- to late-1950s, the increased attention to professionalism within
the new musical culture accelerated the assimilation of European classical per-
forming traditions, a process often undertaken by the artists themselves rather
than from Party directives. Jamiyan had developed techniques for playing the
horsehead fiddle that incorporated performance techniques from the violon-
cello, including ways of holding the horsehead fiddle and its bow, of fingering
the notes on the strings, and of moving the bow over the strings. In 1958, with
the opening of the Music & Dance College, Jamiyan became the leading teacher
of the horsehead fiddle and violoncello in Mongolia.
His ideas about playing and teaching methodologies contributed to the mod-
ernization of the horsehead fiddle and its tradition. He adopted the Western
pedagogical practices of insisting his students learn to read musical notation,
master abstract exercises such as playing arpeggio and scalar exercises, and un-
derstand a composition’s “musical grammar,” such as its pitch, rhythm, and tim-
bre. Jamiyan also demanded that his students play with clear and precise tuning

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 (he had a piano in his office that he would use in his lessons to check students’
intonation). He also encouraged instrument makers to replace the traditional
sheepskin face (soundboard) of the horsehead fiddle with a wooden one, making
it more closely resemble a violoncello in sound and shape. Such instruments also
allowed the instrument to better project its sound in larger rooms and halls and
to stay in tune when performing in countries with different climates.
Jamiyan’s efforts to meld Mongolian and Western musical elements dra-
matically changed the look, sound, and performance practice of the horsehead
fiddle and helped to standardize the ways in which it was taught. His many
students went on to become teachers, performers, and cultural administrators,
thus spreading and institutionalizing his ideas and artistic standards across
the country. By the 1970s, the horsehead fiddle, once only associated with the
traditional ways of nomadic herders, had become reimagined as an instrument
associated with the rising cultural aspirations of Mongolians increasingly inter-
connected with the wider world.

Fiddle Revolutionaries in Inner Mongolia

Inner Mongolia, China, has followed a musical trajectory and orientation
that is at once similar and also vastly different from Mongolia. This section
highlights these similarities and differences through the life and work of Sang-
dureng (1926–1967) and Chi Bulag (b. 1944). In many ways, the contributions of
these two Inner Mongolian fiddlers parallel the work of Jamiyan in Mongolia,
but the instruments and compositional output that resulted from their work are
strikingly different. The wood-faced horsehead fiddle developed by Chi Bulag
(see figure 5.2) is smaller and thinner than Jamiyan’s instrument. Its strings are
also placed closer together and its bow is modeled closer to a Tourte violin or
cello bow. The sound of Bulag’s fiddle is also perceptively brighter, tighter, and
more nasal than the deeper, lower, and more subdued sound of its Mongolian
counterpart. The section that follows briefly explores the circumstances that
led Chi Bulag to modernize the horsehead fiddle and some of the aesthetic and
practical reasons for his choices.
Chi Bulag visited Mongolia in 1988 as part of the first cultural delegation
to Mongolia from Inner Mongolia since the beginning of the Sino-Soviet split
(1956). Much had happened during the thirty-odd year gap in contact to make
these Mongols feel like strangers to one another. Life in the Mongolian People’s
Republic had been shaped by the nation’s close relationship with the U.S.S.R.
and its adoption of Soviet-style socialism. In Inner Mongolia, in contrast, life
had been shaped by the region’s integration into the Chinese Socialist system,
the Mongolians’ new status as a minority nationality (shaoshu minzu), and the
ordeals experienced during the Mao Zedong era. Chi Bulag’s slim, high-pitched

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 FIGURE 5.2. Horsehead fiddle performer, composer, and
innovator, Chi Bulag (used with permission).

horsehead fiddle and his technically virtuosic ensemble performances were seen
as aural and visual evidence of just how separate the two regions had become.
His performance in Ulaanbaatar inspired strong reactions from the Mongolian
audiences (see Marsh 2009) and demonstrated just how little exchange had
taken place during the years of isolation between the two regions. Some of the
most acute changes to the instrument happened during this period, resulting
in the emergence of two very distinct horsehead fiddle traditions.
By 1988, in both Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, the urban horsehead fiddle
had transitioned from a skin-faced instrument played by herders in their gers
to a wood-faced instrument played by professionals on concert stages. During
the preceding decades, the aims of instrument makers were similar on both
sides of the border: to standardize the instrument’s construction, tuning, and

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 technique; to increase its sound volume for larger performance spaces; and to
achieve a steady and reliable tone quality that could hold up under a variety of
climatic conditions. Both regions were influenced by ideologies that identified
European concert music as the highest level of musical achievement. European
instruments such as the violin and violoncello became standards by which
local instruments were judged. However, the ways in which the Mongolians
and Inner Mongolians approached instrument modernization diverged due to
different political contexts, availability of materials, advice of foreign luthiers,
and individual preferences, as well as the overall differences in attitudes toward
modernity, tradition, and ethnic nationalism.
Separated from Mongolia by the vast Gobi Desert, Inner Mongolia had al-
ready developed unique regional musical cultures prior to the administrative
separation of the two during the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911). In fact, there is
quite limited written evidence of instruments bearing the name “horse fiddle”
or “horsehead fiddle” (Mongolian: morin khuur; Chinese: matouqin) in Inner
Mongolia prior to the 1950s. Mongol music scholars Ulanji (1998), Khogjilt
(2006), and Siriguleng (2009) discuss the prominence of the sihu (or dörvön
chikhtei khuur, a skin-faced cylindrical spike fiddle with a suspended bow) in
the eastern and southern regions of Inner Mongolia, choor (a skin-faced box-
shaped spike fiddle) in the eastern Khorchin region, and igil (skin-faced ladle
fiddle) in the far western regions (including in Xinjiang). These local schol-
ars emphasize historical and structural differences between tube-shaped spike
fiddles (resembling the Chinese erhu and related to the Song Dynasty xiqin) and
box fiddles (resembling the morin khuur and related to the ancient shanagan
khuur, a ladle fiddle). They suggest that the earliest forms of the morin khuur
in Inner Mongolia may have been called khikhil khuur or khiil khuur and had
different types of headstocks, including likenesses of animals (horses, swans,
wolves, and others), supernatural beings, or no decorations at all.
Musicians in Inner Mongolia, as in Mongolia, undertook efforts in the mid-
twentieth century to develop a standardized (rather than regionally divergent)
musical representation of the Mongol people. The earliest fiddle performers to be
recruited onto public concert stages included folk artists who had backgrounds
as herders or Buddhist lamas, such as the celebrated early-twentieth-century
box-fiddlers Balgan (1913–1966) and Serashi (1887–1968) (as well as several other
well-known sihu fiddlers). These performers used skin-faced fiddles of varied
names (morin khuur, khuur, and choor; sometimes interchangeably), materi-
als, box sizes, and neck lengths. These differences in construction represented
not only divergent regional communities and conventions, but also available
materials and preferences of individual folk musicians who often built their own
instruments. Instrument tuning, generally in perfect fourths or fifths, varied
depending on string tension and preference.2

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 The musician and composer Sangdureng (1926–1967), a student of both Bal-
gan and Serashi, is recognized today for catalyzing a new and modern fiddle
tradition, a project that Chi Bulag (b. 1944), his student, completed in the 1980s.
A Mongol from eastern Inner Mongolia, Sangdureng became conductor of the
Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Ensemble in the 1950s, and in this capacity
worked to more effectively stage and program Mongol music and musical in-
struments in state-sponsored performances.
According to Inner Mongol scholar Ulanji, Sangdureng was present when a
musical delegation from Mongolia performed in Inner Mongolia in 1953 (Ulanji
interview, Hohot, 2010). Not only was Sangdureng impressed by the perfor-
mances, which consisted of several of Jamiyan’s new compositions for fiddle, he
was also inspired by the fingering technique that he saw—the Mongolian method
of placing the knuckles of the index and middle finger on the side of the string
instead of fingering on the pads of the fingers from the top. He was, furthermore,
likely to have observed details about the newly modernized, louder, and more
stage-worthy fiddle models from Mongolia and to have seen the potential of
the horsehead fiddle—with the horse positioned at the headstock—as a viable
musical icon to represent the Mongol people in local, national, and international
performing venues.
Sandgureng experimented with a variety of fiddle models in the 1960s and
worked with Han Chinese instrument maker Zhang Chunhua to develop snake-
skin and wood-faced models as well as an orchestra consisting of horsehead
fiddles of different sizes. The two received support for their work by the local Inner
Mongolian government, which promoted “improvement” of Mongol performing
arts as evidence of positive government intervention in the region. Sangdureng
went on to compose and publish solo repertoire for the instrument and to develop
the first notated horsehead fiddle teaching method in Inner Mongolia. Unfortu-
nately, Sangdureng’s innovative work was cut short in 1967 when he was killed
in the purges that occurred during the Cultural Revolution in Inner Mongolia.
Despite his early passing, Sangdureng’s fiddle experiments, and perhaps even
his choice of the horsehead fiddle as an instrument worthy of modernization,
profoundly influenced future generations of fiddlers in Inner Mongolia. His
attention to the horsehead fiddle set the instrument on a path of professionaliza-
tion and modernization that continued after the Mao era ended in 1976. Were it
not for Sangdureng’s exposure to Jamiyan’s horsehead fiddle in Mongolia, he may
have never developed an interest in this instrument over other popular fiddle
forms in Inner Mongolia such as the choor or the sihu. Through the combined
and government-supported efforts of Sangdureng and Zhang Chunhua, the
horsehead fiddle became a primary locus of musical attention in Inner Mongolia
and emerged as an instrument with the capacity for displays of virtuosity and
a new repertoire of solo compositions.

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 Chi Bulag followed closely in his mentor Sangdureng’s footsteps and contin-
ued to experiment with the design and sound of the horsehead fiddle. He worked
together with Zhang Chunhua and another Mongol instrument maker, Duan
Tingjun (b. 1949), in the early 1980s until they arrived at a model that would
project well, achieve a clean and precise tone, and hold steady intonation on
the concert stage. The skin-faced horsehead fiddle, though rich in timbre, could
not adequately accomplish any of these musical requirements. Bulag’s work of
transforming this skin-faced instrument into a viable wood-faced horsehead
fiddle was by no means linear (D’Evelyn 2014), but he eventually arrived at a
viable model that became the standard for instrument construction in Inner
Mongolia from the late 1990s to the early 2000s.
As mentioned above, the Bulag model of the horsehead fiddle sounds re-
markably different from the fiddle modernized in Mongolia. His instrument
is tuned higher (G-C instead of F-B-flat) and sounds much tighter and more
nasal than the lower and mellower sounding Mongolian counterpart. A reason
for the timbral differences between the two instruments might be explained by
Chi Bulag’s fascination with Niccolò Paganini, the nineteenth-century Italian
composer famous for his virtuosic violin music. In our conversations, Bulag
explained how he consciously crafted the body of his instrument to be small,
narrow with strings positioned close together in order to facilitate rapid, vir-
tuosic playing techniques akin to those found in Paganini’s solo violin music. In
contrast, the standard instrument model made in Mongolia has a significantly
wider and thicker body and has strings that are both farther apart from one
another and positioned higher off the fingerboard than Chi Bulag’s model.
Ironically, although Bulag is considered a national and ethnic hero in China,
most fiddlers today import their instruments from Mongolia or use instruments
made by local makers in the Mongolian national style (tuned F-B-flat and po-
sitioned with wider spacing between the strings). Horsehead fiddle students
in Inner Mongolia develop fiddle bi-musicality and are often equally versed in
repertoire from both sides of the border as well as the fingering and technical
requirements of both fiddle models.
Chi Bulag’s most important and lasting legacy might very well be his com-
position “Galloping Horses” (Chinese: Wanma Benteng). Among all the works
that form the backbone of the Inner Mongolian fiddle repertoire, this one has
endured as the most beloved and timeless. It successfully merges the traditional
tatlaga style of double-stop playing—a style that evokes the rhythms of a horse’s
gait—with virtuosic and extended fingering and bowing techniques. The piece
has a rousing energy that functions well at the end of a concert, inspiring audi-
ences to clap along, and its interchangeable eight-bar sectional form provides
ample room for performers to add their own creative additions. It has been
covered by every prominent ensemble in Inner Mongolia regardless of genre,

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 from horsehead fiddle orchestras to ethno-rock bands. “Galloping Horses” is
one of the only Inner Mongolian contributions to the canon of horsehead fiddle
repertoire in Mongolia and is still performed regularly on television and stage
performances in Ulaanbaatar. Although Chi Bulag has composed dozens of
pieces and songs, “Galloping Horses” is his most loved, signature piece that he
has brought around the globe, including during his first official visit to Mongolia
in 1988, in a performance at the Musikverein (Golden Hall) of Vienna in 2005,
and in a world-record public performance by one thousand horsehead fiddlers
during the lead-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Chi Bulag’s accomplishments have attracted many young and mostly male
musicians in Inner Mongolia, many of whom now view horsehead fiddle as
a viable career choice. Prior to 1990, only a handful of fiddlers were active,
including Na Huhe, Qian Baila, and Chen Bayar. But the students they taught
helped to generate a resurgence of interest in the horsehead fiddle tradition.
Many families from smaller cities and towns in the region sent their children to
take lessons or enroll in horsehead fiddle boarding schools under the tutelage
of these teachers with the hope that their children might succeed as musicians
and ultimately find careers in a government-sponsored arts ensemble. Before
long, there were far more aspiring and talented horsehead fiddlers than openings
available at the top Chinese universities with fiddle programs. Horsehead fiddle
students from Inner Mongolia began applying to arts universities in Mongolia,
where they now form a critical mass of the horsehead fiddle majors.
The predominance of male horsehead fiddlers and relative absence of female
fiddlers resembles a pattern we have seen in education and professional music-
making in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia since the early decades of the twentieth
century. This pattern is one that appears to be deeply rooted within Mongolian
culture. According to Carole Pegg (2001, 2002), the most valued musical forms
in Mongol society, including the horsehead fiddle tradition, were traditionally
maintained by men. The association of men and their horses is found in many
parts of Mongol society (see figure 5.3). In the division of labor in nomadic en-
campments, it is customary for men and boys to look after horses, while women
and girls look after the sheep, goats, and other animals (Fijn 2011:59, 84–85).
Numerous legends and epic tales tell the stories of Mongol men who, with the
help of their wise and powerful horses, overcome and defeat their enemies.
The connection of men with the horsehead fiddle is just as persistent in his-
torical narratives. Musicologist J. Enebish connects the fiddle with horses and
men, writing:
A horse-head fiddle is also considered to be a good fortune to one’s horse
or herd of horses. Therefore, there is a custom where the male horse herder,
after putting his horses out to pasture in the evening, will come to his ger and
make music with his horse-head fiddle (Enebish 1991:77, n. 2).

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 FIGURE 5.3. A Chakar Mongol performs for his horse on a khiil khuur. Photo
by Henning Haslund-Christensen. National Museum of Denmark (used with
permission).

Musicologist D. Nansalmaa emphasizes this connection of the fiddle with males

in her description of where fiddles are traditionally placed within a nomadic ger.
In the highly structured sphere of the Mongol ger, the khoimor is also the
part of the home where the eldest or most senior males of the ail would sit,
further suggesting the traditional association of the fiddle, like the horse, with
the male gender. In addition, the fiddle was also customarily positioned to
face towards the fireplace (golomt), which is located in the very center of the
ger, and never to the “east” (züün tal), which is the “women’s side” of the ger
(Nansalmaa 1987:350).

Such narratives may suggest that women were, historically speaking, not allowed
to play the instrument. But our research finds, on the contrary, that women in
rural society have actively participated in learning, teaching, and performing
on fiddles alongside men, and continue to do so today. Marsh documents nu-
merous sources that describe how all members of rural households, regardless
of gender or even age, were expected to participate in musical performances in
the pre-Revolutionary period (2009:30–32). In his fieldwork in rural Mongolia
in the 1990s and 2000s, he encountered many families in which women played
fiddles in their homes and at social gatherings. Pegg (2001:69) reported on how

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 some women faced the challenge of performing the horsehead fiddle without
holding the instrument between their legs, a posture considered unsightly and
perhaps even overtly sexual. Based on her research in Inner Mongolia, D’Evelyn
has found that women of an older generation rarely chose to play the fiddle,
but that those who did typically played it in a seated position on the floor to
avoid the open-leg posture. D’Evelyn did encounter stories about older women
or grandmothers who played with open legs in a chair, suggesting a lack of
consensus among Mongol communities with regard to the appropriateness of
the sitting posture.3 Indeed, local stigmas varied with regard to the appropri-
ateness of the fiddle posture. But there does not seem to be an overt taboo that
restricted women’s involvement with the horsehead fiddle as there was in the
past for throat-singing (see Chapter 8 this volume; Pegg 1992); nor was fiddle
playing as exclusively male-dominated as the genre of epic singing (tuul’). Yet,
we do recognize that very few women were encouraged to become local fiddle
specialists who would be sought out to play for public gatherings or to pursue
careers as professional fiddle players.
It is curious, but perhaps not unsurprising, that in contemporary Mongolia
and Inner Mongolia, in a period in which practically no limits exist on who can
or cannot participate in fiddle playing, there is still a great gender imbalance. For
instance, the first two professional female horsehead fiddle players in Mongolia,
Uyanga Baasansuren and Uugantuyaa Jantsannorov, only graduated from the
Music & Dance College and began their careers in 1997. Most horsehead fiddle
players in the Mongolian State Morin Khuur Ensemble, the premiere fiddle
ensemble in the nation, continue to be male. The ensemble’s female perform-
ers typically perform on instruments associated in Mongolia with their gender,
including the violoncello and yatga (zither). In Inner Mongolia, there are a small
number of prominent women horsehead fiddlers who have achieved success
in a musical world dominated by men. Perhaps most notable among them is
Saikhannakhaa, a member of the world-famous ensemble Anda Union. Another
notable performer and rising star in the fiddle scene in Inner Mongolia is the
performer Sorgog, a soloist and member of the all-female throat-singing band,
Mongolia Ensemble (see figure 5.4).

A New Generation of Fiddlers

We end our chapter by exploring the lives of two musicians whose career
trajectory has taken them to the West, where they have introduced the sounds of
the horsehead fiddle to new audiences and offered local members of the Mongol
diaspora a means to connect to their roots. Tamir Hargana (b. 1991, see Hargana
Interlude in this volume) is part of this new generation of fiddlers from Inner
Mongolia who specialize in both the horsehead fiddle and khöömii (throat-

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 FIGURE 5.4. Horsehead fiddle performer, Sorgog (used with permission).

singing). Describing himself as “a grassland boy” in his childhood, Tamir now

lives and works in Chicago, Illinois, and is the first professional musician from
Inner Mongolia to make a career teaching and performing folk and folkloric
Mongolian music in the United States.
Through numerous public performances and workshops, Tamir has intro-
duced audiences across the United States to the Mongolian and Inner Mon-
golian traditions of the horsehead fiddle and the Mongol and Tuvan forms of
throat-singing, often accompanying himself on the tovshuur, doshpuluur, or igil

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 FIGURE 5.5. Horsehead fiddle performer and teacher, G. Urtnasan (used with
permission).

(lutes). He is eager to experiment with new musical styles and has collaborated
with musicians across a range of genres, most famously being the Mongol fu-
sion metal band Tengger Cavalry. Tamir regularly performs for Mongolian-
American communities and has presented his work and performed at several
major academic conferences. He is part of a small but growing rank of Mongol
scholar-performers who research, write, and transmit knowledge about Mon-
golian music in the English language.
Like Tamir, Urtnasan Gantulga (see figure 5.5) is another young fiddle player
and teacher who is bringing important innovations to the contemporary horse­
head fiddle tradition. Urtaa was raised in rural Töv aimag, outside of Ulaan-
baatar, by his grandfather, who was a horse trainer and a folk song singer.
When he was eleven years old, his grandfather began to teach him to play the
horsehead fiddle. Six years later Urtaa enrolled in the Music & Dance College
in Ulaanbaatar, the same school at which Jamiyan taught. There he studied first
with master teacher Yo. Batbayar and then with Ts. Batchuluun, one of Jamiyan’s
most successful pupils. Batchuluun quickly recognized Urtaa’s talent and, in his
first year at the school, placed him in the State Horsehead Fiddle Ensemble.
Urtaa praises Batchuluun as a great teacher: “He showed us how artists should
be and how we should live. I think he never said ‘that’s perfect’ after I performed
something for him. He usually said, ‘that’s close,’ which meant that he wanted
us to understand that there was always room to be better and learn more” (G.
Urtnasan interview, Seattle, February 2020).

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 In 2006, Urtaa emigrated to the United States. “I was young,” he said, “and
wanted to improve myself and learn a foreign culture. But also, I wanted to
become a horsehead fiddle expert in the United States.” Making a living as
a horsehead fiddle player proved to be difficult, but he did find many people
who were eager to learn to play it. The problem was, he lived in Seattle, in the
state of Washington, and many of his potential students lived hundreds or even
thousands of miles away. So, he innovated by creating online instruction videos
and teaching students with online lessons. “At that time, some people said that
teaching the fiddle online would be impossible, that it would never work. But
some others said, ‘Why not?’” Urtaa has trained many students around the na-
tion from his home and has a popular YouTube channel with his video lessons
and recordings of his performances and those of his students. Urtaa was selected
to perform B. Sharav’s Concerto for Horsehead Fiddle and Orchestra at the
Pan Asian Music Festival at Stanford University in 2011, which marked the first
time a horsehead fiddle concerto had been performed in the United States. “My
main goal,” Urtaa says, “is to keep teaching horsehead fiddle and to expand its
presence around the United States. My teacher, Ts. Batchuluun, told me that my
work here could help Mongolians to create an International horsehead fiddle
ensemble, one that draws together people from around the world.”
Young artists like Urtaa and Tamir are helping to extend the horsehead fiddle
tradition far beyond the borders of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia. They have
each found ways to adapt to the rigors of surviving as a Mongolian performing
artist outside of their respective homelands and to the challenges of translating
traditional Mongolian music to non-Mongolian audiences.
As should be clear by now, the horsehead fiddle traditions are not frozen in
time. As recently as the early decades of the twentieth century, fiddles varied
considerably in appearance and sound, only coalescing in the past six or seven
decades into the modernized and standardized forms we see on concert stages
and music videos today. Mongolians around the world have continued to adapt
the instrument and its traditions to a variety of regional, cultural, political, and
ideological needs.
In an interesting reversal, recent interest in musical roots and origins in
Mongolia and Inner Mongolia (Mongolian: yazguur; Chinese: yuanshengtai) has
led some musicians to look backward in time, focusing less energy on virtuosic
displays of modernity and giving more attention to the revival and restoration
of styles and instruments that were previously rejected as backward. The ability
to play with amplification, as well as developments in instrument construction,
have made skin-faced instruments effective for use on the concert stage in ways
that were not possible in earlier decades. The horsehead fiddle is also finding
new expression through the music of contemporary fusion ensembles such as
The Hu, whose instruments are designed with an ethno-punk flavor and played

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 with amplified distortion for the purpose of a heavy metal aesthetic (see Chapter
10 in this volume). One can only speculate about the ways the horsehead fiddle
will continue to change as it travels the globe in the next century.

Notes
1. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
2. Sound recordings of Balagan and Serashi reveal that the lowest string was
generally pitched around an E, one note lower than the lowest string on the modern
Mongolian horsehead fiddle.
3. One Inner Mongolian fiddle innovator, Darma, formulated a way for the
horsehead fiddle to be played in a standing position (with a belt that supports the
instrument at the waist) and used this innovation to establish an all-female, stand-
ing horsehead fiddle ensemble that he saw as a strategy to overcome any stigmas
from the past about the sitting posture.

Bibliography
Baljmaa, T. 2019. “The Hu Awarded Order of Chinggis Khaan, Supreme State Prize in
Mongolia,” Montsame, November 27. https://montsame.mn/en/read/208232.
Batchuluun, Ts. 2017. Khogjmiin dursang [Musical memories]. Ulaanbaatar: Soëmbo.
Chuluunbat, Ts. 1972. Sain duryn uran saikhanchdad tuslamj [Help for amateur artists].
Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.
D’Evelyn, Charlotte. 2014. “Driving Change, Sparking Debate: Chi Bulag and the Morin
Huur in Inner Mongolia, China.” Yearbook for Traditional Music 46:89–113.
Enebish, Jambaliin. 1982. “Mongolyn khögjim” [Mongolian music]. Soyol 1:28–32.
———. 1991. “Morin khuur” [The horse-head fiddle]. In Khögjmiin ulamjlal shinechleliin
asuudald [Problems of the renewal of the study of music], 77–85. Ulaanbaatar: State
Publishing House.
Fijn, Natasha. 2011. Living with Herds: Human-Animal Coexistence in Mongolia. Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press.
Haslund-Christensen, Henning 1971 [1943]. “On the Trail of Ancient Mongol Tunes.”
The Music of the Mongols, Part I: Eastern Mongolia, 13–38. New York: Da Capo Press.
Khogjilt [Hugejiletu]. 2006. Mengguzu Yinyueshi [History of music of the Mongol na-
tionality]. Shenyang: Liaoning Minzu Chubanshe.
Marsh, Peter K. 2009. The Horse-Head Fiddle and the Cosmopolitan Reimagination of
Tradition in Mongolia. New York: Routledge.
Nansalmaa, D. 1987. “Ardyn khögjim” [Folk music]. In Khalkha ugsaatny züi (XIX–XX
zuuny zaag üye) [Ethnography of the Khalkha, 19th–20th century], Vol. I, edited by
S. Badamkhatan, 334–357. Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.
Natsagdorj, Sh. 1981. BNMAU-yn Soyolyn Tüükh (1921–1940) [Cultural history of the
MPR (1921–1940)], Vol. I. Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.
Pegg, Caroline. 1992. “Mongolian Conceptualizations of Overtone Singing.” British Jour-
nal of Ethnomusicology 1:31–55.

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 ———. 1995. “Ritual, Religion and Magic in West Mongolian (Oirad) Heroic Epic Per-
formance.” British Journal of Ethnomusicology 4:77–99.
———. 2001. Mongolian Music, Dance, & Oral Narrative: Performing Diverse Identities.
Seattle: University of Washington Press.
———. 2002. “Mongol Music.” In The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music. Volume
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Lawrence Witzleben, 1003–1020. New York: Routledge.
Siriguleng. 2009. “Bianqian Zhong de Matouqin—Neimenggu Diqu Matouqin Ch-
uangcheng Yu Bianqian” [In the changing of morinhuur—Research on the transmis-
sion and change of morinhuur in Inner Mongolia]. Master’s thesis, Inner Mongolia
Normal University.
Tsendorj, G. 1983. BNMAU-yn mergejliin khögjmiin khamtlaguud üüsej khögjsön n’ [The
origin and development of the Mongolian People’s Republic’s professional music
ensembles]. Ulaanbaatar: State Publishing House.
Ulanji. 1998. Mengguzu Yinyueshi [A musical history of the Mongol nationality]. Hohhot:
Neimenggu Renmin Chubanshe.

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 CHAPTER 6

The Tovshuur and Oirad

Identity in Mongolia’s
Western Provinces
OTGONBAYAR CHULUUNBAATAR

The Oirads (Oirats) have a long history in Mongolia, Kalmykia in the Rus-
sian Federation, and in Xinjiang and Qinghai Regions in northwestern China.
Ethnically homogeneous and linguistically linked to Mongols, they are diverse
peoples who immigrated to the Altai mountain regions in western Mongolia at
early but different times. Oirad peoples settled today in Khovd, Uvs, and Bayan-
Ölgii aimags (provinces) include the Torguud, Zakhchin, Khoshuud, Dörvöd,
Ööld, Altai Uriankhai, Myangad, and Bayad (Ochir 2006; Chuluunbaatar 2010).
In contemporary Mongolia, Oirads share some traditions with Mongols, but they
also maintain their own customs. This is especially apparent in their musical
performances and their musical instruments.
One iconic instrument of the Oirad people is the tovshuur, a two-string
fretless, long-necked lute. The instrument has been modernized and used in
contemporary urban music, but an old form of the tovshuur continues to be
played by the Oirads and occasionally by Khalkh Mongols also living in the Altai
Mountains. The instrument has not received the scholarly attention that other
instruments have received, yet it plays an important role in Oirad communities.1
Its social role is tied especially to its position as an accompanying instrument for
epic (tuul’) traditions. Beyond this, the tovshuur is entangled with performance,
repertoires, beliefs, and values of peoples, some of whom have maintained pas-
toral practices into the twenty-first century, even while others have embraced
new economic and technological opportunities. In this contribution, based on
both scholarly research and personal experience, I position the tovshuur as an
important instrument worthy of focused attention, not only for its role as an
accompanying instrument for epic song, but as an instrument emblematic of
Oirad ethnic identity.2

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 The word tovshuur stems from the Mongolian verb tovshikh, which means “to
pluck.” Early historical evidence of the instrument is seldom found in written
documents. The lack of such information can be explained by ways of life that
did not support written records. From the time after the defeat of the Oirads by
the Manchu in 1757–1759, political conflicts further contributed to the scarcity
of local documents (Gongor 2006). The effect of this is confirmed by the Oirad
dictionaries compiled by Krueger (1978–1984), mainly using words from earlier
Oirad texts, in which the term “tovshuur” cannot be found. The tovshuur is also
rarely mentioned in earlier sources by non-Mongolian authors.3 One possible
reason may be due to its role primarily as an accompanying instrument for ep-
ics, resulting in the production of relatively few instruments. The instrument
is referenced in very few early travel reports in Kalmykia (Pallas 1776). It is
conceivable that when the Oirads immigrated to Kalmykia at the beginning of
the seventeenth century, the tovshuur was abandoned in favor of the balalaika
and dombyra, also referenced as accompanying instruments for epic singing by
scholars such as the Russian Mongolist Vladimirtsov (1923).

Constructing the Tovshuur

The traditional tovshuur in western Mongolia are built almost exclusively
by epic singers who use the instrument to accompany their performances. The
structure and style can hold special significance for a musician. Knowledge about
its construction is passed orally and thus there are differences in the ways they
are built, such as the shape of the soundbox (tsar), the headstock (tolgoi), as
well as certain ornamental forms. The materials used to make the instrument
depend on various criteria. These include above all the tradition of the musi-
cian, the experiences and oral transmission of a teacher, and the environment of
the settlement area, but also other aspects that are often ignored. For example,
Enkhbalsan and Batmunkh, musicians I encountered during my field research,
draw from their expertise as a carpenter (Enkhbalsan) and son of a carpenter
(Batmunkh), respectively, as they carve their own tovshuur from local resources
(see figures 6.1 and 6.2), including the soundboard (tsarny nüür).
In most cases, makers construct the tovshuur soundbox, neck (ish), and
headstock from a single piece of wood. Occasionally, the tovshuur is built with
a separate neck (see figure 6.2). The shape of the soundbox is designed indi-
vidually according to a maker’s or musician’s wishes; soundboxes can be oval,
trapezoidal, hexagonal, octagonal or, rarely, round (called cup tovshuur—aagan
tovshuur). Many of these forms are rounded toward the body of the musician,
and when they are, such instruments are also called shanagan tovshuur (ladle
tovshuur) (Badraa 2017). Shapes of soundboxes are designed differently not only
due to ethnic differences (groups, clans), as other scholars have stated (Pegg
2001; Chao 2001), there are other factors to consider when assessing differences,

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 including musicians’ contact with instruments in other regions, available wood
species, as well as the skills of the respective instrument maker.
The soundboard of the tovshuur body is made of skin, often goat skin, or
occasionally of wood of the larch (shines, khar mod) or pine (nars) tree.4 The
processing of goat skin by makers involves drying after blowing up the skin with
air immediately after the animal has been skinned. Next the skin is softened
by wetting it and when pliable it is pulled over the body of the instrument and
fastened laterally, generally, with glue and nails. Makers say that for a good sound
the skin needs to be thin.5 Very rarely, a small number of tiny superficial holes
are punched into the skin of the soundbox in the shape of geometrical forms.6
Depending on the maker, the tuning pegs (khöglöch chikh) are mounted on
the instrument either laterally (see figure 6.2) or on the rear (see figure 6.1).
They are called “ears” (chikh) by the locals, one of several anthropomorphic
designations of instrument parts used. The instrument headstock is individually
designed, but there are several common forms. The headstock can be of the same
solid wood as the neck or be hollowed out in the center (see figure 6.4). The
latter variant makes it easier to mount the tuning pegs from the side and thus
achieve better string tension. Often the hollowing out is done by the musician.
Sometimes the area of the whole neck between the soundbox and headstock is
decorated with carvings. On the lower narrow side of the instrument there is a
short extension (dood bekhelgee)—often made of wood or a nail—to which the
strings (chavkhdas) are attached.
Most tovshuur players in Mongolia today use strings made of nylon. Per-
formers report that they prefer the sound quality obtained with strings made
of goat intestines or the hair of a stallion’s tail.7 In general, strings made from
natural materials, due to their texture, sound pleasant and soft, whereas strings
from industrial materials present a stark, intense, and harsh sound. Nomads
hear the human strength and warmth along with the vitality expressed by the
natural materials’ sound. When made of hair, the lower string should have an
odd number of hairs, while the upper string an even number (Badraa 2017).
For performance, the strings are tuned a fourth apart. The thinner lower string
is tuned upward by a tuning peg, while the thicker upper string is tuned down-
ward. This can be explained with the significance “heaven” has for local residents
(Jukovskaya 2011).
The length of the tovshuur is often adapted to the needs of each musician. I
received a tovshuur as a gift from the musician and instrument maker Batmunkh
(see figure 6.5); it is much shorter and the soundbox is also narrower than other
instruments. This same construction can also be seen in a picture from 1981,
which shows Batmunkh’s sister with a similarly short and narrow tovshuur.
This is significant because tovshuur-playing women are extremely rare because
women rarely practice epic singing. From my own experience, there is an exist-
ing opinion in society that this style of music could lead to health problems for

6. The Tovshuur and Oirad Identity 157

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 FIGURE 6.1.T. Enkhbalsan, Zakhchin epic singer, 2006. Tovshuur made by the singer
from wood and painted; tuning pegs rear-mounted (note the khadag). Photo by
Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar.

FIGURE 6.2.B. Batmunkh, Zakhchin epic singer, 2016. Tovshuur made by the singer.
Photo by Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar.

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 FIGURE 6.3. Bold, Altai Uriankhai epic singer, 2012. Artistically executed decor e.g.
dragon’s head as well as wooden milk spoon, oval body (note used lighter as lower
bridge as well as different khadags). Photo by Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar.

FIGURE 6.4. Grandson of Dügersüren, Altai Uriankhai epic singer, 2010. Note the
cavity for better fixing of tuning pegs. Photo by Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar.

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 FIGURE. 6.5. Tovshuur for women, produced by B. Batmunkh, 2016. Note the shape
as well as smallness of the sound body, and the lucky symbol of the fish. Photo by
Otgonbayar Chuluunbaatar.

women. However, it is sometimes the close female relatives of epic singers who,
according to reports, pass on the knowledge to their descendants (see Chapter
4 in this volume).
The tovshuur is plucked by means of percussive movements or strummed
with the thumb, the index, or middle finger. This instrumental technique during
playing called tsokhilt (hitting) is used for specific musical themes such as epics
with warlike content or to imitate animal or nature sounds. As an exception,
I have witnessed a special biy dance that is performed with the tsokhilt when
playing the tovshuur. However, this dance melody is now rare and can be as-
signed to the Jangar epic (Chuluunbaatar 2016). The Torguud ethnic group also
has only a single dance song, called savardakh (to skewer with the dungfork),
that is accompanied with the tovshuur (Badraa 2017).

Iconic Meaning of Individual Instrument Parts

The tovshuur often exhibits symbolic elements. Such ornamental elements
found on the headstock and neck originate mostly from Tibetan Buddhism
(fire symbol, the wheel of the Dharma, the eternal knot, lotus flower, fish (see

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 figure 6.5), moon and sun) or they are taken from mythology, such as a carved
dragon head (see figure 6.3) or the Soyombo symbol (Bulag 1998). Some tovshuur
decorations also have lucky symbols (see figure 6.3), such as the wooden milk
spoon tsatslyn khalbaga (Ganbold 2014; Hudgins 2014) used by Mongolian
nomads. The same is used for the daily sacrifice of the first milked milk to
the spirits of heaven. This spoon usually has nine (in the form of three times
three) even depressions. This number, a symbol of the nine treasures, signifies
auspiciousness for Mongolians (Jukovskaya 2011). Quite exceptionally, I have
seen this form also as the lower connecting part of the soundbox.
An animal headstock on the tovshuur can have symbolic and spiritual signifi-
cance. I have seen tovshuur with the ibex as a headstock (yangir tovshuur) acting
as a motif. Such an instrument was once used by the epic singer Enkhbalsan as
a symbol of happiness with reference to a corresponding myth involving this
animal (Dulam 1987).8 It is possible, however, that local geographical conditions
also play a role here, since ibexes can be found in the immediate mountain
environment of the singer.
A swan’s head on the headstock of tovshuur is rarely found in Oirad settle-
ments. The swan, though, does have a long history in Oirad mythology as an
animal motif in epics that conveys a specific magical power. The concept of
the swan virgin is also said to be of totemic significance in various regions
(Poppe 1981). In accordance with the text of the early Oirad epic Jangar, a fe-
male yellow-headed swan, hatches her eggs and also produces the melody of
an Oirad musical instrument with its own voice, namely the end-blown flute
tsuur (Jangar 2000; Chuluunbaatar 2013). The swan also has significance in
Mongolian shamanism where it is used as an ongod symbol (Pürev 1999) in
theriomorphic representations.9 The swan also appears in ritual songs such as
the dallaga ritual (Chabros 1992), which can be performed for various occa-
sions (Rintchen 1959). The swan headstock on the tovshuur, though, was first
created in workshops in Ulaanbaatar where it has become quite popular and
is sometimes also bought by tourists. The soundboard on these manufactured
instruments also occasionally displays painted swans.
Sometimes, local people refer to the tovshuur according to its form or sym-
bolic ornamental elements attached. Examples are böörönkhii tovshuur (round
tovshuur), khun tovshuur (swan tovshuur), yangir tovshuur (ibex tovshuur), or
chandman’ tovshuur (gem tovshuur) (Badraa 2017). Furthermore, it should be
noted that individual Oirad ethnic groups sometimes use their own designations.

The Tovshuur’s Social Relationships

The tovshuur, as performed as an accompanying instrument by an epic singer
(tuul’ch), is above all an expression of the Oirad social and cultural system and a

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 marker of Oirad identity. Epic singing with tovshuur accompaniment symbolizes
the local community’s ideal world. The epic singers communicate by means of
acoustic patterns, attaining variants of spiritual forms of existence via a trance
state in which they perform (see figure 6.2). The artists are regarded as ambas-
sadors who overcome and eliminate detrimental events with their epic songs.
The epic text presented is regarded as something extraordinary, the contents of
which—together with the accompanying sounds—local participants listen to
reverently. The epic performer is thus regarded as a mediator between earthly
society and a transcendent world (Khabunova and Kornusova 2005). Therefore,
the sight of a tovshuur in the rural settlement area awakens a special connection
between the Oirad people and their emotional world. Furthermore, a continu-
ous ontological connection between humans and nature is thus shown; this
relationship is rooted in the reproduction of ecologically significant elements
as well as in folklore (Grebennikova 2012; Post 2019).
Epic singers are invited to perform for different kinds of occasions. Today
a musician is treated as a guest of honor during his stay, and relatives, neigh-
bors, and special guests come from nearby areas to listen to his performances.
With his music, the epic singer both appeases and mollifies the local spirits of
nature. Epic song performances are traditionally of eminent importance for
the rural populations who rely on the natural world, including communion
with the master nature spirits of the land, for survival (see Chapters 1 and 9 in
this volume). The following list offers a sampling of ceremonial events, each
of which may involve an epic singer and are performed to satisfy local nature
spirits (baigaliin ongoduud): commencement of the winter season, New Year’s
festival (tsagaan sar), family celebrations, yurt processions, requests for rainfall,
success in a hunt or war, requests for healing from human and animal diseases,
and support from various misfortunes such as childlessness. (Ganbold 2012).
In the sung form of the epic of the Oirads, the required melody and the tovshuur
accompaniment play essential roles. Oirad epic singers are intrinsically drawn to
the tovshuur to accompany their singing. The sounds have a calming effect and
help the musician reach the required trance-like state during performance. Above
all, the creation of meditative sounds enables the singer to maintain the rhythm
of the verses in order to achieve the state of mind needed to build up the epic
chant. Relationships between epic singing and tovshuur sound and rhythm is
also important for a successful performance. Vladimirtsov (1923) suggested that
a musician encounters difficulties when singing epics without a tovshuur. About
his experience with a western Mongolian Bayad (Bait) bard, he says,
Many times the following scene ensued: a singer was dictating a heroic epic
to me, knew it masterfully, dictated it excellently, and suddenly some circum-
stance, a minute mis-recollection and the thread of the tale was broken; then

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 the bard would take up his tobshuur and sing the last few lines just dictated
to me, and at once the further passage would come to mind, and he again
could continue to dictate the bylina [epic] for some hours, until a new similar
mishap. For the Oirat singer the heroic epic is linked with accompaniment,
with the tobshuur, in an unbreakable association; the accompaniment and the
words of the epic for the Oirat singer are one and the same thing, one fused
and unbreakable whole (Vladimirtsov and Krueger 1983–84:41).

When no musical instrument is available, Heissig (1979) suggests that rhythmic

tapping with a riding whip or a baton (tashuur) may prove helpful.10
A person is often designated as the chosen inheritor of a tovshuur instrument
even before the death of the musician. Sometimes epic singers find a worthy
successor within members of their own family. In such a case, the student re-
ceives the musical instrument from the closest relative of the deceased during a
ceremonial celebration. For this ceremony a new khadag (silk scarf for Buddhist
rituals of auspiciousness) is attached to the neck of the instrument (see figure
6.1), to which another scarf is usually attached after the death of the previous
owner. Other instruments may remain in the family of the deceased in the ab-
sence of a worthy successor until one has been found. The tovshuur is typically
stored slightly elevated at a place of honor in the dwelling. In the yurt, this is
opposite the entrance area directly behind where the elders sit. It is rare to find
such valued family instruments in a museum.

Stories Involving the Tovshuur

Various musical instruments are mentioned in texts of epics and many other
song categories. On the one hand, this shows how important instruments and
their traditions are among the Oirad people, but it also shows how traditional
ways of life are incorporated in epics. The tovshuur not only appears in vari-
ous song forms, it also tells us stories of different ethnic groups (Tsoloo 1987).
In a folk song of the Oirad Zakhchin ethnic group, which has the instrument
name tovshuur as its title, the instrument becomes a symbol for the nomadic
way of life.11 It deals with material components such as larch and aspen wood,
willow or horse tail strings, making the instrument, various horse colors, the
cleansing ceremony of the instrument using incense (arts), and a reference to
the strong significance of age (grey horse) among Mongolians (Chuluunbaatar
and Hofer 2006).

Ulia-san ge-deg mo-doo-ro-o With the artfully made tovshuur,

Ur-laj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am Of larch wood,
Una-gan zeer-diin süü-lee-re-e From the tail of a chestnut horse,
Khyal-ga-salj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am The tovshuur’s strings are tight.

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 Khar-gai ge-deg mo-doo-ro-o With the smoothed tovshuur,
Khar uul daj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am Of aspen (khargai) wood,
Khaliu-khan chikh-tiin süü-lee-re-e From the tail of a dun horse,
Khyal-ga-salj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am The tovshuur’s strings are tight.
Ar-tsan ge-deg mo-doo-ro-o With the arts (juniper incense),
Ariu-laj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am Purified tovshuur,
Ag-sam zeer-diin süü-lee-re-e From the tail (süül) of a wild chestnut horse,
Khyal-ga-salj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am The tovshuur’s strings are tight.
Burg-san ge-deg mo-doo-ro-o The crafted from a willow (burgsan),
Bu-daj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am Colored tovshuur,
Buu-ral mori-ny süü-lee-re-e From the tail of a gray-colored old horse,
Khyal-ga-salj khii-sen tov-shuu-ra-am The tovshuur’s strings are tight.

Other songs with information about the tovshuur can also be found among other
neighboring peoples. This includes the Republic of Altai and the Tuva Republic
of the Russian Federation (Levin and Süzükei 2006; Pegg and Yamaeva 2012).

The Tovshuur in Contemporary Use

In western Mongolia the tovshuur maintained a consistent construction and
musical use even during the period of Soviet influence when other instruments
in Mongolia, such as the Khalkh morin khuur, were adapted for use in European-
influenced orchestras (Tsetsentsolmon 2015). When the morin khuur achieved
status in Mongolia as a national icon (see Chapter 5 in this volume), the tovshuur
in the western regions remained an instrument used almost exclusively by epic
singers. Other Oirad instruments, such as ikil and tsuur, also remained in their
original forms. Adoption of the tovshuur for wider use was also hampered by
the state’s disregard for the Oirads, especially during the early days of the social-
ist government (Bulag 1998). This can be linked also to Oirad rule during the
Zungarian Empire (Namsrai 2015; Zlatkin 2015) in the seventeenth to eighteenth
centuries. In this period, some of the traditional Mongolian musical forms were
not included in the developing national guidelines and thus they were rarely
performed. As an epic instrument the tovshuur represented an obsolete form ac-
cording to the new lifestyle proclaimed under Soviet-influenced socialism. This
development was compounded by the official revocation of numerous ethnic
minorities’ rights (Bulag 1998), which had a strong effect on the epic-singing
Oirads.12 These circumstances, along with the fact that the Oirad settlement
areas were so distant from the ruling authorities, presumably contributed to
the preservation of local epic singing and traditional forms of the tovshuur and
other musical instruments.13

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 Political changes brought not only democracy to Mongolia in 1990, but also a
capitalist market economy and, subsequently, the influences of globalization. At
that time many ethnic groups and individuals still felt a desire to acknowledge
and maintain older lifeways. In the case of the Oirads, this was also expressed
through their traditional music. However, these aspirations were soon pushed
aside by their economic needs and opportunities. Thus, a growing mobility, the
introduction of transnational media, migration, and the increasing rural exodus
of young people to the capital have affected the nomadic population through-
out Mongolia, including the western region, during the last three decades. As
Western influences in music and its genres began appearing in rural regions,
notably with the introduction of mobile antennas throughout the country, there
was a shift of interests, especially among young people. Today there seems little
place for the tovshuur and its social life in modern Oirad society in western
Mongolia. However, all these aspects were never a part of the idiosyncrasies
of the tovshuur. In today’s increasingly fast-moving society there is, relatively
speaking, a lack of adequate access to other cultures and modern media. This
is a clash of two extremes. On the one hand, there is the need for the quiet
world of thought of an epic singer and, on the other hand, a lifestyle shaped by
a capitalist market economy. Some Oirads believe the tovshuur has no place in
popular music. Its sounds represent a nomadic way of life of the herders. The
tovshuur, along with other traditional instruments, can be regarded as a vivid
symbol of rural identity.

Conclusion
In the Altai Mountains, the Oirads have preserved numerous traditions that
are distinct from those of other peoples living in Mongolia. Their expression of
ethnic identity can be attributed, mainly, to their remote rural life in the Altai
Mountains. The tovshuur, an instrument traditionally used to accompany ep-
ics, provides an unchanging connection between their identity and their way
of life. For the singer, this instrument is an essential component in order to
achieve a certain trance state, which helps the performer remember the lengthy
texts. Thus, an Oirad epic is inextricably linked with the tovshuur, expressed
by saying: “one without the other is like a fishing rod without the hook.”14 The
musicians’ interpretation is guided by an inner intuition for the natural land-
scape, whose spirits are to be appeased. Thus, the mere sight of such a musical
instrument in the rural areas, creates a special bond between the Oirads and
their emotional realm.
Throughout this region, the tovshuur is made by the musicians themselves.
Knowledge of this musical instrument is passed on mainly within the family; it

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 is therefore not widespread among the population and hardly documented in
specialist literature. The tovshuur has specific unchanging characteristics and
only in the ornamentation can it show certain individual preferences of the
musicians; symbols that can be of traditional, spiritual, and religious nature.
During the socialist, Soviet-influenced, rule, the tovshuur was rendered use-
less for the then promoted concert music of Mongolia. Therefore, the instrument
remained unaltered by the state. In recent times, the performance of traditional
music in the Altai Mountains has become increasingly difficult owing to growing
mobility and the introduction of transnational media. This is especially true for
the epic and its accompanying instrument. Many years of personal experience
clearly show that information provided by epic musicians about their music as
well as their instruments depends on long-built trust, Oirad origin as well as,
often, the musical expertise of the interviewers.

Notes
1. The tovshuur is rarely discussed in contemporary scholarly literature and, if
at all, generally makes up only a few short paragraphs within any given text (Pegg
1995, 2001; Amgalan 2000; Tsedev 2009; Enebish 2012; Katuu 2013; Badraa 2017).
2. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
3. The tovshuur is also mentioned in an earlier source of the Manchu Dynasty
(Fu 1782) under the name tuobushu’er.
4. Sheepskin can also be used in principle. But the reason goat skin is used more
often is that goat is slaughtered far more often and the skin is less valuable (exclud-
ing cashmere goat) than that of sheep. Pegg noted in 1995 that the Altai Uriankhai
Avirmed used camel calf skin and that sheep and adult camel skins were also used
in addition to goat (Pegg 1995:87). Usually, camel calves are not slaughtered. The
skin of adult camels is used by nomads for products such as saddle bags, leather
cords for yurts, and boots. According to Avirmed´s younger son Baldandorj goat
skin is softer and evenly finer, making it a better material for the purpose, and he
rejects the notion of using camel skin (conversation with Baldandorj on January
17, 2020). Avirmed´s older son Dorjpalam (1959–2011) in numerous conversations
mentioned nothing contrary to this.
5. This is because the sound from an instrument with fine skin is a soundboard
much smoother and softer to the human ear. This is especially audible when the
instrument is played in a yurt.
6. Presumably, this procedure is used only on thicker skin because such openings
would impair the stability of a thinner skin.
7. Owing to a widely held nature religion’s belief, only tail hair from male horses
of a specific age should be used.
8. The origin story that encouraged Enkhbalsan to use the ibex head is quoted
in Pegg (1995) as well. Another similar story involving an epic singer, however,

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 with a maral deer instead of an ibex as prey, was told by the epic singer Avirmed,
on December 9th, 1971, to the scientist Tsoloo (Tsoloo and Mönkhtsetseg 2008).
9. A corresponding representation of a carved swan fixed in a tree can be seen
on a picture in Chuluunbaatar (2017, figure 6b).
10. Vladimirtsov (1923) reports that alcohol may be used, sparingly, as well.
11. This folk song that I have known since my childhood is sung in the Zakh-
chin micro-dialect in the Oirad dialect, which differs from the Khalkh Mongolian
dialect.
12. This was especially the case during the reign of Kh. Choibalsan (1939–1952).
13. Relatively late—especially in the 1960s to 1980s—the Mongolian Academy
of Sciences collected and recorded traditional folk music that also included a large
number of epics (Sampildendev, Gerelmaa, and Gansukh 2004). Most of the record-
ings were made in urban buildings, primarily in Ulaanbaatar, and the performances
thus did not reflect the traditional setting for epic singing.
14. Ene n´ Tuul´ch tovshuurgüi bol, zagasny degeegüi zagaschlakh gesentei adil
tul neg n´ nögöögüigeer baikh bolomjgüi yum [literally: “because the epic singer
without the tovshuur is like a fishing rod without the hook, so you can’t have one
without the other”].

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 CHAPTER 7

Social Lives
of the Dombyra
and Its Makers in
Western Mongolia
JENNIFER C. POST

During the first decade of the twenty-first century in the small city of Ölgii
in western Mongolia, it was not uncommon for me to see a child walking to a
school or toward the local theater carrying a long-necked lute without a case.
Grasping the thin neck of the Mongolian Kazakh dombyra in one hand the child
cradled the pear-shaped soundbox with the other, often holding the instrument
face forward. I have noted over the years players carry the dombyra similarly in a
procession at local village celebrations, as it is moved from one ger to another in
the countryside, or when it is passed from singer to singer at a social gathering.
The dombyra is also often displayed face forward on the wall in a living area of
a permanent home or in a prominent place in a ger. Held or displayed this way,
the Kazakh design applied to the dombyra’s wooden soundboard is available for
all to see. The design not only indicates Kazakh identity, it also often identifies
the maker. When local Kazakh artisans began to produce the dombyra in the
1990s as participants in a new market economy, a soundboard design many
displayed included the Bayan-Ölgii aimag (province) seal or emblem featuring
an eagle (qyran),1 the wooden crown (shangyraq) of the Kazakh ger, and the seal
of Mongolia. Kazakhs are eagle hunters, the crown symbolizes family and home
among ger dwellers throughout the region, and the local Kazakh residents are
proud citizens of Mongolia. In recent years, instruments display other symbols
and patterns tied to Kazakh identity; many makers create variations on historical
patterns also found in textile art, and a few designs are more innovative. In my
early years in the field watching children walking the streets with their dombyra,
I worried about the vulnerability of the instrument to wind, rain, and sun, and

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 the damage a drop or knock might bring about. Yet after years of visiting fami-
lies, especially pastoralists in the countryside, I recognize that as a dombyra is
passed among singers, moved to a new location, or left within easy reach of a
very young child, it is not unusual for the instrument to be irreparably damaged.
The active musical life of a Mongolian dombyra in a community is often quite
short. The makers, then, for many years have focused on providing a constant
supply of instruments for children, youth, teachers, families, countryside mu-
sicians, as well as tourists. At the end of the second decade of the twenty-first
century in Ölgii, when a child transports a dombyra to school or the theater,
they are more likely to carry the instrument in a case that was made in China
or Kazakhstan. This change in behavior seems to mirror the development of
dombyra making among independent artists since the end of the socialist era
who have experienced changes in availability and use of materials, opportuni-
ties for innovation in their designs, stability of their products, and their social
position as makers of the unique Mongolian Kazakh dombyra.
While musical instrument makers typically do not achieve the social recogni-
tion that performers receive, musicians are wholly dependent on makers’ skills,
including their knowledge about materials, construction practices, and sound
production. Their efforts to maintain an instrument-making practice engages
them socially with their communities and with the materials they use in their
production. Instruments and the materials they are made of also have stories
to tell (Qureshi 2000). They are products of history and innovation, they too
hold information about the land, and their characteristics can help to define a
community’s identity. Instruments also provide evidence of a region’s biological
diversity and show the changes in the quality of and access to natural resources
(Post 2019).
In settings such as Mongolia, where the primary materials used for musi-
cal instruments are natural resources, such as woods or skins, the life of an
instrument begins with the growth of plant and animal matter used for its
construction, and it continues to grow as makers work with the materials and
fashion the instrument (Hallam and Ingold 2014). In many ways an instrument
is never completed because once it leaves the hands of a maker it also grows
as performers play or it is on display, and its life may even be punctuated by a
return to a maker for repair and a new cycle of growth will occur when parts are
replaced. Instrument makers, like other artists, engage with what Tim Ingold
(2013:6) refers to as “the art of inquiry”: how a craftsperson “thinks through
making” and engages broadly not only with the materials themselves, but with
processes and practices that make up bodies of knowledge about acoustic and
artistic practices. Ingold (ibid.:7–8) says, “the art of inquiry moves forward in
real time, along with the lives of those who are touched by it, and with the world
to which both it and they belong.” Similarly, the social lives of instruments and

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 their makers that I experienced in Mongolia helped me grow through “cor-
respondence” with their practice; Ingold describes this as “anthropology with
art” rather than anthropology about or of art.
Recent musical instrument research explores how the social lives of mu-
sicians, makers, and instruments are entangled with materials. Kevin Dawe
(2003:269) posits that instrument makers “inhabit a unique world formed out
of the intersection of material, social, and cultural worlds.” Eliot Bates (2012:364)
suggests addressing the lives of instruments is an important step in understand-
ing “relationships—between humans and objects, between humans and humans,
and between objects and other objects.”2 Such frameworks are effective when
instruments are not just objects, and makers are not simply “agents setting a
variety of social practices in motion.” Instead, our knowledge grows when we
consider the breadth of possible relationships materials and makers express as
they interact in forests and workshops, and the local knowledge instruments
hold over time. Materials used for musical instruments, such as those made in
western Mongolia, are often entangled with the characteristics of local lands
and they hold evidence of the effects of weather events as they grow; yet today
many are deeply impacted by climate change.
This chapter explores the social lives of the Mongolian Kazakh dombyra
and its makers in two western Mongolian aimags, drawing especially from
the experiences of four instrument makers who shared stories about entangle-
ments with materials, tools, processes, practices, and change. I interviewed
and developed friendships with the artists and members of their families and
communities during visits to their homes and home-based workshops between
2005 and 2018. My information on the dombyra and makers in different social
contexts highlights relationships between maker and materials; the significance
of community knowledge; the impact of social, political, and ecological changes
on music; and the entanglement of makers, materials, and the instruments they
make.3 The narrative information privileges local knowledge and the Mongolian-
specific experiences of these makers, especially what I learned from them over
time about the dombyra and its social life in their family and community set-
tings. While Kazakh people in Mongolia have lately been linked more directly
with Kazakhstan, exploring Mongolian Kazakh music and musical instrument
practices demonstrates that theirs’ is a unique musical culture linked more
directly historically to Xinjiang, China, an ancestral place for many, and more
recently to Mongolian lifeways and values.4

Kazakhs in Khovd and Bayan-Ölgii

The majority of the Kazakh citizens of Mongolia live in the western aimags
of Khovd and Bayan-Ölgii.5 Most Mongolian Kazakhs carry family histories of

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 arrival from western China in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and
often reference western China as an ancestral place in stories and songs (Finke
1999; Soni 2003; Post 2014). Today they consider Mongolia their homeland
(tughan zher). Herders who move seasonally in support of their livestock, and
city-dwellers in the provincial centers in Khovd and Ölgii (each with populations
of about 30,000), as well as Kazakh residents who have moved to the capital
city of Ulaanbaatar or its suburbs, continue to maintain cultural practices that
reinforce their Kazakh identities.
Economic structures that developed in newly democratic and market-based
Mongolia have impacted lifeways and cultural production as well. As Russians
and Russian Kazakh elites brought new cultural expectations into the region
during their Soviet era, they introduced musical ideas, contributing to an already
unique cultural landscape. In the following decades, after the end of Soviet
control, there was a swirl of movement of Mongolian Kazakhs migrating to
Kazakhstan at the invitation of the government interested in the practices they
maintained while Central Asia was experiencing russification and cultural loss.
Their movement continued in the late 1990s and into the twenty-first century as
many returned to their Mongolian homeland (Diener 2009; Barcus and Werner
2010; Finke 2013; Post 2014). Kazakhstani music scholars in this period began
to visit Mongolia seeking information from Mongolian Kazakhs on what the
residents of Kazakhstan believed to be their own history. A goal appears to be
to construct a shared history of the peoples who have lived in two very dif-
ferent countries. In this period as well, the changing economy for Mongolian
Kazakhs provided support for greater access to technologies, from solar panels
and satellite dishes to cars and trucks, an impetus for even greater geographic
and musical mobility. Increasing opportunities to travel to the capital city of
Ulaanbaatar, as well as China, Kazakhstan, Turkey, and other locations have had
a huge impact on Mongolian Kazakh musical culture, including their dombyra.

The Mongolian Kazakh Dombyra and Its Makers

The two-string, long-necked fretted lute dombyra is an iconic instrument of
the Kazakh people. The instrument plays multiple roles in Mongolian Kazakh
social life and in the lives of Kazakhs in Kazakhstan and other locations where
they reside. In Mongolia, the dombyra accompanies songs of aqyns (poet-sing-
ers) and punctuates the social commentary of dueling aitys (improvisational
sung poetry) singers. It is also played to accompany songs offered at a rural or
urban toi (celebration), such as a wedding (üilenu toi) where it becomes a tool
to ritually remove the bride’s veil to reveal the bride’s face (betashar) in the rural
ger or more recently in local community halls. The dombyra is used to play küi,
a solo narrative instrumental form; it is a principal instrument in the folkloric

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 orchestra at the local theater in Ölgii city (established in 1959) and has also be-
come an important ensemble instrument in local pop bands (Yagi 2019).6 While
some musicians and instruments in western Mongolia may be identified with
a musical elite, the dombyra in Bayan-Ölgii and Khovd today is widely shared
regardless of social class or community standing.
While Mongolian Kazakh social history has produced dombyra with unique
characteristics, the instruments did not develop in isolation from Kazakhstan
or Xinjiang, China. In Kazakhstan, wide variations in shapes and styles devel-
oped for the dombyra over time.7 Scholars representing that country separate
the dombyra in Kazakhstan into two primary geographically based structural
styles: instruments from the western region that have a pear-shaped soundbox
and a long thin neck, and the dombyra of eastern and southern regions with a
spade-shaped (or sometimes triangular) soundbox and a shorter and wider neck
(Kendirbaeva 1994; Kunanbaeva 2002).8 Since many families now in Mongolia
traveled several centuries ago from the region that is now eastern Kazakhstan
to Chinese lands and then into western Mongolia, both spade- and triangular-
shaped instruments were prevalent in Xinjiang and Mongolia in the nineteenth
and early mid-twentieth centuries.
Oral evidence in Mongolia indicates that early makers were local residents,
building techniques were learned in families, and production was focused in
neighborhoods and relied on locally accessible materials. These circumstances
offered opportunities for variations in style and quality. During the Soviet-
influenced socialist period, “culture-building processes” impacted musical rep-
ertoires, styles, and instruments throughout Central Asia and Mongolia (Marsh
2009; Levin 2018). In this period, the western Kazakhstani pear-shaped dombyra
with a long neck became a standard in the local theater, and it was adopted more
widely then for dombyra making. Makers from the Soviet’s Kazakh Republic,
or trained by Kazakhs from the Republic in Mongolian workshops, provided a
standardized, “improved” instrument for the Mongolian Kazakhs (Yagi 2018).
These instruments also made their way from Ölgii to the countryside. Today
Mongolian Kazakh makers build the dombyra according to standard dimen-
sions and maintain a unified form based on the standardized dombyra of the
twentieth century. While standardized in form and measurement, Mongolian
Kazakhs express their unique identities as they make the instruments. Memories
of older dombyra that local musicians and makers once made in different styles,
predating the most aggressive improvement efforts, appear to be fading. Such
instruments are preserved in museums but are seldom found in homes.9
In the post-socialist era, some dombyra makers in Mongolia who had been
making instruments as artisans for the collectives in the socialist period con-
tinued their instrument making independently. At the same time, other wood-
workers began to experiment with dombyra making as well, and together they

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 began to provide these Mongolian-made instruments for local use.10 The goal for
many makers is economic; making a functional musical instrument for everyday
use (for learning, taking part in social events, and gifting), and their standards
provide a customer base for them. The makers establish home-based workshops;
the spaces are typically carved out of a portion of a home; sometimes the space
is as small as a closet. A few have developed separate workshops next to their
homes. Their instrument making takes place in both a designated workshop
space and in shared family spaces where family members may contribute to the
process and a variety of visitors also come and go.
Contemporary Mongolian dombyra makers abide by standards for shape
and size established in the twentieth century during the socialist period. They
typically note the measurements as follows: the neck (moiyn) should be 48cm,
the soundbox (shanaq) no larger than 40x23cm, and the headstock (alaqan)
10cm. In earlier times the soundbox was carved from a single piece of wood,
but today it is made with ribs (typically seven) glued together to form a rounded
back. The soundboard (qaqlaq) is made using three to five pieces of well-planed
wood glued together.11 The frets (perneler; singular: perne) (up to twenty-one)
made of nylon are tied on the thin neck. The strings (shekter) are also made of
nylon, typically fishing line from China, Russia, or Kazakhstan have replaced the
locally made gut strings largely abandoned a generation ago. The woods used for
all parts of the Mongolian dombyra are typically purchased at the local market.
Siberian pine (qaraghai) and Siberian fir (samyrsyn), the most commonly used
woods, are cut from the northern forests in north central Mongolia along the
Russian border and brought to the Ölgii market by truck. Other local woods
used include larch (balqaraghai), poplar (terek), and Siberian spruce (shyrsha).12
A few makers seek other woods such as reclaimed wood from old furniture and
buildings, old abandoned logs in a nearby forest, or wood from Xinjiang.13
When I traveled to western Mongolia in 2005 to learn about the dombyra,
its construction, and musical repertoires, I established relationships with many
makers that I have maintained over the years. The stories of four—Sultanbai,
Daniyal, Säken, and Medixat—illustrate the breadth of knowledge and expe-
rience both maker and instrument convey in their social lives.14 The instru-
ments and the processes makers used for building tell tales of relationships with
mentors and materials, and their stories are tied to rural and urban lifeways,
resource access, historical events, and ecological and sociopolitical changes. I
met with Sultanbai in Khovd sum and Daniyal in Ölgii city only in 2005, and
I have followed the careers of Säken and Medixat (along with other makers)
for over fifteen years.15 Discussions with these artists not only provide evidence
of the dombyra’s contributions to social lives and music over time in western
Mongolia, but they demonstrate the entanglements of maker, materials, and a
changing ecological, social, and cultural environment.

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 Sultanbai
In May 2005 at the home of a local family in Khovd sum in Khovd aimag, a
small group of local residents shared information with me about the dombyra
and its makers.16 They began by telling me that no one in the village was making
dombyra anymore. Leading the discussion, a local cultural official and dombyra
player spoke nostalgically about the instrument and its different styles in twen-
tieth-century Mongolia. Taking my notebook (see figure 7.1), he first sketched a
dombyra with a spade-shaped soundbox, noting it had a flat back and seventeen
to nineteen frets, and then he drew a dombyra with a pear-shaped soundbox
that he said had up to twenty-one frets.17 The latter is the style associated with
the pear-shaped dombyra with ribs that became the standard instrument for
Mongolian Kazakhs in the late twentieth century. Below these he sketched a
second type of spade-shaped dombyra with fewer frets (up to nine) that he said
was typically built at home and never manufactured for sale. Next to it he drew
a dombyra with a triangular shaped soundbox and shorter neck also with up
to nine frets, and next to that a similar short-necked instrument with a round
soundbox. These instruments represent the range of dombyra models once com-
mon in Mongolia which still live in the memories of older residents. In Ölgii city
it is possible to see examples of some of these instruments at the local museum.
Even though access to the dombyra in Khovd sum was limited, the residents
I spoke with indicated their ongoing interest in the instrument and its music. At
the local school, the music teacher reported that there were not enough instru-
ments for the number of students interested in learning to play. They had just a
handful of dombyra, which they repaired with tape when soundbox seams split.
When no longer repairable, the teacher traveled to Ölgii city, the aimag center
in nearby Bayan-Ölgii aimag, to purchase another for the school at the local
market. The departure of local residents for Kazakhstan during the previous
decade, including valued makers, and the deteriorating quality and availability
of woods made it difficult for the community to maintain local support for the
instrument’s production.
Exploring the subject of dombyra makers and the status of woods and other
materials with the residents, I learned from the teacher that instruments available
in the community were generally in disrepair. He showed me one dombyra with
a pear-shaped soundbox made by Bayan Murat, a former resident who moved
to Kazakhstan in 1990, returned to Khovd a few years later, but then went back
to Kazakhstan. He distinguished his dombyra with his own Kazakh design on
the soundboard. Some local residents characterized his dombyra acoustically,
referencing the sound as “thick” and “not very pleasing.” They did not attribute
this to Bayan Murat’s skill but to his limited access to quality woods; he had
access to only lumber grade wood for his instruments, they said, such as larch.

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 FIGURE 7.1.Drawing by a local cultural official in Khovd sum representing different
Mongolian Kazakh dombyra styles, Khovd aimag, 2005. Photo by J. C. Post.

Community members also mentioned the dombyra maker Sultanbai, who

still lived in Khovd sum but was no longer making instruments.18 When I met
with Sultanbai, a man in his mid-late fifties, he seemed surprised by my interest
in his dombyra. He said he began making dombyra in 1988 when his son showed
an interest in playing. After making one instrument, he began to make others for
the neighborhood children, altogether completing about ten. Sultanbai called
his instruments “not very professional” and referred to himself as an amateur,
although other local community members sitting around the room during our
discussion all said the dombyra he made sounded very good to them. While
he no longer had any of his instruments, a community member retrieved one
from a nearby home. No longer in playing condition, it was without strings
or tuning pegs and had a damaged soundboard. Representing the homemade

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 FIGURE 7.2.Sultanbai with a dombyra he made in the early 1990s, Khovd
sum, Khovd aimag, 2005. Photo by J. C. Post.

spade-shaped style, it was boxy with a flat back, and with evidence of nine-ten
frets (see Figure 7.2). Sultanbai said he made his dombyra using Siberian pine,
although sometimes he used Siberian larch for the back. He used fishing line
for the strings.
Sultanbai also used the soundboard to display painted images of locally
valued resources. The instrument shared with me exhibited an argali (wild
mountain sheep) standing on top of a snow-capped mountain, the sun rising

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 behind it. He said local Kazakhs associate the argali with Khovd sum, thus the
instrument identifies and embraces the specific Kazakh region in the aimag.
Sultanbai, and others in the room, said they are proud to protect this animal
that is considered “the rarest and most beautiful, with its long curling horns.”
Inscriptions to individuals written on the soundboard are common on locally
made dombyra, and Sultanbai’s inscription uses Arabic script (predating Soviet
influenced Cyrillic script for Kazakhs).
As I listened to the discussions about the dombyra in Khovd sum, viewed
Sultanbai’s older dombyra, and learned from local residents about their knowl-
edge of its history, I saw more clearly how the social life of instruments in the
community—and thus music itself—were entangled with the complex Kazakh
sociopolitical history in Mongolia and of relationships of Mongolian Kazakhs
with Kazakhstan. Identities were expressed in instrument styles and the orna-
ments, thus images and icons connected them not only to Kazakh identities,
but to place as well, even specifying the importance of local ecologies. They
were impacted also by the quality of materials available and the influence of the
Russian—then Russian-influenced Kazakhstani—theater traditions. The style
of dombyra that Sultanbai made, represented now by an unplayable instrument,
has been all but erased from local use in western Mongolia, although these styles
still remain in the memories of makers, musicians, and listeners.

Daniyal
In Bayan-Ölgii, Daniyal’s relationships to instruments and materials, produc-
tion and preservation, and making and growing took place during a long lifetime.
His contributions to Mongolian dombyra history includes knowledge he brought
from Xinjiang, his ability to adjust to new forms and formats for making, and his
interest in creating new styles. Entangled with both past and current practices
throughout his life, his instruments embody local musical history.
I was introduced to 88-year-old Daniyal in Ölgii city.19 At first I saw him
as a dedicated artist who—despite his age—spent time in his workshop every
day making dombyra and Kazakh crafts. He told me during our first meeting,
though, that he once worked in China as a spy and was trained in medicine,
and I learned later that he was also a highly respected poet in Mongolia. The
eldest in a family of twelve brothers and sisters, Daniyal was born in 1918 in
Altay Prefecture in today’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China. He
was engaged in Islamic religious studies with his father between ages five and
thirteen and came to Mongolia in 1934 when he was sixteen. He studied medi-
cine in Ulaanbaatar and was a doctor in the military, serving in Japan during
the 1930s and 1940s. Daniyal said he learned dombyra making from his uncle
Kusain on his grandfather’s side, when he was fourteen, while still in China.

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 In our conversations, Daniyal shared his knowledge about the different dom-
byra styles, the woods he used, and techniques for building he had experienced
during his lifetime. Since he began making dombyra in 1932, so he had engaged
with its materials, styles, and sounds, as well as the innovative opportunities
the instrument offered him, for over seventy years. His social relationships with
instruments and materials, along with the communities he was sharing them
with, appeared to be important to him throughout his life.
The instrument Daniyal first learned to make was a dombyra with a triangular
soundbox, a short neck, and seven frets; he referred to it as the instrument he
learned to make from his uncle Kusain and called it a “Kusain dombyra.” The
locally highly respected dombyra player Seit Zhumazhan who was a member of
the Ölgii theater for forty-three years, also referred to the Kusain dombyra in a
2005 interview. He said this type, made by his friend’s father who was a dombyra
maker, was his first dombyra. Seit described it as “a simple instrument with a
triangular shaped resonator—a style made for friends.” (Interview, Ölgii city,
June 3, 2005). Describing the materials and construction process, Daniyal said
the wood he used for this type of dombyra was “not special” and each instrument
was assembled quickly using nails. He noted that generally they were not well
made and the sound was “not very good.” Daniyal linked the triangular shaped
dombyra to his early life in Xinjiang, but he did not reference any connection
to historical instruments of central and eastern Kazakhstan with short necks
and—sometimes—triangular soundboxes.
In Mongolia, Daniyal was part of a cooperative for building the standardized
dombyra that was being promoted during socialist time. He said he was the lead
instrument maker and taught many makers in the aimag to make dombyra, in-
cluding several artists I also came to know over the years. This includes Tompei,
who was still working in Ölgii in 2018, and Esentai, who made instruments in
Sagsai sum until his retirement around 2013.
I was not surprised to see a dombyra hanging on the wall in Daniyal’s living
room. Made with a pear-shaped soundbox carved from a single piece of wood,
the soundboard was also one piece, and in addition to a central sound hole it
had six symmetrically arranged small holes. The instrument was adorned with
colorful flowers and designs painted on both the soundboard and soundbox. The
frets and strings were made with a thicker nylon than many dombyra I had seen
being sold at the local Bayan-Ölgii market in the early 2000s. Daniyal said that
he made the instrument in 1988 using Siberian fir and that his son had painted
the designs. While we were talking, a neighbor arrived with another dombyra
that Daniyal had made: it was spade-shaped with a flat back similar in design
to those illustrated by the cultural official in Khovd sum but was more stylized
than the one made by Sultanbai.

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 In our discussion, Daniyal stressed the importance of specific local materials,
especially woods such as Siberian fir, poplar, and Siberian pine. He spoke about
materials and structural styles to produce an ideal dombyra sound that he tried
to maintain, although over time it became increasingly difficult. For example,
he said the soundbox for the dombyra is best when made from a single piece of
wood (rather than built using ribs), and the soundboard is most resonant when it
is constructed from a single piece of wood as well. Yet to make a soundbox with
one piece, the wood must be soft enough to carve, so Daniyal prefers Siberian
fir, which is “light and strong.” He said that while he once used poplar, he didn’t
have access to this wood because of environmental protection policies. Daniyal
said it is also difficult to find pieces of wood that are big enough to carve the
large dombyra soundboxes. While he has carved an entire dombyra (back, neck,
headstock) using one piece of wood, he feels it is impractical. From the same
piece of wood used for one dombyra he can make two if he makes it with separate
pieces for the soundbox and neck. Daniyal said it usually takes about three days
to finish a dombyra. He carves the wood for the soundbox, then dries it near
the stove in the winter and outside in the shade during the summer. Working
primarily alone, he said he sometimes worked with his son; he taught him not
only to make the dombyra but also saddles, knives, and other metalwork.20 As
we talked in his small workshop, Daniyal sat on the dirt floor on his knees to
work. He kept his hand tools for cutting and carving on the ground nearby
within easy reach (see figure 7.3). Carving out a block of wood to make the
pear-shaped soundbox using a hook knife was a slow and methodical process.
As we talked, I realized that Daniyal had contributed a diverse selection of
instruments to the Bayan-Ölgii community. They ranged from simply built
instruments in styles established in the region before the mid-twentieth cen-
tury, including a dombyra with a triangular soundbox that he said he made in
1950 for the local museum and spade-shaped and pear-shaped dombyras using
carved soundboxes (versus the more common instruments made with ribs)
that he made for the Ölgii community. Each was embellished with a decorative
pattern on the face to mark it as a dombyra made by Daniyal. He also designed
a dombyra that became known in Bayan-Ölgii as the “Daniyal dombyra” that
is exhibited at the Ölgii Museum. He admitted, though, that the style did not
“catch on.” He believes that it is because it was too much like the Kyrgyz komuz,
a three-stringed long-necked lute with a pear-shaped body played in nearby
Kyrgyzstan.
Daniyal, who moved to Kazakhstan soon after my visit and passed away there
in 2007, contributed socially to the local musical community as a builder and
teacher. He maintained concern for quality in his instruments and continued
to grow through engagement with current trends. He exhibited innovation as a

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 FIGURE 7.3. Daniyal carving a dombyra soundbox in his workshop in Ölgii
city, 2005. Photo by J. C. Post.

maker and was concerned about conservation of cultural practices as he main-

tained an ongoing relationship with the local museum, which in turn supported
Daniyal’s musical, aesthetic, and innovative interests. The Ölgii museum gave
him opportunities to share musical history through the dombyra, correspond-
ing not only with the local community, but in stories his instruments shared
with visitors as well—from the triangular-shaped dombyra and Daniyal’s own
creation, the “Daniyal dombyra,” to instrument styles established in the socialist
period. As a teacher, Daniyal passed his values on to students such as Tompei,

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 and one of Tompei’s students is Säken, a maker in Dayan who ultimately forged
his own pathway in dombyra making.

Säken
Considering engagement with resources as sources for musical sound, Säken,
settled in a lake region near the Chinese border called Dayan, offered informa-
tion on how he has used what he perceived as traditional practice as a foundation
for his work in post-socialist Mongolia. His interest in resources for their reso-
nance and reliability gave him strength to continue to pursue his work despite
considerable personal challenges. He exhibits knowledge he has gained from
materials in his instruments and shared the significance of social connections
with wood and the nearby forests that provide the resources he values.
Säken was asleep in a late morning in June 2005 when I arrived at his winter
place, a wooden building tucked amid low hills near Dayan Lake, sited and
structured to protect occupants from winter and early spring winds and cold
temperatures.21 The low ceiling in the one-room building made it cold and
dark, but his relatives made us tea and we waited while 44-year-old Säken got
up slowly—leaving briefly to wash—and then returned to sit on the side of his
bed, ready to talk about the dombyra. Like Sultanbai, Säken appeared to be sur-
prised by my interest in the instrument, yet he gladly showed me a completed
dombyra made of Siberian spruce that he had made for a resident in the local
Dayan community. He then pulled another uncompleted instrument out from
under his bed and said he was making this fine dombyra for himself. The neck
and soundbox were reinforced with hardwood strips, a practice that seemed
unusual in the dombyra made in Bayan-Ölgii or Khovd because it requires
wood that is rare in the aimag and it takes extra time. Säken said that some of
his skills came from his experiences working with Tompei; he described the
designs he learned from him, but his Dayan instruments were influenced by
another source as well. He said his designs, measurements, and tools came
from information in a magazine article with instructions for making a dombyra
published in 1982 in Kazakhstan. The article provided all the information on
construction that Säken felt he needed to successfully make instruments on his
own. When I asked whether the style of his instruments ever varied from the
dombyra directions in the Kazakhstani publication, he shook his head.
Säken works alone and sources his wood locally in the Dayan forests, land
once managed by the state during socialist times. Some of the older residents
who became full-time herders in the 1990s worked in the forest or in the lumber
processing “factory,” as they called it, including Säken’s father who worked for
the state from 1968–1988. During that period, Säken said the socialist project
was responsible for the “destruction” of nature and his local community that

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 housed, protected, and used the forests never benefited. Wood taken from the
forests was distributed to other regions in Mongolia, and some lumber was
taken to Russia. The large old growth trees (essential for making quality musi-
cal instruments), and a source for added protection for livestock and wildlife,
are now gone.22 The young pine and fir forests now circle the region, but deep
in the woods, up close to the Chinese border, old stands of endemic Siberian
spruce remain. Säken travels up there on horseback to find fallen trees that he
drags back to his home. He looks for logs that have not been invaded by insects
as the holes spoil the wood’s sound. The logs and tree stumps he collects sit out-
side—sometimes for several years—until he is ready to use them. Even before
he cuts the logs, Säken said he listens to the sound of the wood and then listens
carefully also as he makes each dombyra part. The spruce he uses “makes a good
sound” when he taps it. He described what he identifies as three layers in a log:
the most valuable part of the tree is the “third layer” (its core) that is dense and
has a good sound, the second layer is usable but not very good, and the outer
layer cannot be used to make an instrument: “It has no sound,” Säken said.
I returned to Dayan to see Säken the next year, in 2006, when he was in his
summer settlement. Dombyra parts were piled up in a corner of the ger—Säken
said he prepared them during the winter and planned to work on completing
the instruments during the summer and autumn. Looking both satisfied and
proud, he showed me the completed dombyra he made for himself using shyrshya
(spruce) and qadaghai (pine). The fret board was made from the wood from an
old Russian chair, and he glued and then lacquered paper-cut designs on the neck
and soundboard, including an eagle with wings around the central soundhole.
He also added f-holes, he said, “because many fine instruments have them.”23
Traveling throughout the region and returning each year to see Säken, I
learned that Dayan residents rely on his dombyra. Some pay for them in Mon-
golian tögrög, others offer a sheep or arrange for a barter. Many members of
the Dayan community are eager to acquire one of his instruments; they value
its sound as they play küi and accompany their songs. The instrument also
commonly hangs on the wall of a winter home or spring-summer yurt in order
to display Kazakh heritage. In fact, many people I have met with tied to the
Dayan community who want a “Säken dombyra” have a hard time acquiring one.
While most other small communities outside of Ölgii city lost their dombyra
makers in the late twentieth century, as makers aged and younger people were
less interested in learning a practice with limited economic benefit, Säken has
helped to maintain a valued tradition for this community. Once an individual or
family receives a dombyra from Säken the instrument becomes a status symbol,
displaying the owner’s relationship to this locally respected maker. Stepping into
a yurt or wooden winter home with my Kazakh traveling companions, or sitting
for tea when visitors arrive, I can see that the distinctive decorative style that
Säken has maintained over the years catches their eyes quickly (see figure 7.4).

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 FIGURE 7.4. Säken with a newly made dombyra, Dayan köl, Bayan Ölgii, 2014. Photo
by J. C. Post.

I seemed to arrive each year to visit Säken at a critical time in his life. One year
he was in a yurt celebrating his wedding; the next year I arrived just days after the
birth of his first child. I found him another year in a newly built wooden three-
room home in the Dayan community, having abandoned altogether a mobile
way of life as a herder. He showed me half-finished instruments he was storing in
the corner of a room in his new home, but he didn’t offer information on when
he expected to complete them. In fact, Säken said he was too tired to work and
talked about giving up making instruments altogether. When I returned in 2011
after an absence of several years, Säken told me he had been in Ulaanbaatar
for heart surgery and was still recovering. He seemed in better spirits and was
making dombyra again, but then in 2013 there was an outbreak of foot-and-
mouth disease and Säken’s family lost all their livestock. Sometime in the midst
of all these events, Säken also sold the fine dombyra he had made for himself
to visitors from an organization in Kazakhstan who came to the region seeking
“cultural products.” He said they paid good money for it. With new energy and
improved health, Säken seemed to manage his personal struggles by focusing on
his instrument making and becoming involved in fine carpentry work as well.
I often thought about that fine dombyra Säken began to make before 2005
and finished in 2006—that he had let go to Kazakhstan. I wondered whether
he would ever make another such instrument again. The dombyra style he pro-

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 duced for his community from the aged spruce he gathered in the forest was a
good instrument with fine sound, but it showed little variation and innovation.
Säken’s life events seemed to make it difficult for him to focus creatively, or to
invest in the time needed to produce a unique instrument. The opportunity
came when his young daughter showed interest in playing dombyra. In 2015,
Säken used strips of oak (emen) that he said he purchased in Xinjiang to make
an instrument that was both visually appealing and structurally stronger than
the instruments he had been making. He did this, as he had done previously,
using techniques that fine luthiers use to stabilize necks and make soundboxes
stronger and aesthetically appealing with hardwood strips rather than making
the neck using a single pliable piece of wood. After that, Säken began to experi-
ment with a few new techniques to enhance his dombyra both structurally and
visually. In 2018 he was still relying on being able to gather spruce in the nearby
forests, but his greater mobility also has provided opportunities for him to travel
to seek other wood sources as well.
Säken’s growth as a maker occurred in the midst of life events that he some-
times struggled to manage. His isolation in a rural lake region populated with
village residents and spring, summer, and autumn pastoralists, largely from
Ulaankhus and Sagsai sums, means that his instruments remain locally shared.
His choices of woods and other materials, the designs he adheres to, the orna-
mentation of the soundboard that marks his identity as a maker, models the
significant role a dombyra maker plays in the musical life of a Mongolian Kazakh
community.

Medixat
While Daniyal and Säken had direct and indirect relationships to local
workshops established during socialism, Medixat developed his skills in a dif-
ferent way. From the beginning he created instruments with an eye for style
and an ear for sound and structure. His social experience with the instruments
themselves helped him explore possibilities for structural changes, not only to
improve their strength and sound, but to improve their cultural value in his
community.
I first saw Medixat in 2005 near the entrance to the local Ölgii city market.24
He was sitting on an old tire holding three dombyra he was trying to sell (see
figure 7.5). They had pear-shaped soundboxes and soundboards that displayed
the Bayan-Ölgii seal. Visiting him at his home later that week, Medixat, age 44
at the time, told me he had been making instruments for about six years. One
of twelve children in a herding family from the village of Sogog, north of Ölgii,
previously he worked as a carpenter for the government. He learned to make
dombyra by disassembling instruments that had “good sound” and studying their

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 FIGURE 7.5. Medixat at the Ölgii city market, 2005. Photo by J. C. Post.

structure. He considered ways he might improve their strength and sound and
tested his changes at the market as he developed his skill as a maker. In general,
he said, he has streamlined his processes over the years. While Medixat said in
2005 he worked alone, I could see that his production actually involved several
members of his family. One of his sons was always on hand to help, especially
as he finished each dombyra. His young son Haynazar applied the cut paper
designs that he lacquered onto the soundboard. Medixat’s wife helped to string
the instruments once they were dry. Medixat said he used Siberian pine when he
was able to get it. In fact, he had two large logs, each fifteen inches in diameter,
that he had acquired. He preferred to build instruments beginning with a log
(rather than lumber from the market), although most of the time he had to rely
on market wood. I could see that Medixat’s interest in wood extended also to its
physical characteristics; he looked carefully at wood as he cut it, and again as
he constructed the ribs for the soundbox, in order to create a visually pleasing
instrument. Yet when I asked in 2005 whether he put extra effort into making
high-quality dombyra (sapaly dombyra), he said that he didn’t have time—he
had two children at university and his primary goal was to earn what he could
by making instruments quickly. Medixat’s workshop was in a small building

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 next to the family living quarters. He used this for wood processing, but his
work expanded into outdoor spaces as well as the family kitchen for some tasks.
Selling instruments at the market meant he had to work on instruments at night
so he could go to the market during the day to sell them.
As we continued to talk about materials and processes for his instruments
in the following years, Medixat admitted that he sometimes looked around his
home at his beams and furniture considering the dry wood that he could use
for dombyra parts. He also expressed frustration about the way he has been
forced to acquire wood: standing outside the fenced lumber market to wait for
the proprietor to slide boards over the fence; thus he had no opportunity to
select his own wood. Yet to offer strong and stable necks that will not warp, as
many Ölgii dombyra necks that are typically made with soft lumber do, and to
make ribs for the soundbox that provide volume and a clear sound, Medixat
needed access to dry and resonant wood. Most Ölgii makers build instruments
as a form of subsistence living and Medixat has navigated this difficult terrain
over time with an interest in making a living, but also in providing both high
quality and innovative instruments.
Each year when I visited Medixat I was introduced to changes in his work-
shop space, instrument designs, and even woods. He continued to expand his
workshop, creating a larger, more fully designated space for instrument making.
Stepping into his expanded workshop in 2011, Medixat was working with his
son Haynazar on completing a dombyra. There was the sweet smell of wood in
his new mud-clay two-room building. Medixat and Haynazar were focused on
wood at every stage of dombyra making. As they cut, carved, planed, sanded, and
pieced an instrument together, they used hand tools, from a knife to handsaws,
a few electric tools, including a bandsaw and an old electric disc sander, and
homemade tools, such as wooden clamps. The workshop was quiet, punctu-
ated by brief casual conversations or the sound of a bandsaw when one of them
needed to cut one or two pieces of wood.
Medixat’s attention throughout the building process remained on quality
control. He carefully prepared wood for the soundbox’s seven ribs and five
pieces for the soundboard, and he also showed particular attention to the wood
for the neck. These three elements determine the finished instrument’s acoustic
and structural quality and stability, as well as its appearance. He knows wood
needs to be dry, but with limited time to accomplish this ideal, Medixat uses his
woodstove and the sun, when available, to dry parts of the instrument during
building.
Medixat and his son prepared the ribs for the dombyra as a team; he used a
homemade metal form to mark each piece of planed wood for cutting. The wood
appeared to be burned on one side from the wood stove. As he marked each
piece, he dropped it on the floor and his son, who was sitting nearby, reached

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 down and picked it up. He used a knife to cut the stylized shape along the lines
his father drew. Haynazar’s movements were accurate and quick, and once he
was done his father planed the edges, checking each carefully on a flat surface.
His son then took each rib and moved it across a large flat sanding board using
broad strokes. This kind of partnership, built over time, engaged the makers with
gestures linked also to expectations of the wood and ultimately of the finished
instrument.
Medixat’s innovations carried him well into the second decade of the twenty-
first century. I arrived once to find he had made a double-neck dombyra after
seeing one on a television program transmitted from Kazakhstan. During that
period Medixat began to travel regularly to Kazakhstan to sell instruments,
and later he and his sons sold instruments at the markets in Xinjiang. In 2015,
Medixat greeted me with a mischievous smile; he wanted to tell me about his lat-
est innovation. Still struggling to find quality wood, he was wandering through
the local market and saw tools, such as large axes from China and Russia, with
walnut (zhangghaq) and oak (emen) handles. At the same time, Medixat was
receiving more attention for the quality of his instruments and orders were
beginning to come in, meaning he did not have to go to the market to sell his
instruments as often. He received one order to complete a set of six dombyras
to give as gifts during an event in Khovd aimag. He and his sons worked as a
team to make fourteen ribs for each back using different hard- and softwoods.
Each neck was reinforced with strips of oak to strengthen them and he used a
strip of walnut for each fretboard. The design on the soundboard featured an
eagle’s head and wing feathers around the edge; the central sound hole was the
bird’s eye (see figure 7.6). While the sound of each instrument was not the same
as those he made with Mongolian softwood, it was a clear, resonant sound that
he had been searching for.
When I first met Medixat in 2005 he was but one of a growing group of
men with carpentry skills who were attempting to learn to make dombyras as a
means to an income during difficult economic times in the aimag. Only a few
older makers that were part of the collective system were still working in the
early 2000s. The standardized instrument established during the socialist era
both helped and challenged makers. The dimensions and other characteristics
(such as wood thickness for the soundboard) provided a well-tested format for
instruments. Local makers were all challenged, though, by the struggle to obtain
wood that sings. I have witnessed many provincial residents as they arrived at
the local market from the countryside or city to buy a dombyra for a child, a
family member, or for a gift. They try them out, listening carefully to each before
making a purchase. The increasing mobility between Bayan-Ölgii and China to
buy and sell goods, and between Bayan-Ölgii and Kazakhstan for resettlement
or to visit relatives, offered new pathways for some makers, such as Medixat,

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 FIGURE 7.6. New style Medixat
dombyra, Ölgii city, 2017. Photo by
J. C. Post.

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 with interest in growth of their business and access to materials and ideas. Ac-
cess to new knowledge occurs through technology (such as television) as well,
and musicians and instrument makers have been impacted by the changing
instruments and sounds displayed in both Chinese and Kazakhstan media.

Conclusion
The social lives of Mongolian Kazakh dombyra makers engage them with
family members, neighbors, and musicians, and with the materials they use as
they plan and construct an instrument. As makers continue an artistic practice
learned in their youth, or develop new skills during a career change, dombyra
makers experience growth that occurs before, during, and after each instrument
is made. The instrument also grows and changes in the hands of a musician,
when carried in a procession, or displayed on a wall, and the materials change
their character as they are used during construction and then age during their
lives as a musical instrument. The making and growing process for dombyra
makers in western Mongolia also entangles them with local issues related to re-
source availability, sociopolitical changes that affect economic and social health
and well-being, as well as personal challenges. The process of learning about the
dombyra and its local history from Bayan-Ölgii makers also enabled my own
growth through correspondence with them and their practices (Ingold 2013).
The entanglement of materials, makers’ histories, and local lifeways in western
Mongolia has contributed to the development of specific characteristics found
in each Mongolian Kazakh dombyra made since the early twentieth century. The
Mongolian processes and practices contrast with those in Kazakhstan where
makers can more readily access hardwood, such as maple or even imported
African woods for the soundbox and spruce for the soundboard. Many mak-
ers there are trained in workshops and compete for status in yearly contests,
promoting quality instruments and particular building styles. The Kazakhstani
dombyra in Bayan-Ölgii is inaccessible to all but the economically and musi-
cally privileged residents. In Mongolia, makers’ patterns and practices were
built over time in relationship with life experiences in Xinjiang, Mongolia, and
Kazakhstan. Locally, the instrument and maker grew in the mountains and
steppes of western Mongolia as the Kazakh residents moved seasonally with
their livestock in rural lands, settled in small sums in both Khovd and Bayan-
Ölgii aimags, and contributed to the cultural life of the small city of Ölgii. While
there have been influences from Kazakhstan, makers in Mongolia seldom have
access to formal training. For most, the only wood they can use is softwood
lumber trucked in from another region in Mongolia. They are also not part of
an economic system that allows them time to age wood before beginning the
process of building each dombyra, making the instruments more vulnerable

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 to environmental changes as well. The Kazakhs in Mongolia live in a country
where the Mongol morin khuur is a national icon, and there is no national or
regional system for promoting the Mongolian dombyra. Yet the makers and
materials used for the dombyra are part of an active system to provide an iconic
instrument for a community of Kazakhs eager to continue their local musical
practices in western Mongolia.

Notes
1. Unless otherwise noted, all language references in this chapter are Kazakh.
2. See also Roda (2014) for additional information on the social relations of
instruments and their materials.
3. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
4. Most Kazakhs in Mongolia arrived from China in the nineteenth or early
twentieth century. A small number of Kazakhs also reached Mongolia by way of
the Altai region in Russia. (Soni 2003).
5. In 2015, there were 114,506 Kazakhs in Mongolia, which is 3.9 percent of the
population.
6. For information on these genres in Kazakhstan, see Kendirbaeva (1994) and
Kunanbaeva (2002).
7. An historical collection of dombyra, and other Kazakh instruments, is housed
in the Kazakh Museum of Folk Musical Instruments in Almaty, Kazakhstan.
8. The regions are also associated with two contrasting instrumental playing styles
of küi: tökpe in western Kazakhstan and shertpe in the eastern regions. (Kunanbaeva
2002).
9. Information on dombyra styles in Kazakhstan are repeated in several publica-
tions, including Slobin (1977); Kunanbaeva (2002); Daukeyeva and Nyshanov (2018).
10. Locally made instruments from these makers have not been adopted for use
in the Ölgii theater. Instead, the theater supported the import of instruments and
instrument makers from Kazakhstan that met and maintained Soviet standards set
during the socialist era.
11. Makers report that the wood for ribs should be 2–4 mm thick and for the
soundboard 2–3mm thick.
12. Siberian pine (qaraghai) (Pinus sibirica); Siberian fir (samyrsyn) (Abies si-
birica); Siberian spruce (shyrsha) (Picea obovata); Siberian larch (balqadaghai)
(Larix sibirica).
13. The subject of aging, drying, or soaking wood, common actions for many
luthiers in order to provide stability for the wood, is seldom discussed. Makers in
these remote and economically vulnerable communities say they cannot afford to
add extra time to their processes.
14. I interviewed dombyra makers in Khovd sum in Khovd aimag (2005), and
in Altansogts, Sagsai, Tolbo, and Tsengel sums, at Dayan Lake, and in Ölgii city.
15. I met with Sultanbai just once due to my brief stay in Khovd aimag. My in-

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 terviews with Daniyal occurred only in 2005 because he moved to Kazakhstan in
2006 and passed away in 2007.
16. Khovd aimag population was 88,447 in 2018. In this ethnically diverse prov-
ince, Kazakhs make up 12.2 percent of the population (2015). Khovd sum, close to
the western border of Bayan-Ölgii, with a population of about 3500 residents (2018),
is nearly 100 percent Kazakh (MSIS 2019).
17. These different styles are also sometimes referred to as Zhambyl and Abai
dombyra.
18. Discussions with Sultanbai (b. c. 1955) and members of his community took
place in Khovd sum, Khovd aimag, May 2005.
19. Discussion and interviews with D. Daniyal (1918–2007) took place in Ölgii
city (May-July 2005).
20. Daniyal also carved other objects of interest especially to tourists, including
practical implements used “in the old days” in rural life, he said, such as ladles and
large wooden bowls for milk. These were carved with designs on the outside, and
sometimes painted. In the past, he also carved the outside of some dombyras in the
same way. Daniyal also did some instrument repair work, including repairs to the
bowed qobyz for the theater.
21. Discussions and interviews with Säken Alhan (1961–2021) took place at several
residential sites near Dayan Lake, Bayan-Ölgii, 2005–2018.
22. Säken provided this information and it was confirmed by other long-term
residents at Dayan.
23. The technique for cut paper designs may be linked to a Mongolian paper
cutting tradition, although dombyra makers who use cut paper to embellish their
instruments usually link the practice to Japan rather than Mongolia or China (where
the tradition is well documented).
24. Discussions and interviews with Medixat Khizirkhan (b. 1961) took place at
his home in Ölgii city, Bayan-Ölgii, 2005–2017.

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 PART FOUR

Heritage and
Globalization

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 INTERLUDE

Everything Has
Two Sides
An Interview
ANDREW COLWELL
AND D. TSERENDAVAA

Tserendavaa Dashdorj (b. 1955), a well-traveled khöömiich and state-recog-

nized artist, was searching for his herd of sheep and goats by motorcycle with
me sitting in the passenger seat, holding onto the rack. We were in the vicinity
of his son’s summer encampment (zuslan) and yet the herd was nowhere to be
found. So, he drove us to a nearby hill to take a look around the surrounding
steppes. Like many of the hills in the area, this one also had a sacred rock cairn
(ovoo) at its top. This cairn consisted of a large piece of weathered wood sticking
out of a pile of rocks. However, Tserendavaa had not come to make an offering
to the local deities this time, which is customary at such places. Instead, he sat
down next to the cairn, leaned into it, and scanned the land with his binoculars.
There was a slight breeze, the sky was hazy, and it was cool. There had not
been rain in a while and the winter had been dry so the hills were rocky with
desiccated, leafless plants branching out between cracks. And it was remark-
ably quiet, despite being in the wide open. Even the beating of a crow’s wings a
hundred feet in the air above was clear and sharp.
After no results, Tserendavaa decided to leave the hill and drive us onto the
steppes below. He put the bike into neutral to coast downslope and save gas,
turning on the motor only when we plateaued and began to lose speed.
Before us were the Jargalant-Altai Mountains, rising above everything else,
cutting into the sky. As many locals had said, they emitted a drone (düngenekh)
whenever a storm was building up on the opposite side. The steppes rose and
fell in waves in the distance as we rode into them. Tserendavaa’s flock might
have been just beyond that nearby hill, or another.

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 FIGURE (INTERLUDE) 4.1. Tserendavaa searches for his flock, Chandman’ sum, 2014.
Photo by A. Colwell.

Luckily, it was not long before he spotted them in the distance. We went to
them and then entered into a whole spectrum of sounds: stomping hooves, clash-
ing horns of rival males, child-like yelps, puttering farts, a general cacophony
to my lay ears. The sheep and goats all looked up and around with anticipation
at the arrival of their “master” (ezen).
Tserendavaa told me to get off and help send them along in the direction of
his son’s summer encampment. As he zig-zagged on the far edges of the herd
on motorcycle, I walked behind, waving my hands and screaming “haaa! haaa!”
or throwing stones in the path of any animal that attempted to dart off in a dif-
ferent direction.
Once the herd was on its way home, Tserendavaa came back to pick me up
and we drove to a nearby outcrop.
“This is a good time to talk,” he said, and we sat down on the hard, rocky
earth for an interview (May 9, 2014) I had requested earlier.
I wanted to talk about herders’ usages of sound to call or communicate with
their herds. Tserendavaa was more than obliging and seemed to have a lecture
on sound, pastoralism, and khöömii already prepared. He was quite used to
being interviewed and having foreign researchers stay with him and ended up

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 outlining a range of issues and tensions affecting Mongolian sound worlds in
the midst of global change.
“So,” he began, “herd animals have their own sounds. In general, any living
thing, be it a worm or insect, has its sound. Whether birds, wild animals, or the
five livestock—all living creatures have their own given sounds. For example,
when herds are sent out to pasture in the morning, their sounds are numerous:
hoof sounds; quite fast, fast, quick, quick, rhythmic ‘chir, chur.’ Like this they
quickly tread.
“Around one, three, or four o’clock they return, having eaten, and the herds’
sounds are diminished. Full with grass, lying around, they snort. Their hoof
sounds are few. For example, ‘tur,’ they say, grunting and chewing cud, one can
hear a ‘shir, shir, shir’ sound. A herder watching their herd may say to their
goats, ‘chaa, chaa,’ or ‘khaiya, khaiya, khakhaaiya, khakhaaiya.’ If their herd is
moving faster, faster, it is then made to gather and become calm.
“It is as if they know language. The herds seemingly know their master’s lan-
guage and so they gather, eat, and sit. These sonic feelings (duu aviany medremj)
also lie between herds and people.”
He went on until I eventually interrupted him, recalling how his grandson
once implored me not to whistle before the wind, lest I stir up an angered storm.
So I asked him about the relationship of people, according to pastoral custom:
“One can influence the weather with one’s sounds. When doing khöömii
or whistling from their own true character, and the natural world (baigal’) is
witnessed before one’s eyes, the natural world’s local deities (lus savdag) can
provide and realize one’s wishes—if they desire, dream, and pray from their
true mind-spirit. These are my own thoughts.”
The lecture then took a turn toward the origins of Mongolian “national art,”
which had to do with Tserendavaa’s previous discussion of animal sounds.
“Ok, so each herd animal has a different call, for example, when being coaxed
(avakhuulakh) to accept a rejected offspring. Beginning with a goat . . .”
He began performing some of these calls for me:
“‘Cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg, cheeg . . . ’
‘Zuuzuu uu, zuuzuu uu, zuuzuu uu, zuuzuu uu, zuuzuu . . . ’ Melodizing like this
other beautiful folk melodies, such as beautiful long-songs, were made to sound
(duu avia egshiglekh) as people would melodize (ayalakh) in remarkable ways
following their own thoughts or feelings (setgel) during the activity of calling
animals, making all kinds of melodies with all kinds of methods, techniques,
rhythms and timing. These things are also connected to national art.”
He demonstrated what he meant. For camels, one enunciates in a high, loud
voice: “‘Tooor l’ tooo . . . tor, tor, tor, tor, tor . . .” This spoken call began trans-
forming into a more defined tone with a slight vibrato: “‘Toooo, TOOOR, toooo,

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 khoo, khoo, toooor.” The call shifted down a minor third, then back up, where
it became “a melody,” as was the point of his demonstration.
Such musical shifts from herding call to musical melody, in other words,
exemplified an evolutionary shift from “pastoral technique” to “national art,”
a theory common in Mongolian music research, which was highly influenced
by Soviet and European folkloristics of the nineteenth century. Through such
calling, shouting, whistling, and “melodizing,” Tserendavaa continued, herder
children developed (khögjikh) their voices and herder peoples developed their
signature musical practices, like khöömii or long-song (urtyn duu). Such prac-
tices, correspondingly, could never have evolved among sedentary peoples or
in urban locations:
“The majority of Mongolian nomadic voices are able to sing beautiful long-
songs loudly and calmly. Their vocal melodies are greatly pristine and good.
Among herder peoples such beautiful voices can arise. Why? Because from
two to three kilometers they call out to their herds starting from childhood on,
screaming and making sounds from afar, and so their voices develop from an
early age. This is also a foundation of national art. In contrast, people who live
in buildings with two or three rooms don’t scream or call to their animals on the
streets. Up there, they don’t scream loudly. The people of these sedentary places
speak softly, have few sounds, and think it is bad not to be so. That you must
be pleasant and not sound is a socialist cultured custom (sotsialist soyoltoi zan
uil). And so, in this way the voices of city youth and children are less developed
and worse than country people, as I evaluate from my own research.”
In this way, we arrived at a difficult topic. Tserendavaa fell silent, as he had
done before when discussing the futures of pastoralism in another interview. I
decided not to press him this time. But I was reminded of how the parents of
one wealthy Mongolian child I met discouraged him from sounding his voice
“in weird ways,” as he told me, when he was trying to practice khöömii at home
after I had shown him some basic exercises.
Like Tserendavaa said, sedentary peoples “speak softly, have few sounds, and
think it is bad not to be so.”
And yet Mongolia is increasingly becoming urban as rural residents move
to city centers. Pastoralism is becoming too difficult with increasingly difficult
weather due to climate change. In fact, only one of Tserendavaa’s seven children
had decided to follow suit and live as a herder, the rest having moved to urban
centers to pursue personal livelihoods or professional careers, including two
who had become established khöömiich in their own right.
Later on, during this same research trip, I returned to Tserendavaa’s yurt for
another interview about these difficult topics. This time I asked Tserendavaa
directly about his own thoughts on the radical social, economic, and cultural

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 changes of the last two decades associated with “development” and “globaliza-
tion.” His response was notably pithy:
“Everything has two sides, one good, one bad,” he answered. “Everything in
the universe has two paths. Mongolia is walking towards world development.
And while walking towards world development, world development is entering
Mongolia, opening up all kinds of good and bad paths . . .”

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 CHAPTER 8

Chandman’ and Beyond

Heritage-making of
Mongolian Khöömii
in Past and Present
JOHANNI CURTET

Khorvoogiin altan taizan deer khöömiin egshig n’

uyangalakhaar
Khökh Mongolygoo shuud orlodog Chandman’
(When the melody of khöömii resonates on
the golden stage of the universe Chandman’
becomes Blue Mongol!)
—Extract from Chandman’ nutagtaa örgökh shüleg
(Poem of offering to Chandman’) May 30th 2000,
anonymous (Tsednee 2005:125)

Since the 1990s, khöömii has become one of Mongolia’s most recognized
musical practices performed globally for its distinctive and unusual sound. Its
status as a Mongolian cultural heritage product exists alongside cultural markers
such as yurts, blue skies, green steppes, Chinggis Khan, and nomadic culture.
Yet before the 1950s, few people outside of various small communities in west-
ern or northern Mongolia even knew of the vocal practice. It has taken seventy
years for this transformation to occur and during this time one particular sum
(rural district) called Chandman’ in Khovd aimag (province) became renown
in Mongolia as “the birth-place of khöömii” in light of the significant role of its
community members in popularizing, professionalizing, and promoting the
vocal practice locally, nationally, and internationally.
In this chapter, I address the growth of khöömii in Mongolia from a local to
a national tradition and discuss the specific role that one western Mongolian
community in Chandman’ sum, Khovd aimag, has played in the process. I be-
gin by exploring the musical and performative characteristics of khöömii and

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 introduce some of its practitioners, and then illustrate how khöömii became the
centerpiece of Mongolia’s important cultural heritage through the process of
institutionalization and international recognition during and after the socialist
era. My findings point clearly to the central role that Chandman’ and its com-
munity played in the growing popularity of khöömii in Mongolia and globally.1
At the center of my argument are three phases of institutionalization in Mon-
golia during and after socialism. These forms of institutionalization transformed
everyday events and actions into performance, adjusted practices to meet aca-
demic standards, and engaged with social processes to help recognize artistic
practices as heritage (Parent 2010). During the socialist period, khöömii was
transformed to meet an aesthetic standard for stage performances, including
developing a system of formal transmission process in Mongolian conservato-
ries and universities. In the 2000s, the national implementation of UNESCO’s
Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) further encouraged the Mongolian claim
on khöömii as an important heritage product.
It was serendipitous for Luvsansharav Dagv (1926–2014), a musical profes-
sional and composer in the capital city of Ulaanbaatar, to first meet with a
khöömiich (khöömii performer) from Chandman’ in 1954. Ensuing and sustained
collaborations between herders, musicians, composers, folklorists, officials, and
foreigners were the result of concerted efforts to “develop” a national culture
during socialism and then to “preserve” cultural heritage in the democratic era.
The inscription of khöömii on the Representative List of the ICH of UNESCO in
2010 is only the most recent permutation of an enduring relationship between
pastoral, professional, and official actors, and the role of Chandman’ in shaping
these relationships is significant.
One way of illustrating the importance of Chandman’ in the social and in-
stitutional history of khöömii in Mongolia is revealed through a brief survey of
available recordings of Mongolian khöömii. For example, the first recordings
by Mongolian National Radio in the 1950s and 1960s featured four khöömi-
ichid residing in or visiting Ulaanbaatar from Chandman’, amounting to just
sixteen individual tracks over the span of two decades. But since the 1980s, and
in roughly the same amount of time, there have been more than thirty-one
recordings issued by over eighteen khöömiichid (Curtet 2013). Among these
proliferating numbers of practitioners following the 1950s debut of khöömii
on the stage, a great number of the most influential were, and still are, from
Chandman’. Research associates I have worked with since 2004, both within
and beyond Chandman’, have consistently reinforced this Chandman’-centric
khöömii narrative in conversations, interviews, and at various cultural events.
Accordingly, there is a well-established historical narrative in Mongolian and
Western scholarship that presents these influential khöömiichid from Chandman’
as the engineers of a national musical aesthetic (Badraa 1983; Pegg 1992). How-

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 ever, a more recent body of academic work mostly from Europe and America
(Levin and Süzükei 2006; Curtet 2013; Colwell 2018), and also from Mongolia
(Enebish 2009; Sandagjav 2010), has explored the complications, nuances, and
gaps in the previous dominant narrative. Previously, academics would point to
Chandman’ as the root of one aesthetic in khöömii development. Later scholars
showed how the development of khöömii came from other places and people in
Mongolia, by revealing the diversity and depth of khöömii in Mongolia beyond
Chandman’ sum.
During my own research, for example, I quickly learned about other com-
munities with significant practitioners or communal histories of practicing
khöömii, especially in western Mongolia. Various Mongolic and Turkic peoples
across the Altai-Sayan Mountain region of Inner Asia practice khöömii or in-
terrelated forms of “throat singing.” The practices are found in the republics
of Altai, Khakassia, Tuva, and Bashkortostan in Russia (Pegg 1992); nationally
in Mongolia (Curtet 2013); in northern Xinjiang in China (Mergejikh 1997);
and most recently in Inner Mongolia, Buryatia and Kalmykia (Curtet 2013).
Within Mongolia, there are similarly Turkic and Mongolic peoples with a wide
range of histories, understandings, and practices of khöömii. I further illustrate
the examples of these diverse khöömii practitioners from various locations in
Mongolia in a later section.

What Is Khöömii?
According to legends gathered by researchers in the field, practitioners in
Mongolia developed khöömii out of a desire to imitate the sounds of the wind,
water, and birdsong (Badraa 1983, 1998; Desjacques 1988, 1992; Pegg 1991, 1992;
Kherlen 2010; Curtet 2013). The Mongols have an animistic understanding of
the world that perceives natural phenomenon and some inanimate objects as
imbued with spirit life. These beliefs are expressed in particular through the
arts. As the practice of khöömii is related to the daily life and environment of
nomadic peoples, it conveys a spiritual relationship with them as well. Khöömii
expresses a conception of the Mongol world that uses a stratified vertical and
hierarchical sense of space. We find this, for example, in vertical deer stones,
the Mongolian vertical script (Mongol bichig), and the circular and vertical con-
ceptualization of space in the ger. It also becomes a subtle way for practitioners
to inhabit, play, and interact with this space (see figure 8.1).
In Mongolian, khöömii means “the bottom of the palate” (Tsevel 1966) or
“pharynx” (Desjacques 1992; Hangin 1986; Bawden 1997). It is not referred to
as a type of “singing” (duulakh) but as a way of sounding (duugarakh) the vocal
apparatus (Curtet 2013; Colwell 2018). Grammatically speaking, one may “do
khöömii” (khöömiilökh), but one cannot say they “sing khöömii” (khöömii duu-

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 FIGURE 8.1. Interaction between Mongolian conceptualization of the world and
khöömii, 2020. Diagram by J. Curtet.

lakh). Also, those who do khöömii can be referred to as a khöömiich (literally,

khöömii-er) but they cannot be referred to as a khöömii “singer” (duuchin). This
means that terms from the English translations common in academic literature
or popular discourse like “throat singing” or “overtone singing” diverge signifi-
cantly and fundamentally from Mongolian understandings of the vocal practice,
an issue that several scholars have discussed (Tongeren 1995; Levin and Süzükei
2006; Curtet 2013) and which Colwell (2018) in particular addresses.
Technically, one person doing khöömii intentionally and simultaneously su-
perimposes several layers of sounds with his voice, including two distinct lines,
called suur’ öngö (literally, “basic color,” corresponding to the vocal drone) and
isgeree (literally, “whistling,” corresponding to the melodic line of overtones).
This set of sounds suggests other superimposed colors (davkhar öngö) and
echoes (tsuurai). It is interesting to note that, while the Mongols do not have a
vernacular term for “harmonics,” “overtones,” or “drones,” western descriptive
terminology for these practices places an emphasis on these terms. In fact, the
Mongolian use of terms such as suur’ öngö to refer to “drone,” and isgeree to refer
to “overtone,” might have emerged due to the desire to translate the Western
acoustic terms.
Physiologically speaking, one does khöömii by first contracting the vocal
cords to produce a richer, denser timbre and second by placing the tongue into
particular resonant positions that emphasize the naturally occurring harmonics
of the human voice (Trân Quang 1975; Pegg 1992; Desjacques 1992). The various
styles and techniques of khöömii, accordingly, are variations of this basic use of
the vocal apparatus. Depending on this modulation, the pitch of the drone and
the pressure on the throat, there are many techniques of khöömii, identifiable by
their variations of vocal timbre. Mongolians have traditionally referred to these

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 techniques in metaphoric, rather than acoustic or technical, terms that tie the
style to broader values or understandings of the natural world. For example,
the prominent harmonics of isgeree khöömii (literally translated as “whistle
khöömii”) are not “whistles,” acoustically speaking, but Mongolians refer to
it as such because it resembles a whistling sound. This association ties isgeree
khöömii to various animistic beliefs about the power of whistling to call up—or
even anger—local master-spirits that preside over the natural world. Another
important style is kharkhiraa, a style most foreigners might describe as “guttural,”
although the Mongolian term is an onomatopoeia for various natural sound
sources including waterfalls (khürkhree) and the calls of a certain kind of crane
(Desjacques 1992). Once again, there is a wide gap between non-Mongolian and
Mongolian descriptions for khöömii technique and style.
The connections between technique (isgeree khöömii and kharkhiraa) with
nature through metaphor suggests how important the natural world is to Mon-
golian understandings of khöömii. Mongolian and Tuvan khöömiichid often
refer to practices of learning from or imitating rivers and other natural sound
sources (Desjacques 1988; 1992; Badraa 1998; Pegg 2001; Levin and Süzükei
2006; Curtet 2013). However, many rural practitioners consider the quality of
the natural environment to be a direct influence on the talent of musicians and
singers and it is not uncommon for practitioners to pray to local master-spirits
who preside over a mountain or river and request they receive musical talent
(Colwell 2018).
There is a common understanding among pastoralists throughout Mon-
golia that creativity and artistry emerge from the natural world. For example,
anthropologist Laurent Legrain (2009:98) writes that “in Darhad country [in
northern Mongolia], all the valleys of the liminal belt of steppes are perceived
as the natural cradles of vocal talents.” Several communities in Khovd aimag,
including Khovd’s Chandman’ sum, similarly affirm that local geography located
in the Altai mountain range is the ultimate source of local musical talent. Its
location between two mountains (Jargalant Khairkhan and Bumbat Khairkhan)
and three large lakes (Khar-Us Nuur, Khar Nuur, and Dörgön Nuur) is signifi-
cant for residents in that it helps explain why the sum would have produced so
many gifted khöömiichid over the years.2 Many mothers of these talented people
with whom I have spoken have often said that any child born in this region will
typically have similar facility with this vocal technique.
Two traditional methods of teaching music were highlighted by Carole Pegg.
The first, geriin surguul’ (home school) is where music is passed on by parents
or those around them. The second, nair naadmyn surguul’ (the festival school)
is its transmission by renowned artists during their involvement in the context
of a domestic celebration or an arts festival (2001:256). Including those contexts,
khöömii has always been transmitted orally from generation to generation in

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 many ways. I learned from Chandman’ herders and khöömiichid Darjaa Düger
(1933–2016), Margad Gombotseden (1939–2005), and Shagj Myatav (1939–2010)
that before the 1950s transmission occurred by imitating each other within the
community. There were no specific exercises related to an elaborate pedagogy.
Everyone had to find out for themselves by following the instructions of the
elders: namely, how to take and manage the breath, how to contract the muscles
of the throat and place the tongue in the oral cavity to modulate the overtones,
and more important, how to connect with nature, such as in the mimesis of
the wind, water, and so on. This process is still going on. With the spread of
khöömii through the airwaves since the 1950s, some people learned on their own
from the radio. This includes Erdenekhüü Ayuurzana (b.1957) from Kharkhorin
in central Mongolia, who imitated Zavkhan aimag’s khöömiich Chimeddorj
Gaanjuur (1931–1980). But the vertical teaching between master and apprentice
had started by the end of the 1970s with Chandman’-born khöömiichid Sundui
Dovchin (1938–2003), Sengedorj Nanjid (1948–2020), Davaajav Rentsen (b.1952),
Tserendavaa Dashdorj (b.1954), and Ganbold Taravjav (1957–2011).3 Each teacher
developed his own pedagogy and created the first orally transmitted “schools”
of khöömii in the country.4

Who Practices Khöömii?

In rural western Mongolia, the connection to nature is important. Through
my many journeys in Mongolia, my own learning as a musician with mas-
ters Tserendavaa and Odsüren Baatar (b.1949), and my ongoing involvement
in the lives of these artists through concert tours I have produced in Europe
with my NGO Routes Nomades, I have encountered the inner worlds of many
khöömiichid and then learned about the spiritual aspects of their tradition.
For Sengedorj, to become a good khöömiich you have to practice constantly,
particularly in a special place rich with sounds of nature. For Tserendavaa, a
good khöömiich must be strong, honest, intelligent, respectful of others, and,
if possible, be a good rider and a good wrestler. Khöömiichid agree that the
quality of a khöömii performance can be observed in the choice of timbre,
one’s breathing capacity, the power of the voice, the melodic beauty, and finally,
the performer’s ability to evoke the natural environment (Legrain 2007, 2011).
On the other hand, Odsüren maintains another view of the khöömii tradition,
which I observed in his khöömii class during my scholarship at the University
of Arts and Culture (Soyol Urlagiin Ikh Surguul’) from 2006–2007. For Odsüren,
the attitude of the Mongolian khöömiich during a performance is of particular
importance. In performance, singers must be relaxed, especially in the face. In
fact, nothing should be tense and the khöömii should come from the belly, from
within. He also teaches that one should not show feelings on the face and if one

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 FIGURE 8.2. Herder and khöömii master Davaajav Rentsen during the recording of
the CD An Anthology of Mongolian Khöömii, Chandman’, Khovd aimag, 2015. Photo
by J. Curtet.

of his pupils has the misfortune of showing a grimace, he risks having his lips
pursed or face slapped by the teacher. This teaching method is a persuasive way
to prevent students from adopting “bad habits.” Odsüren considers such habits
to be idiosyncrasies of countryside khöömiich, such as having a red face and
moving the lips all over the place while performing khöömii. Odsüren wanted
to change these habits to “develop” khöömii in order to distinguish it from rural
practices. He believes his method is based on a custom in Mongolia whereby
Mongols observe the outward appearance of children so that they can become
good wrestlers, or that of horses so that they become good steeds.
While collecting data for my PhD thesis between 2007 and 2013, and later
while making field recordings for my CD project An Anthology of Mongolian
Khöömii (Curtet and Nomindari 2017), I gathered the essentials of this vocal
technique in Mongolia from early sound archive to the present day. In the
process, I realized how many khöömii bearers there are in today’s Mongolia.
Indeed, there are many more now than in the 1950s. Since that time, the number
of practitioners has increased, growing slowly at first, until the 1970s, and then
consistently in the twenty-first century. The well-known masters are not always
professionals. For example Tserendavaa and Davaajav in Chandman’ are mainly

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 herders, and the rest of their time is dedicated to teaching or practicing khöömii.
Sengedorj worked in all positions in Khovd’s drama theater, from sweeper and
lighting designer, to actor, singer and khöömiich, and then director.
In Ulaangom city, Uvs aimag, the Bayad master Toivgoo Ejee (b.1957) is
retired from the local theater now, but he worked his whole career as a profes-
sional khöömiich with a civil servant status. He taught dozens of children, some
of whom became internationally well-known khöömiichid, such as Otgonkhüü
Orshikh (b.1974) and Lkhamragchaa Lkhagvasüren. In Tes sum, Uvs aimag,
the Bayad elder and herder Mangaljav Lkhamsüren (b.1943) taught khöömii to
his extended family and local children, as well as to his grandson Baska who is
now a celebrated khöömiich. In Tsengel sum in Bayan-Ölgii aimag, a sole Tuvan
teacher named Papizan Badar (1957–2016) taught local children for many years,
some of whom have become teachers and established performers in their own
right, such as Batsükh Dorj (b.1990). Papizan was an important keeper of Tuvan
traditions, and also a multitalented artist and instrument maker. In Zavkhan,
aimag musicians who contributed to national khöömii history include Chime-
ddorj Gaanjuur (1931–1980), one of the first khöömiich to perform on stage,
and Odsüren, who was the first to teach this vocal technique in a university.
In Bayankhongor aimag as well, Pürev Byakhar (1949–2009) worked as a pro-
fessional khöömiich at the local theater for thirty years. Other khöömiichid of
western Mongolia are known only by the local khöömii community. They are
just herders or work in an office or a shop. They are not teachers, nor do they
appear on stage or in competitions.
Traditionally, it was said that women were not permitted to perform khöömii
because it is believed the practice causes infertility in women (Pegg 1992).
­Tserendavaa and Odsüren are recognized as the first who were open to teach-
ing women. Tserendavaa started with three women in 1982: Bolormaa Begz
(b.1968), Davaasüren Margad (b.1968) and Serjmyadag (b. unknown). He was
very proud that the first emegtei khöömiichid (female khöömii performers) were
from ­Chandman’. Odsüren was Alimaa Gavaa’s (b. unknown) early teacher, and
his student Ösökhjargal Pürevsüren (b.1973) became the first female khöömii
performer abroad; she performed as soloist for Khukh Mongol ensemble in
Ingolstadt, Germany. Later, Odsüren’s khöömii class at the University of Arts and
Culture in Ulaanbaatar hosted several women, such as Undarmaa Altangerel
(b.1986) (see figure 8.3) from Ulaangom, who worked as a soloist in the National
Theater and became an independent artist. Another is Zolzayaa Damba from
­Chandman’, who is now working as a soloist at the theater in Khovd. In 2008,
Toivgoo taught his first two female students: D. Tseveenchimed, a dancer from
his theater company, and D. Bolormaa. While there are timbral differences
between women and men’s practice due to their gender and vocal range, each
one is able to perform the same techniques and styles.

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 FIGURE 8.3. Undarmaa Altangerel during a recording session for the CD An
Anthology of Mongolian Khöömii, Ulaangom, Uvs aimag. Summer, 2015. Photo by
Sh. Nomindari.

In the past forty years, the khöömii training and transmission developed,
spread, and grew each decade, increasingly reinforcing it as a national heritage.
The following section introduces an outline of how khöömii became a national
heritage practice, and a description of the major steps of its institutionaliza-
tion that led it to the contemporary practice of khöömii becoming a national
tradition.

From Steppe to Stage

How did khöömii, transition from a practice performed in pastoral and natu-
ral settings where spiritual connections can still be found to become a practice
for the professional stage in urban settings? The answers, I suggest, revolve
around the transformation of the performance practices during the socialist
period, specifically starting in the 1950s followed by the transmission of the
practices to academic institutions after socialism in the 1990s. This culminated
in the reframing of khöömii as Mongolian national heritage. Khöömii’s institu-
tionalization, according to Pegg (1992), began during the Soviet period, provid-

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 ing post-socialist heritage-making with a preexisting conceptual, political, and
policy foundation.
The general aim of socialist cultural policy in Mongolia was to create a new
national culture that resident pastoralists unfamiliar with socialism would self-
identify with and espouse in everyday and public behavior, values, and social
life through folklorization (Stolpe 2008; Hamayon 1990; Marsh 2009). Musically
speaking, realizing this aim meant selecting specific local practices for “cultural
development” in order to promote them to a level of performance. Once an art
form was professionalized, it could thus be considered “national” according to
standards derived from Soviet cultural policy (Curtet 2013). Professionalism,
in turn, meant the ability to perform appropriately on the stage in concert set-
tings before a seated audience in a concert hall. But by the 1950s, after socialism
had been seeking to create a national culture for almost thirty years (since the
revolution in 1924), cultural elites and official folklorists charged with selecting
practices for cultural development had yet to encounter khöömii, a rare practice
even within its few communities in western and northern Mongolia. Other prac-
tices had already been adapted to the stage at this time, such as performances
on the horsehead fiddle (morin khuur), short-song (bogino duu), and long-song
(urtyn duu) (Yoon 2011).
This situation changed when the composer D. Luvsansharav, then director
of the Musical and Drama Theater of Khovd aimag in Khovd city, happened to
hear khöömii in 1954 during a rehearsal for the approaching Khovd Ten Days
of Art Festival (Arvan khonog urlagiin naadam) to be held in the distant capital
of Ulaanbaatar (Enebish 2009; Sandagjav 2010; Kherlen 2010; Curtet 2013). In
this rehearsal, a young Khalkh5 student and actor from Chandman’ called S.
Tsedee (1924–2004), who had learned khöömii from the brothers Derem and
Chuluun Togooch, approached the composer to demonstrate isgeree khöömii
(Enebish 2009:157). Thoroughly impressed by Tsedee’s khöömii, Luvsansharav
then decided to incorporate it into the finale of his choral arrangement of “Altai
magtaal” (In praise of Altai), whose key motifs he had derived from various
regional versions of the praise-song among epic singers.6 For the composer, the
finale with khöömii resounded as an appropriate climax to follow the praise-
song’s final refrain, a nationalistic ode to the majesty of the Altai Mountains
but also a political salute to prominent politicians at the time from western
Mongolia.7
In 1954 Tsedee became the first to perform solo, unaccompanied khöömii on
stage at the local Khovd theater and then later in Ulaanbaatar. Local authorities
on the Central Party Committee greatly appreciated Luvsansharav’s arrangement
and gave it a certificate of honor (Sandagjav 2010). For this recognition and artis-
tic capacity for the stage, practitioners and scholars would later consider Tsedee
to be the first “professional” khöömiich. Chimeddorj Gaanjuur from Zavkhan

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 aimag became the first to perform khöömii overseas in another arrangement
of the Altai praise-song. He learned the vocal practice from Tsedee and then
from Sundui Dovchin, a Chandman’ native who succeeded Tsedee at the Khovd
theater in the 1960s. In academic histories, these individuals became “pioneers”
of sorts as the first performers to adapt khöömii technique and repertoire for the
professional technical and acoustic demands of the stage (Pegg 1992; Enebish
2009; Curtet 2013).
Later, Sundui began exploring aspects of Western classical music, departing
from indigenous aesthetic values to the degree that he sought to adapt techniques
of bel canto for khöömii performance. As historian Françoise Aubin writes, by
the 1970s this Western vocal technique performed with traditional instruments
was already a success in rural areas (1973). Even Badraa Jamts (1926–1993),
a staunch advocate for traditional culture, proudly wrote how “having opera
singers is one of the important achievements of our socialist musical culture.
It is also our pride of development!” (2005 [1977]:151). As ethnomusicologist
Alain Desjacques (2009) writes, Sundui first demonstrated how virtuosity in
khöömii performance could be instantiated by employing vibrato, a hallmark
of bel canto singing, but never heard in prior recordings of khöömii. Notably,
Desjacques observed that there seems to have been no equivalent to vibrato in
traditional horsehead fiddling or singing, and the technique likely appeared
alongside the introduction of radio and television to the country in the 1960s.
Sundui studied with the voice pedagogue Dorjdagva Jigzav in Ulaanbaatar,
learning during this period the bel canto technique (Colwell 2018). The addition
of vibrato in Dorjdagva’s teaching helped Sundui to stand out from rural folk
artists who did not employ vibrato (Desjacques 2009).8 Vibrato, moreover, was
not only an aesthetic move, but a political means of instantiating progress away
from the rural past and toward a Western ideal of performance (see Chapter 3
in this volume).
Sundui’s example inspired a great number of khöömiich from Chandman’,
such as the previously mentioned Sengedorj Nanjid, Davaajav Rentsen, Tseren-
davaa Dashdorj, and Ganbold Taravjav, to similarly pursue professional paths
in the 1970s. These musicians would go on to receive recognition, in their own
right, and teach their own aesthetic versions of khöömii, which they derived in
great part from what they would begin calling Sundui’s “high” or “fluid” (shin-
gen) style, marking a general Chandman’ aesthetic. Some of these teachers also
created novel styles of their own, such as Tserendavaa’s “combined” (khosmoljin)
khöömii, or expanded the existing limited repertoire of khöömii by creating solo
demonstration pieces, self-accompanied by a fiddle, as T. Ganbold did, and later
with a small ensemble of traditional instruments. The arrangements were written
in Western style, especially in the harmonization of traditional melodies (Curtet
2013).9 By the fall of socialism in 1990, these now established masters would

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 become the first to teach and perform overseas, whereas socialist restrictions
had previously barred Sundui from teaching foreigners (Desjacques, personal
communication).
Such professionalization and innovation, on the other hand, raised concerns
about the continuity and meaning of traditional culture as well, especially among
a growing set of intellectual elites in the capital city during the 1970s. In par-
ticular, the influential composer, politician, and Party member Jantsannorov
Natsag (b.1949), along with the music researcher J. Badraa, began advocating
for traditional culture in his official capacity as Minister of Culture in the 1980s.
They then redirected political orientations toward a more Mongolian than Rus-
sian culture, effectively inviting Mongolian composers to assert their identity
(Marsh 2009).
Despite the proliferating practitioners and innovations discussed earlier,
only one cultural institution in Mongolia, the Khovd Theater, had an officially
designated professional position for a khöömiich. This continued until the 1970s,
when in Ulaanbaatar the National Song and Dance Ensemble officially hired
Sundui, resulting in two such positions. Singers, fiddlers, and dancers, among
others, had numerous official positions in provincial theaters throughout the
country, suggesting how rare khöömii remained for decades before its global-
ization began in the 1990s. While the academic institutionalization of rural
practices like the horsehead fiddle (Marsh 2009) and long-song (Yoon 2011)
started in the 1940s, practitioners began teaching khöömii in universities only
in the 1990s when Badraa, once again, sought to introduce the vocal practice
into higher education.
Through Badraa’s initiative, the National University of Mongolia held a class
in 1992, although the goal was to train researchers more than performers (Kher-
len 2010). It took over a decade before the first class of professional khöömiich
would graduate with a diploma, but from the University of Arts and Culture. In
both cases, the teaching was entrusted to Odsüren, who remained, until 2019,
the sole academic professor of khöömii in Mongolia.10 Unlike khöömiichid from
the Altai region in western Mongolia, as noted previously, Odsüren developed
a pedagogy strongly inspired by Western conservatories and he contributed by
developing the shape of its performance and, generally, standardizing khöömii
at the national level.
Since these first classes, the numbers of his students, many of whom also
learned through kinship networks in rural places like Chandman’, have pro-
liferated greatly. Accordingly, they tend to espouse a generalized aesthetic and
perception of khöömii that reflects Odsüren’s views. And their professionalism
at home for cultural tourism or abroad for concert tours also requires that they
emphasize a Mongolian homogeneity, rather than individual idiosyncrasies, fa-
miliar pedagogies, or communal or regional styles they may have grown up with.

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 FIGURE. 8.4. In the khöömii classroom of B. Odsüren at the University of Arts and
Culture, with Inner Mongolian visiting students, beginners level, 2010. Photo by
J. Curtet.

Current Phase: Heritage-making and

Community Institutions
During the socialist period, the khöömii tradition moved from the mountain
steppe to the stage at a time when Mongolia had little interaction with the non-
Soviet or capitalist world. More recently, the cultural management of khöömii by
the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage project set its development on differ-
ent paths. While the institutional aims of both regimes were equally based upon
the western ideologies of stage performance, professionalism, and institutional-
ized training systems, the transition from socialist cultural management with its
aim of building a new and modern national culture, to democratic-era “cultural
heritage safeguarding” with the aim of preserving “traditional culture” in its
very fluid form, was significant (Tsetsentsolmon 2015). However, ­Nomindari
Shagdarsüren, a specialist in Mongolian intangible cultural heritage, notes how
some pre-socialist laws and legal instruments demonstrated an awareness of
“heritage” with protections for natural elements (2010:16–19).11
More generally, heritagization (in French patrimonialisation) can be under-
stood as “the process by which a supposedly traditional social or cultural fact

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 sees its practice voluntarily relaunched in parallel or at the end of an inven-
tory and a safeguard” (Charles-Dominique 2013). On one hand, the concept is
meant to embrace and promote difference. But on the other hand, as created by
UNESCO, it is Western in origins, meaning, and implementation. The result is a
tension between the promotion of Indigenous culture by framing it as cultural
heritage and the use of foreign frames and values to do this promotion.
Badraa (1998), for example, navigated this tension when promoting khöömii
through various Western frames that he also tried to resignify. For instance, in
the late 1970s, he advocated that the vocal practice be categorized as a form of
“classical art,” following a reconsideration of what “classical” itself means (see
also Curtet 2013; Colwell 2019). He made this argument in the context of social-
ist cultural policy, which officially designated various levels of “development”
of musical practices, European classical music being the most “developed” and
“universal,” and traditional Mongolian music being the least in both regards.
Badraa, however, argued that “classical” referred to the “most select” practice
of any people, regardless of their provenance, which evinces “professionalism”
through the formality of its techniques, technical vocabulary, and difficulty
(Badraa 1998). In this regard, Mongolia had promoted genres such as khöömii
and urtyn duu (long-song) as “classical” practices, thereby influencing their
selection for programming and further development.
Because of such efforts to promote traditional music through foreign frames
and forms of institutional management, the novel concept of heritage (öv) was
not very difficult for Mongolian intellectuals, performers, and officials to latch
onto following the democratic revolution of 1990, which resulted in the quick
development of various new cultural heritage policies (Jargalsaikhan 2007).12
These policies reflected the government’s desire for “development” modeled on
capitalist (no longer Soviet-aligned) countries. As a practice that Badraa and
others had already marked as distinct and important during socialism, khöömii
would soon become a focus of presidential decrees between 2006 and 2014
proclaiming the need to develop the vocal practice (Curtet 2013).13
Post-socialist heritage-making creates various other tensions. The Decree
of the President on the Development of the Art of Khöömei (2006), for example,
was purely political and institutional in nature with little communal input from
practitioners regarding its conceptualization or implementation. Only the head
of the Ulaanbaatar based Mongolian Khöömei Association (Mongol Khöömein
Kholboo) at the time had any influence on or say about the program. To this
degree, such a national program did not reflect key tenets of community par-
ticipation given in the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural
Heritage (UNESCO 2003). Unfortunately, it is quite common generally for states
to implement this convention similarly without communal input and guid-
ance (Foster and Gilman 2015). Another tension lies in how UNESCO-oriented

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 heritage-making in Mongolia had framed khöömii as an endangered musical
tradition in need of safeguarding after successive threats of Sovietization, West-
ernization, urbanization, industrialization, and extraction-based capitalism. And
yet khöömii was promoted and popularized precisely during socialism for the
sake of cultural development and building a national culture (Nomindari 2012).
Many goals of Mongolia’s heritage programming for khöömii have been
achieved over the years. There have been various national and international
festivals at which competition winners won medals; the publication of two
works entirely devoted to khöömii (Kherlen 2010; Sandagjav 2010); the Mon-
golian Khöömei Association’s 2012 release of an album featuring exemplary
khöömiichid from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s (Altan üyeiin ankhdagchid); and,
perhaps most celebrated, the registration of khöömii on the List of the Intangible
Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2010. Yet regarding transmis-
sion, institutional academic instruction has become more and more privileged
as a means for students to learn the practice, receive diplomas, and emerge
with demonstrable professional performance skills that can be featured in con-
servatories, national ensembles, and tourism-oriented concerts. In short, the
emphases on stage performance and institutions has left little tangible support
for rural tradition-bearers who teach khöömii in traditional, pastoral contexts.

Chandman’
In the following case study on Chandman’ sum, Khovd aimag, I explore the
institutional realities of the implementation of heritage-making and how it has
shaped rural khöömii performance, practitioners, and their communities. Some
of my research indicates that post-socialist heritage-making was primarily an
institutional phenomenon with little community input. However, Chandman’
local residents, in response to its development in the twentieth century, have
created their own institutions to reframe khöömii as local cultural heritage. This
observation leads us to Chandman’ sum to see how one rural community with
a tradition of khöömii performance has responded to heritage-making in the
democratic era. Locally organized programs and events reveal how the com-
munity’s leaders and teachers have relied upon local forms of institutionalization
to promote a narrative that Chandman’ is “the birth-place of khöömii” in light of
how its native-born khöömiichid have consistently been featured in the history
of khöömii’s cultural development during and after socialism. The best example
of these efforts is the construction of a local “Khöömii Palace” in 2009–2010 in
the center of the sum using provincial and national funding (see figure 8.5).
The palace is just across from the local elementary and high school, which
is named after D. Sundui, the local and national khöömii hero. The school also
has a classroom that the director, Sundui’s little brother Myagmarjav Dovchin,

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 FIGURE 8.5. The “Stone” of Khöömii, Facing Jargalant Khairkhan (also
known as Jargalant Altai), Chandman’, Khovd aimag, 2010. Photo by
J. Curtet.

dedicated to khöömii by decorating its walls with photos and documents de-
tailing the lives of famous local khöömiichid and various important feats they
accomplished, such as Tsedee’s first performance on the stage. While local teach-
ers have traditionally taught in their homes or when out herding, Tserendavaa
and Davaajav have adjusted their practices by teaching at this palace and at the
school. It is not uncommon to hear a mother saying that at the school, any child
can have the gift of khöömii.

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 N. Sengedorj’s khöömii students learning epic singing (with tovshuur
FIGURE 8.6.
accompaniment) in Duut’s school, Khovd aimag, 2010. Photo by J. Curtet.

Local leaders and organizers have also “registered” khöömii as cultural heri-
tage in other ways. For example, when I began studying with Tserendavaa he
took me to a stone by a waterfall high up in the nearby Jargalant Khairkhan
(see figure 8.5), which has the following inscription on it:
A melody unequalled in the world / Delkhiid khosgüi egshiglen
Khöömii originates in these waters / Khöömii ene usnaas ekhleltei

Whether or not one can verify these origins, the stone bears witness to a broader
communal effort to maintain khöömii’s national and international prominence
through programming, architecture, and monuments. The notion of ICH was
built initially upon the notion of “tangible heritage,” and this example shows
how it is important for people to refer to something tangible when they need
to express the intangible.
This heritage-making in Mongolia, as mentioned earlier, consists primarily of
institutional policy, programming, and implementation with little community
input, Chandman’ locals have done their own heritage-making through local
institutions and creative acts as well. In both cases, heritage-making also reflects
local or governmental projects to promote perceptions that khöömii originates
in Mongolia or, more specifically, in Chandman’.

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 FIGURE 8.7. Papizan Badar and Batsükh Dorj during the field work of An Anthology
of Mongolian Khöömii project, Tsengel sum, Bayan-Ölgii aimag, 2015. Photo by
J. Curtet.

Chandman’ sum has vested political and economic interests in maintaining

its position as “the homeland of khöömii.” For example, local teachers have
been invited to neighboring sums to teach the vocal practice to local students,
providing an additional source of income. While Chandman’ demographics are
primarily Khalkh, neighboring sums where these teachers travel are populated
by ethnic groups, including Zakhchin and Altai Uriankhai. This is particularly
notable because these ethnic groups used to have prominent khöömiich of their
own, according to fieldwork and archive material (Curtet 2013). But when I asked
Altai Uriankhai students of Sengendorj (see figure 8.6), a renowned khöömiich
and teacher from Chandman’, in Duut sum about their reasons for learning
khöömii, they gave the following responses:14
“Khöömii is one of our national arts.” Ankhbayar Nanzaddorj (b.1994)
“Khöömii is a national art recognized by UNESCO in the name of Mongolia.”
Baljinnyam Bataa (b.1998)
“Khöömii comes from our Mongolia, it’s Mongolian national music.” Amar-
bold Enkhsaikhan (b.1997)

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 These statements suggest that these students are motivated to learn the vocal
practice because of national sentiment, in contrast to local sentiment derived
from local khöömii practices and heritage in Duut sum specifically.

Conclusion
Khöömii in Mongolia today emerged in the 1950s with the first steps toward
professionalization, followed by the considerable contribution of Sundui’s vi-
brato in the local and national khöömii aesthetic, then the creation of new
pedagogies spread broadly, and finally the use of tangible elements to express
a claim to ownership. Chandman’ played a role at every stage of the heritage-
making process of khöömii, as it was acknowledged as national heritage then
international ICH. While looking at the definition of the vocal technique and
presenting those who are its bearers, I have highlighted the diversity of its prac-
tice, so that we can understand the heritagization as a multifaceted process that
started in Chandman’ but spread then in many other directions.
With these perspectives in mind, It might be worthwhile asking: what does
heritage-making mean from the inside and outside? The Convention for the
Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (UNESCO 2003), aims to protect
the existing traditions and, as Khaznadar (2009) says, to ​​maintain traditions
over time. In fact, the transmission process is at the heart of the heritage-making
project of intangible cultures, which is shown in Article 14 of the Convention
(UNESCO 2003). Noriko Aikawa-Faure (2011), one of the founders of the Con-
vention, explained that their document calls for the respect of authenticity in
the transmission processes. The UNESCO heritage issue is a political project
in which people make choices that are necessarily oriented and influenced by
international foreign policy. As Luc Charles-Dominique explains (2013:84), “at
the level of a community, a region or a state, heritage policies are part and parcel
of identity strategies.” Khöömii, of course, is a tradition shared by peoples divided
by colonial borders, including Tuva, Altai, and Khakassia (Russia), western and
northern Mongolia, and Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia (China). It makes sense
that governmental heritage-making focused on khöömii has resulted in regional
tensions, following China’s inscription of khöömii as a UNESCO ICH in 2009.
To this degree, heritage-making has created novel forms of cultural conflict for
national governments (Nomindari and Curtet 2015; Curtet 2021; Colwell 2018).
At stake in these debates are the cultural and economic capital that registration
engenders in the form of medals, recognition, and tourism opportunities.
The stakes of heritage-making are also international in economic scope. For
example, Inner Mongolian music students especially in Hohhot (China) are
increasingly studying traditional Mongolian music in the pursuit of professional

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 careers in the world music industry or in ethnic minority ensembles. Without
any local teachers of khöömii, these students have been learning from teachers
coming from Mongolia since the 1990s, but more recently from Tuvan teach-
ers as well. As Tsenrendavaa’s son and khöömiich Tsogtgerel told me in 2013,
their lessons now constitute a significant source of income as some of them
now travel annually to Inner Mongolia to teach. The impacts of institutionally
driven heritage-making have most likely expanded the economic opportunities
for teachers, in this sense.
If some ethnic groups turn to the Khalkh to learn, the fact that the practices of
Tsengel Tuvans were mentioned in the Mongolian dossier presented to UNESCO
(2010) opened doors for them in their recognition in Mongolia. But aside from
the case of Papizan and his protege Batsükh (see figure 8.7), who performed
at the Grand Folk Arts Festival in Ulaanbaatar in 2011, it seems that few of the
unestablished khöömiichid have benefited from their inclusion or recognition
in heritage programming.
Nowadays, becoming a khöömiich can give rise to national and sometimes
international recognition. The one who learns better than the others is no longer
seen as a herder capable of khöömiilökh, but directly as a khöömiich, usually
qualified as a professional. The Mongolian language makes the distinction be-
tween a “professional khöömii performer” (mergejliin khöömiich) and a “popular
talent” (ardyn av’yaastan). The latter category is equivalent to the status of ama-
teur. Quite often in my field, as I trace the links from teacher to student, I have
noticed that the ardyn av’yaastan have once been the role models for practicing
professionals today. The teaching of Mongolian oral music in institutions and
the fixing of repertoires by writing (recording or arrangements and composi-
tions) have only widened the gap between the generations.
For khöömii, this differentiation came to its peak with the successive open-
ing of khöömii classes at the university in Ulaanbaatar. Due to the kinds of
distinctions between professional and amateur brought about by the univer-
sity training system that has produced a young generation who are focused
toward technicality and virtuosity, khöömiichid herders point to their inability
to read music theory as a reasoning for not considering themselves to be good
khöömiichid. The link between school and professionalization of the form as
performance is important in their mind. However, these rural khöömiichid know
much more about khöömii that is not transmitted in the city. The embodiment
of the natural spaces that they carry within them certainly has greater force in
their performances than knowing how to perform khöömii renditions of O sole
mio by Eduardo Di Capua, or an extract from Carmen by Georges Bizet.
For the young generation, there are many models. Some prefer to turn to
the model of the lyrical prowess of a Pavarotti, which many audiences enjoy.
Others look for new influences such as the trendy ethno-rock that started with

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 the band Altan Urag and has become internationally recognized with the recent
world phenomenon The Hu (see Chapters 5 and 10 in this volume). Legrain
suggests that domestic artists’ primary aesthetic criteria is often linked to feel-
ings of nostalgia for the native country (2011:86,458). Here, the significance of
khöömii is not the same as one moves from the countryside to the city, although
the latter now tends to set the tone and pace across the country, leaving the
nomadic heritage itself and its relationships to nature as the responsibility of
local practitioners and heritage institutions in places such as Chandman’.

Notes
1. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
2. This would be a typical tendency of Mongolian musicians to make their birth-
place the cradle of their musical or artistic specialty. In the Uriankhai sums of Duut
and Mönkhkhairkhan, for example, the interpreters of epic tuul’ and tsuur flute also
emerged from these mountainous areas of the Altai.
3. Ganbold is the uncle of Egschiglen ensemble’s khöömiich Amartüvshin Baas-
andorj.
4. For more information about the diversity of teaching khöömii in Mongolia,
see Curtet 2013.
5. The majority ethnic group in Mongolia.
6. To listen to this recording, see Curtet and Nomindari (2017), An Anthology of
Mongolian Khöömii, CD-1 track 15.
7. This is a direct quote from Luvsansharav recorded on April 9, 2011 at his home
in Ulaanbaatar. See the complete score in Curtet (2013:460–467).
8. Listen to Sundui accompanied by a morin khuur fiddle in Curtet and Nomi-
ndari (2017), op.cit., CD-1 track 17.
9. Listen to T. Ganbold accompanied by yatga and yochin zithers in Curtet and
Nomindari (2017), op.cit., CD-1 track 22.
10. Before this period Odsüren also taught as a guest at universities in Inner
Mongolia (China) and Buryatia (Russia).
11. Chinggis Khaan’s Ikh zasag (Great Power, thirteenth century, date unknown)
and Khalkh juram khuul’ (1709, Law “Khalkh Rule”); or the protection of the tangible
heritage under the Soviet period, such as Sudar Bichgiin khüreelengiin dürem (Regu-
lation of the Institute of Letters, 1921), Ardyn Zasgiin Gazryn 32 dugaar togtool-Ekh
orny tüükhend kholbogdokh dursgalt züilsiig khamgaalakh tukhai düren (Ordinance
No. 32 of Government of the People-Regulations on the Protection of the Historical
Remains of the Fatherland, 1942), BNMAU-yn soyolyn dursgalt züiliig khamgaal-
akh khuul’ (Law of the Mongolian People’s Republic on the Protection of Cultural
Remains, 1970).
12. Mongol ulsyn ündsen khuul’ (Constitution of Mongolia, 1992) ; Mongol ulsyn
töröös barimtlakh soyolyn bodlogo (State Strategy on Culture, 1996); Soyolyn tukhai
khuul’ (Loi sur la Culture, 1996); Soyolyn öviig khamgaalakh tukhai khuul’ (Law

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 on the Protection of Cultural Heritage, 2001); Soyolyn biet bus öviig khamgaalakh
tukhai UNESCO-giin 2003 ony Konventsid negden orokh tukhai khuul’ (Ratification
of the 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural
Heritage, 2005).
13. Mongol ulsyn yerönkhiilögchiin Mongol khöömiin urlagiig khögjüülekh tukhai
zarlig (Decree of the President on the development of the art of khöömii, 2006);
Mongol Khöömii ündesnii khötölbör (National program Mongol Khöömii, 2008–
2014). which includes the project of nomination of khöömii to UNESCO’s Repre-
sentative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
14. Testimonies recorded at Duut on September 14, 2010.

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 CHAPTER 9

Mongolian Music,
Globalization,
and Nomadism
ANDREW COLWELL

This chapter addresses the historical and contemporary relationships of

Mongolian musical performers to globalization, a process and discourse that
has figured deeply into Mongolian sound worlds as well as ethnomusicologi-
cal research. In Mongolia, scholars, policy makers, and performers refer to
globalization as dayaarshil, or sometimes globalagchlal. Both terms are direct
translations of a notion that probably entered the Mongolian language in the
1990s, after the fall of socialism in 1992, when the country transitioned from
authoritarian socialism to free-market democracy. As foreign companies began
doing business in Mongolia, musicians and genres began circulating openly into
and out of Mongolia as well, resulting in the formation of new rock, pop, or hip-
hop scenes, expatriate bands catering to foreign listeners, and cultural tourism
focused on nomadic culture. It was around this same time that ethnomusicolo-
gists began seeking novel ways of comprehending the burgeoning global picture
in response to similar drastic social, cultural, economic, and political changes
occurring around the world. These attempts generally fell into two categories,
as Martin Stokes (2004) surveyed: sweeping theories of the prevailing capital-
ist world system (Erlmann 1999; Jameson 1991) and cautious depictions of the
emerging transformations (Slobin 1993; Appadurai 1996). Yet both categories
emphasized the hegemony of capitalism, worldwide economic interdependency,
the commodification of difference in all its forms, rapid cultural change es-
pecially in the form of migration and circulation, and the resulting threats to
traditional, “folk,” or Indigenous culture throughout the world.
Nevertheless, after two decades of transition and scholarship, globalization
has revealed itself to be a complicated subject of which no single perspective

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 can take full account, even as global changes continue to shape Mongolian life,
music, and scholarship. For such reasons, following the work of scholars such
as Anna Tsing (2005), James Clifford (2013:6) conceives of globalization as “a
name for the evolving world of connections we know, but can’t adequately
represent” in contrast to invoking an immanent “foreign,” “neoliberal,” and
“capitalist world system.” My conversation with Tserendavaa (see Interlude 4
in this volume) would suggest that such caution to the worldly connections of
Mongolian musical performers, whether professional musicians, urban youth, or
talented herders, is appropriate. As ethnomusicologist Bob White (2012:4) rec-
ommends, scholars of music should “focus on what globalization does or, more
precisely, what people do with globalization, rather than fretting over theories
or definitions.” And so, this chapter provides perspective on the evolving world
of connections—and worldly connections—of Mongolian musicians. It asks
how these connections developed in the recent or far off past, what they mean
in the entangled global present, and what they suggest about the burgeoning
futures of Mongolian music in the midst of global change.
Such worldly connections, most notably, have raised questions over what
Theodore Levin refers to as “the future of the past” (2016:ix), a widespread
concern among cultural producers throughout Inner Asia over the integrity
and meaning of cultural heritage in the midst of commercialism, social change,
political exigency, and environmental degradation germane to globalization.
Mongolian responses to these questions appear to be strategic and evolving,
whether in southern Germany or among the Altai Mountains of western Mon-
golia. While taking advantage of dayaarshil’s various promises or benefits, many
performers also seek the maintenance of salient values like yazguur, a post-
colonial notion that fuses the socialistic onus to sound “original, distinct from
others” with veneration for “place of origin, birth” (Colwell 2019). Returning to
Tserendavaa’s reference to the “good” and “bad” paths of “world development”
in the interlude, economic opportunity is among the “good” paths. And among
the “bad” is the feared demise of yazguur as younger performers increasingly
learn practices of pastoral origin, like khöömii (throat-singing), in urban places.
In the opinion of many elder performers and scholars, they thereby forego the
sounds and sentiments of baigal’ (nature, existence) and the pastoral aesthetic
it engenders.
Whatever dayaarshil entails, this chapter emphasizes that it is a pivotal and
evolving moment of drastic change that Mongolians have engaged during a
number of innovative, creative, and customary projects and movements since
even before the rise of the Mongolian term for globalization, as I discuss in the
following section. Following this discussion of what globalization itself means in
Mongolia, I discuss how Mongolian musicians have created worldly connections
for Mongolian music during and after socialism, when participating in gov-

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 ernment cultural delegations during socialism, or when forming independent
bands with the transition to democracy. Khöömii (throat-singing, also overtone
singing) features prominently among these delegations and bands as a central
means of re-creating and representing Mongolness to the Mongolian nation as
much as the international world. As the editors of one world music textbook
write, “It is ‘overtone singing’ that has brought Mongolian music to world atten-
tion” (Miller and Shahriari 2012:214). Of course, one could seek to understand
globalization in Mongolia from many other sonic or musical perspectives. But
these circulations of Mongol musicians, in particular, vividly reminds us to avoid
simple oppositions between the global and the local, modernity and tradition,
foreignness and Mongolness, innovative change and traditional loss when trying
to understand the global futures of Mongolian music.1

Globalization and Globalism

Globalization is not only a process, but also a discourse. As a process, it is
typically associated with capitalist production and economic interdependency,
and their corresponding social or political effects. But as an idea, it has also
been leveraged to promote neoliberal or Euro-American interests at home and
beyond. For these reasons, some scholars take care to distinguish “globaliza-
tion,” the process entangling disparate peoples and places through mutual and
capitalistic economic dependency, from “globalism,” the discourse of promoting
capitalism to serve neoliberal or Eurocentric agendas.2 In this light, it can cer-
tainly be said that globalism took root in Mongolia alongside the drastic changes
of transitioning to a free-market democracy in the early 1990s. But in the case
of globalization, there are important socialist and pre-socialist precedents that
have long shaped not only the societies and economy of Mongolia, but also the
culture and music of Mongol peoples. Most importantly, these precedents chal-
lenge perceptions that Mongolian musical culture arose from an untouched,
purely nomadic, and insular traditional society that is now suddenly facing the
external, foreign threats of globalization.
To begin with, world-systems scholars, in fact, debate when and where glo-
balization first started taking place. André Frank and Barry Gills (1993), for
example, note that trade across long distances and capital accumulation (both
typified hallmarks of globalization) have existed for at least 5,000 years while
Janet Abu-Lughod (1989) stresses its advent in Eurasian societies before the
age of European hegemony starting around 1500 C.E. Christopher Beckwith,
meanwhile, considers the role of Inner Asian and especially Mongol empires
in shaping trade and capital accumulation well before 1500 C.E. (2009). A host
of other scholars have also sought to rethink, or rather finally acknowledge, the
central role of Mongol peoples in engendering globalization itself (Weatherford

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 2004). The resulting connections and changes of this historical globalization
and empire still resonate today in the shared sounds, sentiments, and musical
practices of Eurasia’s historically sedentary and nomadic peoples. Lutes, fiddles,
and oral traditions like epic singing, which were reframed in the twentieth cen-
tury as national icons by Soviet socialist governments or as unique examples
of cultural heritage by international organizations like UNESCO, demonstrate
these long-standing regional interconnections in their construction, aesthetic
values, and associated meanings.3
Globalism, on the other hand, is more circumspect in its account of worldly
interconnection. Globalist narratives typically suggest that globalization began
with the advent of European capitalism, industrialization, and democracy in
the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Western Europeans, accordingly, then
exported these modes of production and governance to “the rest of the world,”
resulting in a global increase in living standards and food production that alter-
native modes of production (such as socialism, agrarianism, hunter-gathering,
or pastoralism) cannot achieve.4 The fall of the Soviet Union, in particular, led
many scholars to portray globalization as an inevitable, and even “natural,”
historical force with European origins that would eventually sweep up the rest
of humanity (Fukuyama 1992). The ensuing adoption of free market economy
and democracy throughout most of the world seemed, for many, to evidence a
corresponding argument that “opening up” to the capitalist world necessitates
leaving behind pastoralism in order “to catch up” in terms of “development.” The
most renowned exponent of this view is former Mongolian president Enkhbayar
Nyambar (2005–2009). As he is famously quoted when discussing his perspec-
tive on the question of national development, “It is not my desire to destroy
the original Mongolian identity but in order to survive we have to stop being
nomads.” (Murphy 2001:30). Many similar narratives of opposition between
modernity and tradition, capitalism and pastoralism, the future and the past,
continue to discuss globalization as an inevitable outcome, as the one and only
way in which modern societies around the world can organize their economies
(Campi 2006).
However, there is no inherent opposition between economic, social, cul-
tural, or political systems like pastoralism and capitalism. As anthropologists
Caroline Humphrey and David Sneath stress, pastoralism “is compatible with
many different social and economic systems, including technologically advanced
and market-oriented ones” (1999:3). Instead, it is adherents of ideologies like
globalism or modernism that promote perceptions that pastoralism has no
future in “the modern world.” As with the desire to distinguish globalization
from globalism, some scholars respond to this problem by distinguishing pas-
toral lifeways from the discourse of stereotyping pastoralists by reserving the

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 term “nomadism.” Nomadism, in their usage, refers to the Inner Asian variant
of Orientalism that portrays pastoral peoples as “wanderers,” “barbarians,” or
“peaceful wild-people” (Said 1978; Sneath 2007; Orhon 2011). Pastoralism refers
to the lifeway of herders who practice transhumance and are highly mobile. I
have found it very useful to take up this distinction when writing about Mon-
golian music, although important to note is that many scholars also use these
two words interchangeably when referring to either the discourse or the lifeway.
In the performance of Mongolian traditional music, a similar dynamic between
the discourse of nomadism and pastoral lifeways plays out. Many musicians
must address a tension between urban economic livelihoods centered around
representing a nomadic Mongolia and the original aesthetic of yazguur that
privileges pastoral relations with baigal’.
In any case, it is globalism—not socio-economic reality or culture itself—that
presumes globalization to be an all or nothing at all conflict between one way
of life and another. More recent scholarship, accordingly, has sought to com-
plicate the Eurocentric simplicity of globalism by lending due attention to the
role of non-European peoples in coproducing globalization. It also draws more
attention to the severe ecological and climactic impacts of global capitalism that
are undermining living standards (especially of lower income, non-European
peoples) and to the loss of traditional knowledge, practices, and lifeways as
societies or peoples integrate, often by force, with the global economy.5 Ac-
cordingly, Mongolian music reveals a long and complicated range of worldly
connections both on the steppe and on the stage.
Globalization, in this light, is a conflicted process that is entangling disparate
worldviews and social worlds, engendering debates and discussions about the
future and meaning of what makes music “Mongol.” On one hand, global integra-
tion promises access to foreign world music markets for professionally trained
musicians and, for rural herders more often without professional backgrounds, a
degree of access to cultural tourists interested in pastoralism. On the other, such
access is concomitant with larger social transformations, such as mining, urban-
ization, and government economic policy that contribute to the undermining
of pastoralism as a viable lifeway across Mongolia. Today, many bands profes-
sionally trained in the performance of traditional or national music incorporate
novel genres (such as heavy metal or alternative rock) and instruments (such
as the guitar or djembe) while some rural herders pursue their own stake in the
cultural tourism market as entrepreneurs by networking with tourists directly
or through tourism companies. On television or in the yurt, scholars, elders,
musicians, and publics continue to debate what “Mongol music” should or could
sound like if it is to reflect pastoralism, history, and traditional values alongside
Mongolia’s long history of engendering and pursuing worldly connection.

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 Soviet Internationalism and
“Cultural Development”
Both domestic and foreign listeners tend to regard traditional music as among
the most nomadic, ancient, and original of Mongolian expressions. For example,
on April 30, 2015, many Mongolians were excited to learn that the band Khu-
sugtun had qualified for the final stage of Asia’s Got Talent. Many supporters
had been spreading the news and had concerted their efforts to get the vote out
in favor of Khusugtun. While the band’s first performance in episode two had
been a success for the judges, it was the fans alone who could vote them into
the top nine. The effort worked and was widely reported and commented upon
in Mongolian newspapers, television, and social media. As one commenter
stated just days before the finale in the comments to a news article in the UB
Post, “You are almost a world band.”6 As for the members, they seemed to be
fulfilling their raison d’etre. As they describe themselves on their website,
We are a group of Mongolian folk musicians with the objective of bringing
Traditional Mongolian music to the world. We are inspired by our nomadic
ancestry and by our historic civilization. In addition to the traditional instru-
ments of our group, we also incorporate the breath taking throat singing of
our forefathers. We hope you can feel the passion and pride in our music as
strongly as we do. We are KHUSUGTUN . . . conveyors of the Mongolian
nomadic culture.7

After hearing the band perform “a traditional Mongolian musical piece, initially
starting with bird chirps and a few instruments,” one Mongolian journalist wrote
(B.Tungalog 2015), the celebrity judges then gave highly positive remarks and
the band eventually secured second place, a remarkable feat.
There is indeed compelling evidence to suggest that various Turkic and Mon-
golic peoples of Inner Asia have long practiced instrumental or vocal practices
like those that Khusugtun presents for millennia, possibly in relation to animis-
tic and pastoral customs and lifeways. At the same time, a significant amount
of archival evidence, oral testimonies, and scholarship show how traditional
Mongolian musicians continuously transform these practices in relationship
to contemporary lifeways, economics, and politics. For example, when socialist
cultural policy began implementing musical educational programs to profes-
sionalize Mongolian musicians in the 1950s, khöömiich (throat-singers) began
experimenting with novel formats, aesthetics, and settings in order to reflect a
socialist professional aesthetic, radically transforming the techniques and mean-
ings of the vocal practice in the process. These socialist-era transformations then
became foundations for the performance of traditional musics and dance forms

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 on the stage, lasting into the democratic-era and influencing performers like
Khusugtun to this day.8 It was no different in the case of many other practices,
such as the horse fiddle (morin khuur), which gained its f-holes through the
collaborations of Soviet and Mongolian luthiers (Marsh 2009). These performa-
tive transformations stemmed in no insignificant part from the creative drive of
talented musicians, who were genuinely interested in the unfamiliar possibilities
of professional stage performance. But the authoritarian Mongolian People’s
Republic (MPR), a satellite state to the Soviet Union, and its socialist policies
of “cultural development,” national distinction, and international recognition,
first set these transformations into motion (Pegg 2001; Marsh 2009).
During the 1950s, in particular, the Soviet Union sought to forge interna-
tional relationships after decades of isolationism under Stalin’s leadership in a
bid to compete with the United States for allies in the so-called Third World
and to promote its own version of modernity. As Tobias Rupprecht (2015:3)
writes, “Internationalism was not only an empty political catchphrase, but an
ideal that many soviet scholars, intellectuals, cultural figures, political decision
makers and, through the consumption of internationalist cultural products,
ordinary citizens actually subscribed to.” Following historians Tom Ginsburg
(1999) and echoing Chatterjee (1989), ethnomusicologist Peter Marsh (2009:99)
discusses how Mongolian elites “cultivated close relationships with their Soviet
counterparts as a calculated political strategy, like those among other colonized
peoples in history, i.e., learning to use the tools of power colonialists held in
order to claim a degree of control over themselves.” Accomplishing this goal
required, in part, the international promotion of socialism as a viable, inclusive,
and alternative world order to the emerging democratic capitalism of western
Europe and the United States. And one way to do so was by organizing large,
televised cultural festivals with Soviet-aligned nations, like Mongolia (a satellite
state) or Cuba (a fellow socialist nation).
In this vein, the MPR regularly included select professional musicians in cul-
tural delegations that traveled overseas annually to promote national culture at
the World Youth Festivals, national competitions, or other cultural events. This
international effort started in the 1950s, in tow with the Soviet Union’s policy
of internationalism, and was accompanied by a domestic effort to identify and
professionally train rural talents at newly built district, provincial, and national
musical institutions. Following the lead of the Soviet Composer’s Union and
official Soviet folklorists sent to document and “develop” Mongolian folk music
(Smirnov 1975), Mongolian composers and musicians, both amateur and profes-
sional, were then tasked with creating a “national culture” to announce the young
Mongolian socialist nation on not just any “stage” (taiz), but “the world stage”
(tavtsan), a notion for which Khalkh Mongolian reserves a distinct term. They

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 did so by adapting traditional practices or genres to the acoustic and aesthetic
demands of the stage, long before the commercial adjustments of post-socialist
musicians to cultural tourism and concert touring.9
The performative results were radically transformative, especially in the case
of khöömii. For example, the music scholar Jamts Badraa (1998:47), who played
a direct role in cultural policy at the time, writes in retrospect of how the vo-
cal practice was not yet “developed” before the 1950s. For him, this meant that
khöömiich did not yet perform recognized folk song melodies, which for gov-
ernment cultural policy of the time especially instantiated “national culture,”
echoing an emphasis placed on promoting folk music throughout the Soviet
Union (Levin 1996; Olson 2004). Instead, interviews, archival recordings, and
scholarship suggest that Mongol khöömiich performed a small set of “tunes,”
such as “The Melody of the River Eev,” or mimetic improvisations in informal
settings, such as when herding alone or in communal gatherings. As Curtet
details in this volume (see Chapter 8), this situation changed in the 1950s with
the first performances of khöömii on stage, the first through-composed ar-
rangements that included khöömii performance, and the creative explorations
of Chimeddorj Gaanjuur, who first learned how to perform folk song melodies
with khöömii. It was through these first encounters, seminal concerts, and aes-
thetic transformations that khöömii first registered under socialism’s cultural
radar as “national culture” for Mongolian intellectuals, elites, music researchers,
and publics in the capital and beyond.
As is well detailed in the literature and interviews, Chimeddorj was first to
introduce khöömii to “the world” when participating in cultural delegation tours
to Europe and East Asia, including the Fifth World Youth Festival in Warsaw,
Poland, in 1955. Of the 134 Mongolian participants (Krzywicki 2009:305), just
one was a khöömiich, the rest being singers, dancers, athletes, intellectuals, and
politicians. Rare black and white footage of this seminal performance reveals
one of the first times that Mongol khöömii “opened up to the world,” this time
in the auditorium of the Palace of Culture and Science. Members of cultural
delegations from other countries sit in the myriad rows, which extend upward
into the indoor distances of the auditorium. We then cut to a close-up of the
folk choir, a popular Soviet-era musical genre (Smith 1997; Olson 2004), this
time with the composer Damdinsüren Bileg conducting. The camera pans from
left to right to highlight the upright qualities of the singers as stand-ins for the
Mongolian people, women in front and men in the back. After several minutes
of an upbeat, march-like performance, the conductor eventually seems to nod
at a member of the choir, and the other singers fade into a low hum. A metallic
whistle sounds at a fifth above the choral arrangement’s tonic, and then flutters
down and resolves. The camera cuts to the folk choir again, except now a man is
standing out in front. It is Chimeddorj. His hands are behind his back. His lips

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 are pursed and motionless, despite emitting a wide range of pitches along with a
drone. He repeats the same phrase as the choral voices continue to hum. We cut
once more to the lofty ceiling and farthest seating of the auditorium. The camera
seems to suggest that the sound is “up there,” too, reaching the international
world. But then the scene cuts abruptly to the end of the choral performance.
The choir bows in unison twice as the audience roars with applause.
The state-honored singer, Zangad, who performed at this festival, preserved
and kindly shared the program for this concert. While the Polish-language
program does not mention khöömii at all, it does provide insight into the sig-
nificance of the first worldly connection of Mongolian khöömii under socialism.
The following brief description and lyrics are given for “Pochwala Altaju” (Altai
Praise-song):
“ALTAI PRAISE-SONG”
An old Mongolian song about the mighty Altai Mountains of the MPR
From their eternally snow-capped peaks
The meadowy and forested slopes
Beautiful and generous
Ever mighty
Flowing Altai
Famous Altai
Abundant Altai10

The language of the program’s introduction is explicit and didactic: “The youth,”
who are “democratic,” we are told, are already invested in “a global fight,” as are
“all people of good will,” for a “better future, for peace, and friendship.” We are
told that the festival itself is a “review of the power of the youth of the whole
world.” The program continues by indicating how the festival’s performers,
each representing their “nationality,” in its specifically Soviet sense (see Hirsch
2005), demonstrate this “good will” and worldly engagement via the presenta-
tion of their respective musical performances. But it is important to recall the
state-honored horse fiddler Batchuluun Tsend here, who said in an interview
with the linguist Saruul-Erdene Myagmar, “If you didn’t sing like Norovbanzad
[the famed long song singer] you didn’t go overseas.”11 Under the gaze of the
international world, only select talents could stand in for the nation by reflect-
ing the aesthetic ideology of socialism.
The aim of cultural delegations was not only to demonstrate cultural distinc-
tion to “the world,” but also, conversely, to “the nation,” producing a feedback
loop between foreign and domestic perceptions, aesthetics, and values, as was
the case with Tuvan khöömii (Beahrs 2014). One channel of this feedback loop
consisted of published reports on the achievements of cultural delegations in
official journals like Soyol (Culture). One particularly exemplary report comes

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 from Lkhavsüren (1973:44), the head of a cultural delegation to the 1973 World
Youth Festival in partition-era Berlin. He noted how . . .
[a]t the great festival, we successfully included our art, receiving praise from
the government for the development of our national art—proof of our ongo-
ing attention and consideration—while our artists demonstrated the energy
they are putting into their creative efforts.

Socialism, as the numbers in Lkhavsüren’s report evidence, was highly invested

in quantifying “cultural development” by giving numbers of participants, med-
als, feats, estimated audience size, or collaborations with radios or orchestras.
Over seventy “talents” participated, many of them achieving a “professional
level” of performance to receive nineteen medals altogether, including gold for
the delegation’s sole khöömiich. Sengedorj Nanjid (1948–2020), originally a
herder-cum-construction-worker from Chandman’ sum (district) who could
sound khöömii very well, was one such example of “professional uplift.” Two
years after he participated in the 1973 World Youth Festival in Berlin, he became
the resident khöömiich at Khovd aimag (province)’s Music and Drama Theater,
in addition to working there as an actor. In our interview, he regarded “cultural
development” positively while noting conflicts between socialist ideology and
Indigenous aesthetics elsewhere. As he stated,
We prepared for two months. We did so much preparation. And so, before
going abroad they taught classes on how to posture your body correctly. One
had to be cultured when arriving at those countries, one had to posture their
body and go in a cultured way. The government supervised as much as pos-
sible. I fondly remember those times. From getting off at the station to the
food, we received the healthiest and highest quality treatment because these
were officially connected things. (Interview, September 26, 2013)

Whether a well-known genre like long-song, or a then-rare vocal practice like

khöömii, everyone was taken very seriously as a representative in delegations
since “culture,” in a particularly socialist sense (Stolpe 2008; Tsetsentsolmon
2014) was considered a sanctified mode of address between nations within the
Soviet sphere of influence (Rouland 2004; Rupprecht 2015).

Originality, Cultural Sovereignty,

and Nomadism
Beyond the Soviet sphere of influence, however, listeners understood Mon-
golian traditional music in somewhat different terms, as became evident as the
Mongolian government began pursuing diplomatic relationships with nonso-
cialist nations. Japan was among the most significant of these new worldly con-

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 nections, eventually becoming the largest development assistance provider to
Mongolia (Narangoa 2009:373). For example, the Japan Foundation sponsored
a cultural exchange project in 1978 to promote “communication and exchange
between Asian countries in the field of traditional performing arts” (Emmert
and Minegishi 1980:vi; italics added), centering around the theme of that year:
the voice. The Mongolian delegation included Norovbanzad, the famed long-
song singer, and Sundui, another Chandman’ native whose style would eventu-
ally become hailed as an aesthetic ideal among later generations of khöömiich.
Involved researchers and musicians alike focused on “points of comparison”
arising from “voice production, text, melody relationships, techniques, textual
content, revealing a people’s way of thinking and feeling” (ibid.). But important
to note here is how the authors of the report resulting from this cultural ex-
change emphasized the locality, tradition, and nomadic origins of khöömii, while
contemporary Mongolian accounts of overseas performances typically inspired
perceptions that khöömii was of “international quality,” “developed,” and even
an exemplar of “world classical music.” Numerous biographical descriptions of
Sundui, for example, valorize his performances in the 1970s of “world classi-
cal works,” more specifically the thematic melodies of European masterpieces
(Myagmarjav 2015:36), a topic that Curtet details in this volume (see Chapter 8).
These contrasting interpretations of khöömii had important political di-
mensions, especially as intellectual elites in Mongolia began challenging Soviet
Eurocentricism (Marsh 2009:100–120) in the 1980s by legitimizing traditional
expressive culture as a worldly pinnacle of its own, as I detail elsewhere (Colwell
2018, 2019). The key figures behind this movement were the famous composer
Natsag Jantsannorov and the music scholar Jamts Badraa, but a wide range of
performers, music researchers, and officials participated in this effort to increase
Mongolian cultural sovereignty. Jantsannorov and Badraa centered their efforts
around the legitimation of a novel cultural category called yazguur to add to the
prevailing categories of “folk,” “national,” and “classical.” Badraa first proposed
the notion in the late 1970s when referring to what he called ardyn yazguur
urlag, which he translated himself into English as “authentic folk art,” follow-
ing European and Soviet folkloristics (2005:56).12 But it is likely that he also
associated yazguur with the Russian term samobytnost’, meaning “originality,”
a politically salient concept at the time that he references elsewhere for similar
purposes (Badraa 1981 [1978]). Mongolian dictionaries (Tsevel 1966; Bawden
1997) reinforce this suggestion by defining yazguur as a reference to “origins”
and being “original” depending on its use as a noun or adjective. Badraa’s aim
was to specify expressive practices that originated in a far-off, pre-socialist,
and thus more originally Mongol past, with khöömii and long-song serving
as his key exemplars. In this light, the accordion could be considered a “folk”
practice, but not an “original” one, due to its introduction by the Soviets. For

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 FIGURE 9.1. Tserendavaa (far left) performs as part of a cultural delegation in 1988
that would eventually go to New York City. Photo courtesy of D. Tserendavaa.

these reasons I translate the term as “originality” in order to reflect these other
meanings, which exceed those of “authenticity.” In any case, soon after Badraa
proposed the idea of yazguur, Jantsannorov (1996:156) personally warned the
current general secretary, Tsedenbal Yumjaa, on numerous occasions of the
possible demise of “original art,” eventually securing approval and funding for a
national art inspection of rural talents in the early 1980s. Yazguur then became
an official concern of cultural policy with the issuing of a government resolu-
tion toward this inspection’s completion (Jantsannorov 1989:19), culminating
in the organization of two highly influential cultural festivals in 1983 and 1988
that focused on exemplars of Mongolian originality.
But affiliates of this cultural movement remained concerned with the inter-
national world. Yazguur performances, in fact, became a means of projecting
another Mongolia to foreign audiences, one that was more nomadic than social-
ist, in a growing official effort to de-associate the satellite state from the Soviet
Union and bridge ties with “the West.” For example, in 1987 a cultural delega-
tion—headed by Badraa and including Tserendavaa, one of his chief khöömii
collaborators—performed in New York City at the Asia Society to mark the
occasion of establishing official diplomatic ties with the United States (see figure
9.1). A journalist who witnessed the New York concert wrote how the delegation
“provided a cogent and charming sampling of traditional Mongolian movement,

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 song and music-making . . . that made one forget one’s surroundings,” especially
the long songs which “evoked dreams of exotic temples and ancient rites” (Som-
mers, 1987). As for Tserendavaa, his performance of khöömii “sounded just like
a synthesizer.” After the concert, as Tserendavaa recalled in an interview (May
9, 2014), another incredulous journalist then approached him with a strange
request. This journalist believed that Tserendavaa might have a metallic appa-
ratus of some sort lodged in his throat, producing the unfamiliar and seemingly
nonhuman sound of khöömii. In response, he asked Tserendavaa to eat a banana,
an apple, drink some water, and only then perform. Tserendavaa kindly obliged
and wowed the journalist even more. For these journalists, Mongolia was terra
incognito just as yazguur practices like khöömii and long-song appeared to them
as “mysteries” in need of explanation, recurring to a well-studied Orientalist,
and nomadist, trope. But whereas Euro-American audiences tended to focus
on the traditionalism, naturalness, and nomadism of these performances, the
Mongolian performers also considered themselves to be demonstrating the
worldly legitimacy of yazguur and Mongolness itself in their pursuit of cultural
sovereignty from the Soviet Union. It is also important to note here that the
official emphasis on yazguur did not translate into a shift in economic policy to
promote pastoral lifeways, even after the fall of the Soviet Union, when radical
changes associated with globalization would suddenly sweep through a country
heading chaotically toward free market democracy.

Egschiglen: A Post-socialist Beginning

The transition to a free market democracy dramatically altered the con-
ditions under which musicians could secure livelihoods. As Marsh reviews
(2009:121–123), students began protesting for democratic change in January of
1990, echoing protest movements throughout the Soviet Bloc. A few months
later, the Politburo, the principal policy-making committee of the communist
party, decided behind closed doors that it would resign. The news soon went
public, along with an announcement for democratic elections that same year.
To complicate matters, the Soviet Union also dissolved, resulting in the in-
stant cessation of significant economic aid to Mongolia. With socialism’s fall
in 1992, state-support for the arts and culture in Mongolia vanished overnight.
The tögrög, Mongolia’s currency, became worthless. Even food became scarce.
Musicians had to seek out new livelihoods as cultural institutions closed their
doors, leaving their members to their own devices.
But at the same time, the transition engendered novel cultural, economic,
and political possibilities, which actors immediately capitalized upon out of
existential necessity as much as creative interest. Most significantly, perhaps,
the distribution of private passports to citizenry for the first time provided a

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 hitherto unknown option: independent travel overseas. Professional musicians
began organizing and managing their own tours, no longer as part of cultural
delegations or officially sanctified ensembles like the People’s Folk Song and
Dance Ensemble (Ardyn duu büjigiin ulsyn chuulga) (PFSDE) but as bands and
groups of their own making. No longer was it only officially selected exemplars
who could tour overseas, as socialist policy once dictated, but any musician
with the right blend of connections, talent, and resilience could go. In several
highly influential cases, solo artists and bands even emigrated to central or west-
ern Europe, especially Germany due its being a hub for world music. Perhaps
the most influential of these path-breakers was the band Egschiglen, whose
name means “melodious sound.” They would set an aesthetic standard for stage
performances of Mongolian music for later generations, including Khusugtun
over twenty years later. Although Egschiglen’s membership has changed over
the years, three core members continue to perform regularly after twenty-plus
years of expatriate life in Germany. None of the initial members performed
khöömii, although that would soon change once they began adjusting to the
European world music economy and its growing demand for the vocal practice
in the wake of successful Tuvan bands like Huun-Huur-Tu, which began touring
internationally in the early 1990s.
Egschiglen was founded in 1991 when its four initial members graduated
from the Music and Dance Middle School, now the Music and Dance College.
However, they were not yet a band, but rather a quartet of three horse fid-
dlers—Tümenbayar Migdorj (b.1969), Khayagsaikhan Luvsansharav (b.1971),
Tömörsaikhan Janlav (b.1972)—and bass fiddler (ikh khuurch) Ganpürev Dagdan
(b.1971). The quartet was a socialist import that reserved itself for the perfor-
mance of music modeled upon European classical music. Egschiglen, however,
was founded on the cusp of socialism’s fall, so its members were immediately
challenged to procure livelihoods without institutional support. At the same
time, Euro-American popular music was already making inroads into Mongo-
lian life with the weakening of socialist control in the 1980s. (One socialist-era
journal article from 1988 even briefly introduced the heavy metal band Iron
Maiden.) Egschiglen altered their repertoire and aesthetic accordingly. Their
early repertoire, for example, consisted of the once officially approved works of
Mozart and Mongolian classical composers, like Jantsannarov, alongside once
banned compositions and composers like the Inner Mongolian horse fiddler
Chi Bulag and the Beatles.
But another influence, as the quartet’s first horse fiddler Tömörsaikhan ex-
plained in our interview (January 11, 2016), was their trip to Tuva in 1991, where
they performed with the renowned khöömiizhi13 Gennadi Tumat (1964–1996).
This concert featured many other renowned khöömiizhi and their groups, in-

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 cluding Huun-Huur-Tu (then called Kungurtuk), the highly influential band
whose performance style would become an aesthetic model for later Tuvan
bands (Levin and Suzukei 2006; Beahrs 2014:75–83). Following the Tuvan tour,
Egschiglen remained a quartet. But the experience did convince them that
they needed a stronger vocal element in their group. In 1995, they eventually
enlisted the now-renowned khöömiich Khosbayar “Hosoo” Dangaa (b.1971),
who is better known as Hosoo, as he transliterates his own name, and thus
expanded their quartet into a band. However, Egschiglen did not emulate the
Tuvan band’s aesthetic, whose initial releases evinced what Beahrs describes as
an “experimental, ambient” and “neotraditional groove” aesthetics. He is refer-
ring to Huun-Huur-Tu’s engagement with various Euro-American pop and rock
qualities to present “old songs and tunes” and evoke the “ancientness” of Tuvan
music and khöömii while consciously foregoing the Soviet-sanctified aesthetics
of prior ensembles (Beahrs 2004:77–84). Egschiglen, by contrast, continued to
perform socialist-sanctified classics, relying upon their professional conserva-
tory training, while developing their own approach to yazguur performance by
incorporating khöömii, among other visual and acoustic changes.
In 1993, they had their first opportunity to tour Europe and perform at a range
of folk music festivals, thanks to the support and facilitation of an expatriate
Mongolian connection residing in Italy. The tour was a pivotal learning experi-
ence for Egschiglen, which helped them succeed quickly when they moved to
Germany a few years later. As Tömörsaikhan said of the 1993 tour, “Our eyes
and ears were opened.” It was the same for the audiences. As he elaborated,
listening to a Mongolian horse fiddle quartet perform European classical music
and the Beatles alongside praise-songs like “Altai Praise-song” came as a big
surprise for European audiences for whom Mongolia was wholly unfamiliar.
It was the combination of familiar and unfamiliar elements that explained the
band’s success, Tömörsaikhan surmised. The band adapted quickly, especially
by learning from the other bands they encountered during the 1993 tour, and
they soon hired an amateur agent called Rudi Wagner to help bring them back
the following year in 1994.
Wagner has since continued to operate as a “culture broker” for Mongolian
bands in Germany by both managing the logistics of touring for musicians and
interpreting Mongolian music for European listeners during pre-concert talks.
As anthropologist Robert Paine writes, the cultural broker is “one who, while
purveying values that are not his own, is also purposively making changes of
emphasis and/or content” (1971:21). In our interview, Wagner did not elaborate
on how he represented Egschiglen in the early 1990s, but he did discuss how
he represents Khukh Mongol, a band that was founded by former members of
Egschiglen in the late 1990s:

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 I always tell the people that I will take them on a journey to Mongolia. We
will begin with the Altai Mountains and I say what the Altai look like, what
livestock there is, and try and associate them [with the music], the region and
the mountains, or the desert and the lakes. And the horses. . . . That is really
what the people should imagine with their eyes, they are now in the desert
or the mountains and hear them. The people must now go there for a little
bit. To just make a program, and play a few songs, without any background,
is certainly not helpful. If you present it like this, then one experiences it dif-
ferently and it sticks more. (January 10, 2016)

Egschiglen’s record label Albakultur follows this focus on nature and nomad-
ism in its online description for the band’s first album release, titled Traditional
Mongolian Song (Traditionelle mongolische Lieder):
On the one hand Mongolian sounds seem strange and mysterious to Western
ears. On the other hand the music sounds familiar, expressing basic human
feelings such as love, longing, sorrow and thankfulness. This album is a col-
lection of pure traditional musics from Mongolia presented in fine-tuned ar-
rangements. With their virtuosity Egschiglen musically transmit the harmony
of their culture and show an impressive variety and delicacy of expression.14
(italics added)

But despite this strategy tailored to European nomadist perceptions of Inner

Asian pastoralists, bands like Khukh Mongol and Egschiglen are invested in
performing yazguur in order to promote and legitimate Mongolian culture on
a worldly scale as much as to succeed in the world music economy.
The pieces on the album, accordingly, reflect a diversity of genres that do not
easily fit into the Euro-American notions of traditionalism and nomadism in
that many of them are socialist-era compositions by Mongolian classical com-
posers (e.g., “On the Shore of Flower Lake” by C.Sükhbaatar and “Serenade” by
Mend-Amar Jambal) based upon European classical harmony and composition.
Others are novel reinterpretations of traditional genres, like the praise-song
(magtaal), that were thoroughly reworked to suit the aesthetics of the concert
stage (“Dunjingarav praise-song” and “Altai praise-song”) despite their roots
in pastoral epic ritual and customs. Such cultural brokerage and adaption are
key practices for many musicians who are invested in representing themselves
to novel audiences, especially in Europe and North America, requiring them
to “reproduce and transform tradition in dialogue with the people, places, and
ideas they encounter” (Ruskin 2011:86; Klein 2007), reflecting the productive
and destructive “frictions” of globalization (Tsing 2005).
These frictions had ramification not only for expatriate musicians in Ger-
many but also among musicians in Mongolia who were similarly invested in
performing and representing yazguur in the post-socialist era. After the suc-

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 cessful release of Egschiglen’s second album, Gobi, in 1997, for example, Hosoo,
along with bassist Ganpürev, left to start a briefly extant band together. They, in
turn, parted ways to establish more enduring bands of their own, like the latter’s
Boerte (founded in 2000) and the former’s TransMongolia (founded in 2005),
which Hosoo founded after establishing himself as a solo artist. Before them,
Erdenebold Dashtseren, a flautist who briefly joined Egschiglen for their early
overseas tours, did the same when establishing Khukh Mongol. The member-
ships of these expatriate offshoots would change more regularly than Egschi-
glen’s over the following years, creating a transnational circuit of Mongolian
musicians. After seeking success primarily in Germany, as their predecessors
had, these circulating musicians then tended to move back to Mongolia, where
they formed other bands of their own that would then travel overseas, in turn,
by relying upon their expatriate knowledge of the world music economy.
Many of these “third generation” offshoots are now themselves aesthetic
and economic models of performance for younger musicians graduating from
the music programs at Ulaanbaatar’s colleges and universities. The leaders of
Domog (founded in 2006) and Khusugtun (also founded in 2006), for example,
both had brief stints as members of Khukh Mongol, and the members of Sedaa
(founded in 2010) got their start in Hosoo’s band TransMongolia. After two
decades of transnational circulations and offshoots, devising a comprehensive
list of all these members would require some in-depth genealogical research.
Other bands took cues from Egschiglen by experimenting with the band format’s
instrumentation and genres to explore aesthetics such as “folk rock,” in the case
of Altan Urag in the 2000s, or more recently “folk metal” in the case of the Hu
(see Chapter 10 in this volume).
The expatriate experiences also helped many musicians to do business in the
cultural tourism industry that arose after the fall of socialism. Today, khöömii is
a critical element of any of the myriad culture shows in Ulaanbaatar that tailor
to foreigners by performing only during the summer tourist season. But anyone
can easily hire a khöömiich or a band to perform privately at their hotel or yurt
camp thanks to formal and informal verbal contracts between tourism organi-
zations and musicians. Individual entrepreneurs have also sought to leverage
cultural tourism on their own terms, and in the case of Hosoo, the aim is not
only to do business but also to expose foreigners to a more yazguur Mongolia.
He became particularly adept at leveraging cultural tourism to complement his
economic life in Germany, even obtaining a degree in business management
from a German university. In the early 2000s, he began leading his own cultural
tours to Mongolia, personally escorting his guests to his hometown of Chand-
man’ sum (rural district) in Khovd aimag where he conducted plein air khöömii
workshops that focused on understanding the vocal practice, and pastoral music
more generally, in its original context. Later tours, however, have ceased to

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 travel to Chandman’ sum for logistical and budgeting purposes. Participants
have tended to be Germanic amateur musicians or vocalists who learned about
the tour when attending Hosoo’s concerts or workshops in Central Europe.

Conclusion
Expatriate concert touring and domestic cultural tourism have engendered
ongoing debates over the meaning of yazguur and Mongolian identity in what
some intellectuals refer to as “the age of the free market.” Mongolian music
researcher Kherlen Lkhavsüren (2010), for example, is among those who hail
the post-socialist promotion and popularization of Mongol khöömii while ad-
dressing the challenges of globalization. The critical issue for her is how Mon-
golians are “to combine” globalization and “original folk art” (ibid:5). Hosoo
himself addressed this same tension in our interview when problematizing the
transmission of khöömii in non-pastoral, and thus non-original, settings where
yazguur aesthetic values are foregone in the absence of nature (September 9,
2013). The music scholar Jambal Enebish makes a similar point in an article on
the problems of preserving the cultural heritage of Mongolian “people of the
felt tent” (tuurgatan), a pan-nomadic term for Inner Asian peoples who reside
in yurts, regardless of their Turkic or Mongolic ethnicity. As he writes,
It is impossible to consider the artistic thinking of Mongolian people who
were raised in pastoral lifeways, along with the real meaning and significance
of their creative means, apart from the nature that birthed them, their geo-
graphic surroundings, the seasons, daily living with herds, custom, and free
labor. (2012:71)

He goes on to argue for a focus on the “artistic thought” of pastoral culture

bearers alongside a more direct consideration in cultural heritage preserva-
tion of baigal’ due its role as a moral authority and aesthetic model in pastoral
expressive culture.
Significant efforts to promote and preserve cultural heritage have sought
to address such widespread concerns in the last two decades. However, the
democratic government remains focused on promoting mining, sedentarization,
higher education, and tourism—all factors that are radically challenging or ef-
fecting pastoral communities throughout Mongolia. Musical actors throughout
Central Asia remain concerned with “the future of the past,” as Levin puts it,
and “how traditional forms of music-making are being adapted, appropriated,
transformed, and revitalized by a variety of contemporary actors and stakehold-
ers in the domain of arts and culture” (2016:ix). While some argue that Mongol
khöömii has successfully been “preserved” and “developed” into a “worldly classi-
cal art,” others lament that the “original quality” of khöömii is either on the brink

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 of “destruction” (ustgal) or has already been destroyed despite record numbers
of professionally trained khöömiich at Ulaanbaatar’s conservatories. These la-
ments accompany discussions about globalization wherein cultural heritage
requires “preservation” at the risk of its loss as society “develops” further and
further away from the past, the source of Mongolian origins and originality. On
one hand, socialist-era “cultural development” reveals how aesthetics, notions,
and practices now considered to be yazguur arose out of a creative dialogue
with foreign aesthetics, formats, and performance settings. On the other hand,
the increasing unfamiliarity of younger performers of Mongolian music with
pastoralism and its environmental musical aesthetics would seem to suggest
that Mongolia is indeed at a hitherto unencountered crossroads, even despite
its long history of worldly interconnection. Whatever globalization and “world
development” entail, to return to Tserendavaa’s words, it is critical to under-
stand how these processes continue to open up paths that are both “good” and
“bad,” productive and destructive, original and interconnected in a globalizing
Mongolia.

Notes
1. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
2. See Fairclough (2006) and Turino (2003) for cogent discussions of these terms
and the relationship between the processes of globalization and neoliberal discourses
that self-associate with them. Marin (2008), Sneath (2002), and Stolpe (2006) pro-
vide various perspectives from Mongolian studies on the subject of globalization
and globalism in Mongolia.
3. See Levin (1996), Levin and Suzukei (2006), Levin and During (2002), and
Levin, Daukeyeva, and Küchümkulova (2016), among many others, for perspectives
on these regional interconnections.
4. See Turino (2003) for an overview of examples of globalism in the scholarly
literature on globalization, including in ethnomusicology.
5. See Apffel-Marglin and Marglin 2011[1990];et al. ; Humphrey and Sneath
(1999); Buyandelger (2008); and Schwartz, ed. (2006), among many others, for a
range of alternative perspectives onto the impacts of globalization and development
in Mongolia and beyond.
6. See http://ubpost.mongolnews.mn/?p=14397. Accessed May 25, 2017.
7. See: http://www.khusugtun-group.com/#about. Accessed May 25, 2017.
8. See Levin and Suzukei (2006); Enebish (2012); Curtet (2013); Beahrs (2014);
Colwell (2018).
9. See Pegg (2001) and Marsh (2009) for a range of musical perspectives on
socialist “cultural development” in Mongolia and Central Asia.
10. All translations from the Polish by Agnieszka Rec.
11. See http://saruul.niitlelch.mn/content/8319.shtml. Accessed June 2, 2017.

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 12. The exact date of this article is not made clear but circumstantial evidence
suggests that it was published in the late 1970s.
13. The Tuvan spelling for khöömiich, although the term also implies the per-
former to be a master.
14. See http://www.albakultur.de/egschiglencds.html. Accessed May 27, 2017.

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 CHAPTER 10

“We Were Born with

Global Ambition”
Continuity, Innovation,
and a New Chapter in
the Development of
Mongolian Popular Music
PETER K. MARSH

In relative terms, the success of the Mongolian “heavy metal” band The Hu
has been quite sudden. The group released the first music videos for its songs
“Yuve yu” and “Wolf Totem” (Video Examples 1 and 2) in late 2018. Both videos
feature the musicians sporting hand-tooled black leather jackets, heavy buck-
les, and traditional boots performing in stunning locations of the Mongolian
countryside. The group’s instrumentation and musical style draw from Western
rock and Mongolian folk music traditions. Posted on YouTube.com, these two
videos caught the attention of Western audiences and quickly “went viral.” By
June 2019, they had been viewed twelve million and nineteen million times,
respectively.1 By fall of that year, the band had signed a recording contract with
New York–based Eleven Seven Music, home to such established heavy metal
groups as Mötley Crüe, Five Finger Death Punch, and Papa Roach, and released
their debut album, The Gereg, which quickly topped Billboard magazine’s Top
New Artist chart and reached near the top of its Indie Label chart. It also ranked
in the top five of U.K.’s Rock & Metal Album chart and Album Downloads list
(Farber 2019). By the end of 2019, The Hu was in the midst of a world concert
tour that included sold-out shows in clubs and headlining performances at
major rock music festivals in Europe, North America, and Australia.
The degree of penetration into the Western popular music mainstream that
The Hu achieved in less than a year is extraordinary. No other Mongolian musi-
cal artist or group has managed to achieve this level of international recogni-

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 tion or attention, even after years of trying. Some have done well, such as the
Mongolian folk ensembles Khusugtun and the Altai Band.2 The Mongolian “folk
rock” group Altan Urag (Golden Urag) achieved popular attention in the West
for its work on the soundtracks to the movie Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan
(2007) and Netflix’s Marco Polo (2014–2016) (Cengel 2019). Although many
Mongolian rock and pop artists have toured in North America and Europe
since the 1990s, their audiences have often been limited primarily to members
of the Mongolian diaspora.
Perhaps the closest parallel to The Hu has been the Mongolian heavy metal
group Tengger Cavalry (see Interlude 2 in this volume). The group’s leader was
from Inner Mongolia, China, but formed the group in Beijing before later re-
locating it to New York City. As can be seen in the YouTube video for its song
“Lone Wolf ” (released in May 2019; see Video Example 3), the band features
a similar mixture of Western and Mongolian instruments and the lead singer,
Nature Ganganbaigal, alternates between the use of khöömii and a more con-
ventional rock vocal style. Between 2010 and 2019, Tengger Cavalry released a
number of studio albums (the last released on the Austrian label Napalm Re-
cords); undertook concert tours through the U.S., Europe, and China; provided
music for two video games;3 and even performed a concert at Carnegie Hall in
New York City.4 Yet, even with such accomplishments, Tengger Cavalry did not
achieve the level of success that The Hu had attained by the end of 2019.
This chapter explores the possible reasons why The Hu was able to achieve a
level of international recognition and success that earlier generations of Mon-
golian artists and bands were not able to do. An examination of the imagery
and music of these first two songs reveals clear continuities between The Hu
and developments in the history of Mongolian popular music over the previous
nearly five decades. The lyrical references of the group’s songs also locate them in
a contemporary Mongolian context. Yet, The Hu has also brought to their game
important innovations in the areas of sound, imagery, and dissemination that
has set them apart from previous Mongolian artists and has helped it to connect
with the transnational metal community. What The Hu has accomplished points
to how Mongolian artists are getting better at reading and reacting to shifts in
the global popular music landscape and suggests major changes may be taking
place in the dynamics that shape and control the global flows of popular music
and culture that may benefit small nations like Mongolia.5

Pass the Popcorn: Mongolian Youth

and Cultural Loss in “Yuve yuve yu”
A close examination of The Hu’s first music video, “Yuve yuve yu” (Video
Example 1), released in September 2018, reveals music and messages that may

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 be new to many non-Mongolian audiences but will be familiar to many Mon-
golian ones. Interestingly, the video begins with a 40-second prelude before
the song begins. In quick succession, we see individual members of the band
in various urban locations, presumably in Mongolia’s capital, Ulaanbaatar. We
first see the lead singer, “Gala” (Galbadrakh Tsendbaatar), sitting at a table in
a coffeeshop playing a video game on his smartphone. Next, we see another
member sitting on a couch in front of his television playing a video game
(simulated European football). We see a third member sitting in front of his
television, munching popcorn while watching a movie (in English), while a
fourth is shown sleeping on this stomach in bed, the alarm clock showing it
is almost noon. At first, non-Mongolian viewers may be struck by just how
normal this scene is. Viewers can easily imagine young people in urban areas
around the world doing the same kinds of activities, suggesting that The Hu
wants its audience to understand that, despite its geographic distance from the
West, they and their viewers share a common cosmopolitan youth culture. At
the same time, the prelude does not portray these characters very sympatheti-
cally: each appears isolated, alone, and devoted only to his respective screens,
as if each was sleeping—or sleepwalking—through life. But then the characters
are jolted out of their stupor by the unexplained and mysterious appearance
of the Mongolian countryside. It appears first to a character who opens a door
in his apartment and then to the others on their phones as texted images. The
next scene switches from the dark and cramped interiors of city apartments to
a beautiful, light-filled vista of a lake in the countryside. A band member enters
the frame, admires the view, takes a deep breath, and then picks up his instru-
ment and begins to play, marking the start of the song. From this point, the
video features constantly shifting images of band members sitting or standing
in various stunning locations in the Mongolian countryside. Though physically
distanced from each other, they are clearly playing together, communing both
with each other and the surrounding landscape, which, clearly, is meant to be
another character in this video.
The Hu doubtlessly meant their viewers to note the contrast between the
characters portrayed in the prelude and those performing the song. Those in
the prelude appear slouched over their phones or TV sets or shuffling, sleepily,
through their apartments. But in the song, they appear standing or sitting erect
and confidently, feet planted squarely on the earth, making strong, forceful
movements with their arms and legs, their heads bouncing to the beat of the
music. The contrast is made starker by the visual power of each performer’s
location, e.g. at the edge of a steep cliff, on a mountain summit, or upon the
sands of a vast desert. The band seems to suggest that while they partake in
urban cosmopolitan youth culture, their true identity as young people is most
powerfully expressed when they put on their Mongolian clothing, pick up their

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 Mongolian instruments, and set foot in the Mongolian countryside to play their
own Mongolian music.
This sense of power connected with the homeland is further emphasized
through musical and vocal styles. The band’s instrumentation mixes Mongolian
folk instruments (tovshuur or two-stringed lute, morin khuur or horsehead
fiddle, and the tömör khuur or jaw harp) and Western rock instruments (elec-
tric guitar and bass, electric keyboard, and drum set), with the timbral balance
tilting in favor of the Mongolian instruments. All four core members of the
band sing together in unison, an octave apart, each using one of the forms of
khöömii, creating a block of vocal sound with a timbral “edge” or “roughness”
that easily projects through the instrumental texture. The song verses are sung
in a style that resembles that of a traditional folk singer reciting a legend or epic
song and accompanying himself on a string instrument.
The song’s lyrics are also directed at a domestic audience. They are sung in
the Mongolian language and stated in the form of a complaint to the people of
their nation:
You [Mongolians] have been born in the ancestor’s destiny, and yet you’ve
been sleeping deeply and cannot be wakened; . . . You take our Great Mongol
ancestors’ names in vain; . . . Yet, you would not honor our oath and destiny;
. . . Why is it so difficult to cherish the ancestor’s inherited land? . . . Why is
the priceless edification of our elders turning to ashes?

The singers allege that Mongolians today are quick to boast to others about
Chinggis Khan and the Great Mongol Empire of the thirteenth century, but slow
to honor the responsibilities that this “honor” or “destiny” grants them. They
are quick to turn their backs on their ancestral lands, wisdom, and customs that
are their cultural inheritance. The allegation that Mongolians are sleeping, or
sleepwalking, through their lives is an allusion to the characters in the video’s
prelude who seem similarly “lost” in their urban cosmopolitan bubbles.
This fear, that Mongolians are “sleeping” or “forgetting” their past, is a cul-
tural trope with deep roots in contemporary Mongolia. Filmmaker Benj Binks
records the Mongolian epic singer B. Bayarmagnai expressing it for his 2012
documentary Mongolian Bling:
Now it’s the generation of youth. All those old folk songs that our past epic
singers used to sing have been lost to the Heavens along with the elders. The
youth don’t understand our traditions. Mongolian traditional folk singing is
part of our identity. Today, there are so many things to see and watch due to
mass media, such as many TV channels and the internet. Half of Mongolia’s
population lives in Ulaanbaatar. The more they settle down in the city, the
more they lose their nomadic traditions. Urbanization is a great thing, but
we should not forget our customs (Binks 2012).

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 Bayarmagnai is pointing to the paradox at the heart of the processes of western-
ization and urbanization, which were introduced into Mongolia in the decades
following the People’s Revolution of 1921. While they benefited the nation and
people, such as by improving healthcare, education, and communications, they
also had negative consequences, such as the slow, but steady, ebbing away of
common knowledge about the nation’s cultural heritage. The process of opening
our society to Western culture is a double-edged sword, Bayarmagnai seems to
say: that our youth today can share in a cosmopolitan youth culture is a good
thing, but at what cost?
It is ironic that a similar question led to the creation of the first popular music
ensemble in Mongolia nearly five decades earlier.

“Sound the Bells”: Youth Transgressions

in the Socialist Period
The “mass media” in Mongolia in the late 1960s and early 1970s consisted
primarily of radio, television, and cinema along with the dissemination of LP
records and was controlled and managed by the ruling Mongolian People’s
Revolutionary Party (MPRP). A political satellite of the U.S.S.R., the Mongo-
lian People’s Republic closely aligned its cultural policies with those of its So-
viet “brother” nations. And thus, what Mongolians experienced through these
various media forms was carefully curated to promote the Party’s political and
cultural aims. Music one might hear on the state radio would include record-
ings of modernized folk music and song, classical music by both Mongolian
and Western composers, zokhiolyn duu (modern songs about countryside life
that were composed by urban composers in folk song styles), and songs from
Mongolian movies.
In the same period in the U.S. and U.K., music was undergoing a revolution
in content, style, and expressive power. Rock and pop music were a significant
part of the musical mainstream in these nations and they were quickly being
disseminated to other parts of the West and the world. The Community Party of
the Soviet Union (CPSP) considered this music to be a threat to their ideologi-
cal control over young people, portraying it as “one of the cleverest ideological
diversions yet invented by capitalist imperialists” (Sarkitov 1987:93). The CPSP
denounced and actively suppressed its consumption and practice, and the MPRP
followed in step.
Young people in Mongolia, on the other hand, found the Western music they
heard as intoxicating, and like their counterparts in other socialist nations of the
period, they found ways to get their hands on it. In her documentary Live from
UB, Lauren Knapp records the Mongolian visual artist Altanzaya comparing
this trickle of access to Western popular music to the act of peering through

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 a small hole in a wall into an entirely different and tantalizing world (Knapp
2015).6 Knapp also records the Mongolian parliamentarian Oyungerel saying
that when she was a teenager in the late 1960s and 1970s, she and her friends
had reliable, if sporadic, access to “unofficial” music, namely, LPs of Western
pop music by the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, ABBA, Smokey Robinson, and others
(ibid.). She and others of her age in Ulaanbaatar typically spoke Russian, had
access to radios and turntables, and generally had more wealth and freedom to
explore alternative identities than their rural counterparts. It was these youths,
some of whom were children of Party officials, who were at the center of this
illicit trade in Western pop cultural products (Marsh 2010).
This access to Western music transformed the musical ideas and expecta-
tions of young people in Mongolia. They began to compose and perform their
own songs on themes of everyday life, often critical of societal problems and
the workings of the government. Young people performed these songs in their
homes or on the steps of their apartment complexes for themselves and their
friends, away from the eyes and ears of party officials. Officials knew what was
going on, however, and in the early 1970s the Party sanctioned the creation of
several state-funded estrad (the Russian word for “staged”) music ensembles
that integrated the musical styles and instruments of Western popular music
with contemporary Mongolian folk music. The goal was to create a form of
popular music that, while resembling the Western styles and forms, would be
identifiably Mongolian and would uphold the party’s broader ideological goals:
cultural progress and uplift.
Soyol Erdene (Cultural Jewel) was formed in 1971 and became the first of
these state-controlled popular music ensembles. The core of the group, con-
sisting of standard rock band instrumentation (i.e., electric guitar and bass,
electric keyboard, and drum set), was at times expanded with Mongolian tra-
ditional instruments. For instance, the song “Tsenkher zalaa” (Sky-blue crest,
Video Example 4), from the early 1970s, prominently features the sound of
the Mongolian yatga (a Mongolian zither), including a solo by the instrument
later in the song. The Party managed all aspects of the musicians’ professional
lives, from where they performed to how they styled their hair (Marsh 2010).
Their songs were about love but also farm tractors and the electrification of the
countryside, and all were composed by urban, professional composers with the
aim of propagandizing the Party’s efforts at “building socialism.”
By the late 1980s, however, rising social concerns were pushing popular mu-
sicians to test the limits imposed upon them by the Party. Young people were
increasingly supportive of calls for the government to distance itself from the
Soviet Union. A movement for greater independence was brewing in Ulaan-
baatar that would lead to widespread popular protests and the eventual collapse
of the MPRP. Party officials were becoming less able, or perhaps less willing, to

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 enforce the strict cultural policies of previous decades, and young musicians
were some of the first to publicly challenge them. In 1988, the then-lead singer
of Soyol Erdene, D. Jargalsaikhan, recorded his song “Chinggis Khan,” which
praised the spirit of the thirteenth-century military leader and founder of the
Mongolian nation and asked him to forgive the Mongolian people for forgetting
about him. A song on this subject was still, even then, considered politically
taboo, and yet, despite this open challenge to Party authority, Jargalsaikhan was
not arrested or persecuted. Knapp records the singer as saying that the Party’s
decision not to prosecute him for this song was an indication of just how far
the attitudes toward dissent were changing in this period (Knapp 2015).
A year later, the pop-duo Khonkh (Bell) helped to crystalize growing popu-
lar sentiment against the Party with its song “Khonkhny duu” (Sound of the
bell). Its lyrics called upon the Mongolian people to “awake” to the dawning
of a new day, a veiled sentiment that many Mongolians understood as a jab at
single-party rule:
The sound of the bells,
Let us awake, awake.
The sound of the bells,
Let us awake (Kristof 1990)

The melody of the song became an anthem sung by protestors in street demon-
strations and rallies, many of which took place outside government buildings
between 1989 and 1990. Jargalsaikhan describes the song as “the anthem of
democracy” that contributed to the fall of socialist rule in 1990 (Knapp 2015).
Such songs resonated with a widespread sense of unease about a national
leadership that many felt to be more focused on maintaining a “brotherly
friendship” with the Soviet Union than in understanding and responding to
the everyday needs of its citizens. Mongolian popular music artists and groups,
responding to a fear that their nation was “forgetting” its past or “sleeping” when
it needed to be awake, demonstrated an increasing unwillingness to passively
glorify state ideology. Such independence demonstrated the emerging maturity
and authority of popular music in Mongolia, which it would maintain without
pause into the post-socialist era.

From Madonna to Nirvana: Mongolian

Pop Music’s Embrace of the West
Around the time of the so-called democratic revolution of 1990, popular
music was rife with political ideas and criticism. D. Jargalsaikhan recalls this
as the time “when politics was in the air we breathed” (Marsh 2010:347). But

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 youth interest in politics faded fast following the rapid introduction of market
economic reforms and the successful completion of the nation’s first multiparty
election. The severe economic downturn that accompanied the sudden end to
generous Soviet subsidies, coupled with doses of economic shock therapy ad-
vocated by the World Bank, contributed to the turn away from overt political
messages in popular music. Mongolians suddenly faced not only the disap-
pearance of many social services they had come to rely upon, but also a steep
decline in their standards of living. For many, even finding enough food to eat
was difficult. Mongols had finally won the right to freely travel and speak their
minds, but few had the resources to do so.
Despite the difficult economic situation, however, Mongolian popular culture
expanded dramatically in the first half of the 1990s, fueled in large part by the
growth of the communications and broadcast sectors of the economy. Privately
owned media and broadcasting companies, including satellite and cable TV
service providers, began operations in Ulaanbaatar by the mid-1990s, introduc-
ing such popular channels as MTV, MTV-Asia, and Star-TV and bringing real
competition to the still state-run Mongolian Television & Radio. This, along with
the opening of Internet cafes, allowed Mongolian young people direct access to
the transnational flows of popular culture for the first time. In the same period,
the availability of relatively inexpensive electronic recording and production
equipment gave them the means to record, mix, and master their own audio
and video recordings at levels of quality and control that were unavailable to
earlier generations of artists.
Mongolian popular music became increasingly diverse throughout this pe-
riod as artists began to experiment with new Western musical genres, including
R&B, boy- and girl-bands, jazz, different styles of rock music—such as hard rock,
heavy metal, and alternative rock—and rap and hip-hop music. Some of the
most famous performers of this period included the balladeers D. Jargalsaikhan,
B. Sarantuya, and T. Ariunaa, and the bands Hurd (“heavy metal”), Haranga,
and Niciton (both “hard rock”).
The popular music artists I met in the late-1990s made it clear that their
audiences and fans did not want to hear imitations of Western pop music but
rather Mongolian versions of it (Marsh 2010). Still, that Mongolian artists and
fans were paying close attention to their Western pop idols is evidenced in
their discourse. The singer T. Ariunaa was dubbed by her fans the “Madonna
of Mongolia.” Members of the boyband Camerton, one of the most popular and
influential groups of the late 1990s and early 2000s, described to me how they
fashioned their music and stage presence after the American boy-band Boys
II Men. They explained how they would watch their music videos and imitate
their a cappella, R&B vocal harmonies and musical textures as well as the ways

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 in which they moved and interacted with their audiences while on stage. One
member told me that he even sought out the same style of glasses worn by a
member of the group (group interview, Ulaanbaatar, February 1999).
The alternative rock band Nisvanis was, as the name suggests, deeply influ-
enced by the music of the American “grunge” rock group Nirvana and tried
to channel its transgressive sentiments. Music producer Natsagdorj described
to Knapp how Nisvanis’s music changed “people’s perceptions—showing them
that they could think differently. You don’t have to live by society’s rules. You
can live your way, following your own belief,” adding that this band “opened
the gates for musicians to come” (Knapp 2015).
While many Mongolian pop artists and bands seemed to be channeling West-
ern pop idols, some continued to experiment with the synthesis of Western
pop and Mongolian folk musical elements, as Soyol Erdene had done decades
earlier. Hurd’s song “Bakharahal” (Pride) includes a horsehead fiddle player
performing alongside other members of the heavy metal group in something of
a forerunner of The Hu. Even the members of Camerton described to me how
the lyrical nature of their songs as well as their focus on topics of romantic love
draw deeply from the Mongolian song traditions (group interview, Ulaanbaatar,
February 1999). But it was the “techno-rap” group Har Sarnai (Black Rose) that
most forcefully and vocally continued this trend, incorporating into their songs
and stage shows khöömii, long-songs (urtyn duu), folk dances, and rapping
on passages from famous Mongolian poetry.7 The group’s lead singer “Amraa”
(Sukhbaatar Amarmandakh) told Knapp that Mongolian young people needed
to be reminded about their nation’s past:
During the purges of the 1930s, it was forbidden to talk about our history or
even mention the names of our great kings: Chinggis Khaan and Batmunkh
Dayan Khaan. At one point we had accepted the Cyrillic script and left our
traditional Mongolian script behind. Being forbidden from knowing our his-
tory for about 100 years, caused the Mongolians to forget their traditions and
history. So, we wanted to revive Mongolian heritage and started producing
songs praising our country (ibid.).

We see, once again, the trope of “forgetting” in Amraa’s words. But it is also
interesting how the group’s inclusion of folk cultural elements in their music and
public performances was not merely about adding interesting sonic or visual
displays. Amraa’s stance is that of an activist: Har Sarnai will use these references
of the past to not just remind Mongolians of their history and cultural heritage
but to “revive” it. Such a bold agenda for popular music was not very popular
in the 1990s. But this would change with the new millennia.

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 “We Can’t Eat Money”: Mongolian Pop Music’s
Embrace of the Past
A series of major events throughout the first two decades of the twenty-first
century led to rising popular distrust of the government and criticism of its
policies, particularly those related to the development of the huge Oyu Tolgoi
mine complex run by the multinational mining corporation Rio Tinto in the
southern Gov’ Desert. While contributing a significant level of income to the
state government after it started operations in 2010, it also became for many a
symbol of broader societal problems, such as governmental corruption, envi-
ronmental degradation, and endemic economic inequalities that divide urban
and rural sectors of society (Gillet 2012; Langfitt 2012; Theunissen 2014). A
downturn in the nation’s economy after 2012 only deepened public anger, much
of it directed at the contracts the government had made with Rio Tino and other
foreign-owned mining conglomerates—deals that many deemed to be overly
generous to these foreign corporations.
The fear that foreign entities were exploiting the nation’s mineral wealth
stoked nationalist sentiments, which quickly found expression in popular cul-
ture. Hip-hop was already a mature art form in Mongolia at that time. Having
emerged in Ulaanbaatar in the late 1990s, it quickly became a medium for youths
to critique contemporary Mongolian society. The most popular hip-hop groups
of this period, Dain ba Enkh (War and Peace), Lumino, IceTop, and Digital, often
took aim at ineffectual or corrupt government institutions, lampooning them
through sharp visual and musical satire. They also rapped about the problems of
domestic violence, alcoholism, or being young, poor, and powerless in a society
of enormous inequalities (Marsh 2010).
“Gennie” (Gennie Bolor), who represents the next generation of hip-hop
artists, is one of the first female rappers to appear on the scene. Called by her
friends the “Queen of Mongolian hip-hop,” she has broadened the perspectives
of hip-hop’s societal gaze since she started singing in the early 2000s (Binks
2012).8 Gennie was one of many in Mongolia, including artists, politicians, and
environmentalists, who raised concerns about the environmental and social
costs of mining in the nation’s countryside. She equated the foreign mining
corporations and Mongolians getting rich from their connections to them as
“muggers” plundering the nation’s natural wealth:
While the drunken Mongolia stumbles in madness and insanity,
Everything is taken from us, robbed and exploited by piracy,
The land is excavated and made a desert,
While the poor live for the day, these muggers get rich (ibid.).

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 In the music video for their 2013 song “Minii nutgiig nadad uldee” (Leave my
homeland to me, Video Example 5), the rappers Gee and Jonon imagine a
near-future homeland decimated by mining. The Mongolian countryside is
depicted as a barren landscape of sand and scrub. The once bountiful natural
environment has disappeared and, with it, the culture and customs that had for
centuries sustained the people who had lived within it. Gee, Jonon, and a small,
ragged band of survivors stagger through this landscape, finding buried in the
sand bits and pieces of the life they—and by extension, their nation—once had.
The singers’ message is stark:
We are forgetting our ancestors.
The real treasure doesn’t exist underground,
It exists in our intelligence, our blood, and our land.
We trade the gold for money, but we can’t eat money.

In referencing tropes of land, blood, and the ancestors, these songs move
beyond mere social criticism to sentiments of nationalist outrage. Some orga-
nizations have fed off of such sentiments, including neo-Nazi groups that have
threatened violence against foreigners, particularly those perceived as being
ethnically Chinese (Barria 2013, Henderson 2016). While few Mongolians openly
support such extreme views, Khaltmaa Battulga was elected in the 2016 presi-
dential election. His populist messages amplified fears of threats to the nation’s
sovereignty posed by foreign corporations and he called for changes at the highest
levels of the nation’s government (Campbell and Edwards 2019; Edwards 2016).
In contrast to the outrage and pessimism of the hip-hop artists, R&B singer
D. Bold saw the opportunity in 2010 to promote a different vision of Mongolia’s
future. One of the founding members of the 1990s boyband Camerton, Bold
described his new project, Mongol Pop, as a “new trend in Mongolian pop
music,” one that “combines the old traditional instruments with modern pop
music, making a new style that does not lose the beauty of the traditions of my
nation” (D. Bold interview by Lauren Knapp, April 12, 2012). He introduced the
new style in two solo albums from this period, Mongol Pop (2010) and Mongol
Pop 2 (2013).
The song “Kheeriin salkhtai ayalguu” (Melody of the windy steppe, Video
Example 6), from the first of these albums, provides a good example of this
so-called new style. Like many songs in both Mongolian and R&B traditions,
“Kheeriin salkhtai ayalguu” is about love; but in this case the object of the
singer’s attention is not a person, but the horsehead fiddle or morin khuur, a
folk musical instrument with deep roots in Mongolian culture (see Chapter 5
in this volume). For many Mongolians, the instrument has become a cultural
icon whose image and sound embodies Mongolia’s ancient cultural heritage
(Marsh 2009:133). The video associates the instrument with Chinggis Khan, the

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 Mongol Empire, and a host of other cultural elements: a man carving wood to
make the horsehead fiddle, a young woman in traditional dress performing a
folk dance, and a child undergoing his first haircutting ceremony. At one point,
an intergenerational group of Mongolians are shown gathered for a traditional
nair (an informal social gathering) where they drink milk tea, flirt, and listen to
fiddle music. At another point in the video, young buff Mongolian herders chase
after and lasso wild horses. And throughout the video, paralleling the refrain,
“My horsehead fiddle, whose sound is the highest worship,” people are shown
raising horsehead fiddles into the air, strings upward, in a sign of respect. For
Mongolian viewers, such lyrical and visual references point to cultural elements
rooted in the Mongolian deep past, the period preceding the People’s Revolu-
tion of 1921 (Humphrey 1992:375). But Bold also includes images of well-known
contemporary folk fiddlers and ensembles, including the State Horsehead Fiddle
Ensemble. The cover photograph of the Mongol Pop 2 album shows a similar
mixture of old and new, featuring Bold in suit and tie presiding over a “party”
with other young Mongolian millennials, some dressed in Western clothing and
others in traditional clothing (some even from the pre-Revolutionary period).
Bold’s vision of the future appears quite different from those of the rap-
pers Gennie, Gee, and Jonon. In contrast to the dystopian vision portraying
Mongolians walking mindlessly (that is, sleepwalking) into a period of cultural
forgetting and destruction, Bold’s vision appears more utopian, one in which
Mongolians live a cosmopolitan lifestyle that embraces and honors both the
best of the global and the local. For him, it seems, a synthesis of the traditional
and the modern, the past and present, is the only way to move forward. That
such views parallel the Mongolian government’s policies of cultural preserva-
tion and promotion could explain, in part, why it awarded Bold the prestigious
Töriin shagnalt (State Award) in 2014, the highest award presented to Mongolian
citizens by the government.9 The contrasting approaches to these issues may
also be related to a difference in perspective between those of the cultural elite,
to which Bold belongs, and those of the lower or middle classes, to which Gee
and Gennie belonged when they wrote their songs.

“Nobody Understands It but Everyone Feels It”:

The Hu Plots Global Conquest
The Hu came together as a band in 2016 within this cultural milieu, and
by the time it released its first video two years later, there was little to point to
in the band’s makeup, instrumentation, appearance, or lyrics that was radi-
cally different from what had come before. The band’s mixture of Mongolian
and Western rock styles and instruments was hardly new; Mongolian popular
music has been syncretic since its origins in the 1970s. The band’s costumes,

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 body movement (including the “head banging”) and use of nature imagery in
its videos are also all variations on what other Mongolian artists and bands had
done for decades. And, lyrical references to Mongolians sleeping, forgetting,
or mindlessly wandering through life were well established tropes long before
The Hu used them, as was the practice of using popular music to critique social
behavior and advocate for “remembering” or “honoring” their nation’s past and
its “oath” to its ancestors.
And yet, within weeks of their release, The Hu’s first two videos were viewed
and shared by millions of people around the world, and within months the band
began to receive offers to record and tour in the West. While there are many
factors that account for this rapid and extraordinary success, the two innovations
that stand out are the transcultural nature of the band’s music and imagery and
the means by which the band has promoted them. The four core members of
The Hu and its producer, Dashka (B. Dashdondag), all keen observers of global
metal, fashioned a sonic and visual syncretism that mixed key elements of this
global musical tradition with their own folk cultural heritage and then took
advantage of the transnational nature of the global metal community, of which
social media platforms play a key role, to get this music into the ears and before
the eyes of as many people as possible. More than any other Mongolian artist
or band, The Hu has fashioned a syncretic product that was designed from the
start to “go viral.”
In Metal Rules the Globe (2011), Jeremy Wallach, Harris Berger, and Paul
Greene list a set of core musical qualities that characterize the metal genre and
provides “a musical center of gravity to the growing and diversifying global
scene.” These qualities include: “the distinctive timbre of the heavily distorted
electric guitar;10 either soaring or raspy and unpitched vocals (including shout-
ing, shrieking, and growling); prominent use of a Western drum set, often with
a heavy emphasis on double-bass drums; and energetic and prominent guitar
figuration, in the form of the virtuosic melodic expression of classic heavy metal
guitar solos or the fast-paced riffs of thrash metal” (Wallach et al. 2011:11). The
Hu’s form of metal provides an interesting take on this list. While the band uses
an electric guitar and bass, the lead roles are played by two horsehead fiddles and
a tovshuur, and in many of the group’s songs, the mixing of the electric guitar,
bass, and amplified folk instruments produces a musical timbre that sounds
akin to the “distorted” guitar sound referred to by Wallach et al. The solos,
played by electric guitar in most other metal bands, are performed by one or
both horsehead fiddles. In addition to a Western drum set, the band uses what
it calls “Mongolian drums,” basically a set of large drums of various sizes that
emphasize lower frequency beats and rhythms.11 The group’s vocals are typically
sung in one or more forms of khöömii, individually or in various groupings,

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 which gives them a raspy and often guttural timbre that sounds, again, akin to
those often heard in other forms of metal music.
The core members of the band (Gala and Enkush on horsehead fiddle, Jaya
on vocals, and Temka on tovshuur) constitute a folk or folk-rock music ensemble
of the sort that would be familiar to their domestic audiences, whether or not
the group is playing by themselves or with the other members of their extended
group.12 But many non-Mongolian listeners report hearing this syncretism as a
subgenre of metal. Through their reaction videos, metal influencers were some
of the first to promote the music of The Hu and many of their responses have
focused on the band’s unique music sound. Metalhead Reacts, for instance, de-
scribes the sound of “Yuve yuve yu” as “very interesting. It’s got a very tribal feel
about it. . . . It’s the way they’ve merged the classic native style of the Mongolian
music with the rock elements, and it really works very well.”13 He goes on to say,
“It’s just so much fun, such an enjoyable piece of music . . . It made me happy! . . .
And it’s something I’ve never even thought of before. You hear of Viking metal
and all these sorts of metal, like Pirate metal, for example, but I’ve never even
considered Mongolian rock. It’s one of those things that’s never crossed my mind,
yet it seems so obvious, really.” Gaming Patrol says, “I loved the aspects of the
traditional. I liked the bit of modern rock, the modern heavy metal.”14 Bowser’s
Reaction Pit compared the music of this song to that of Rammstein, the German
heavy metal group: “It’s a different kind of Rammstein, but it reminds me a lot
about it!”15 The Nobodies, a father and son pair, asked if The Hu’s music was really
heavy metal but then answered the question themselves: “It’s such a weird form
of metal. I’ve never heard a song like this,” and then ended their video saying,
“That had to be the weirdest-slash-most unique metal song I think I have ever
listened to. I’m so lost at what was happening, but it was so freakin’ good!”16
Rock critics have also described the group’s style as a genre of heavy metal
rock music and not a “metal-like” folk music. Neil McCormick of The Telegraph
called The Hu “the biggest Mongolian throat singing heavy metal band in the
world. To be fair, it’s a niche genre” (McCormick 2020). Roison O’Connor of the
Independent writes, “The HU may be pegged as a metal band—you can certainly
hear traces of Metallica and Rammstein—but there’s a level of technical skill
their classical training . . . provides that feels relatively unmatched in modern
popular music” (O’Connor 2020). British journalist Robin Askew gets at the
transcultural aspect of the music in her review:
[Heavy] metal is a universal language, inspiring and exciting musicians around
the world. Rather than simply aping the likes of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest,
the best of them bring their own culture and instrumentation to the form.
The classically trained members of The Hu are no exception (Askew 2020).

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 Non-Mongolian audiences also appear to experience the band’s music in ways
similar to other more mainstream forms of metal. Numerous videos posted on
YouTube.com show live performances of the band in various locales in the U.S.
and Europe, from nightclubs to festival stages, with audiences packed together
by the hundreds or thousands (these concerts preceded the global pandemic
of 2020–2021). Many in these audiences visibly respond to the musical sound
by head-banging and raising their hands in the air to either clap or show the
Dio sign (the index finger and the little finger are upright and the thumb is
clasped against the two middle fingers)17 to communicate their appreciation
to the band. While we cannot say for sure without formal surveys what these
audience members were experiencing, we can deduct from their behavior that
many of them were feeling intense pleasure or “flow” from the music. They may
have been experiencing what Wallach et al. call “affective overdrive,” a kind of
sonic and affective saturation generated by the “sheer volume and rich timbres
of metal fill[ing] the audible sound spectrum,” which is a key constituent of the
global metal tradition (Wallach et al. 2011:13).
Such powerful sonic experiences are often associated with equally powerful
ideas and stories. Wallach et al. found that “[d]espite significant differences
across national and regional metal scenes, . . . all metalheads, regardless of their
preferred subgenre or subgenres, view metal as the opposite of light entertain-
ment. To them, it is a form of serious music that endorses a particular set of
values” (ibid. 2011:8). The Hu’s songs deal with “serious” themes, such as the need
to remember and connect with one’s ancestors (“Yuve yuve yu”), that strength
can be found within one’s community (“Wolf Totem” and “The Great Chinggis
Khan”), and that greed can lead to personal and communal destruction (“Sad
But True”).
What is particularly interesting, however, is that The Hu only sing its songs
in the Mongolian language, meaning that most of the group’s non-Mongolian
audience do not understand its lyrics. And yet, many in the English-speaking
audiences outside of Mongolia report that the language is not an issue for them.
Some even likened the sound of the Mongolian language (with its sharp con-
sonances, heavy accents, and guttural sounds) as being like “another instru-
ment”18 and as deepening their affective experience with the music. The metal
influencer Galacticriminal says in his response video to “Yuve yuve yu” that
“doing [the song] in their style but also doing it in their own language just gave
it this different edge and feel and tone . . . [and added] to the eerie nature of this
thing . . . that, man, gives me chills each and every single time”19 Many of his
viewers express agreement with him in their comments: “Nazaire Dragonash”
writes: “Mongolian throat singing was MADE for metal. Lol! these guys rock
it”; “Larry Paul” writes: “You don’t need to understand what they are saying
for it to sound great!” Similar responses are posted in the comments of other

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 of The Hu’s videos. “Eric Mink” writes: “Nobody understands it but everyone
feels it.”20 “Neko Bat” writes: “I don’t have to understand the words. I feel it in
my soul. It speaks to me on a deep level as if I should know somehow.”21
In fact, the range of responses in English posted in YouTube.com alone points
to just how broad an audience the band is reaching. Many responders appear to
be metalheads, relating the sound of the band to other Western and Asian metal
bands, but others admit to being moved by particular aspects of the music. The
masculine and warrior-like character of the music and visuals evokes in some
responders a sense of the primitive. “RoadLord2000” writes: “I love the fusion
of rock rhythms with traditional instruments, these guys put forth a killer pri-
mordial, atavistic sound. Honestly, Klingons made real, warrior/poets right here
on Earth.”22 “Just Kylie” writes: “This animalistic, primal, masculine kind of stuff
really gets into my soul as a human woman. It’s why I love metal-type music so
much. We don’t see much masculinity in society today, especially in modern
music, so seeing it ‘worshipped’ in a pure form within alternative musics still,
and appreciated by people, is so refreshing.”23 “Cj W” was one of many viewers
looking in from outside the metal community who wrote of being surprised
by the power and attractiveness of the group’s music: “I’m a 58yr old Grandma.
Thought my headbanging days were over. NOPE! Teaching my grandkids with
The HU!!!”24 Other responders explain how they related to the environmental
and spiritual messages in The Hu’s music. “Eric Davis” writes:
Yuve Yuve Yu is a song about cultural identity and heritage, questioning why
so much has been lost, and yearning to recover the wisdom of the elders. . . . I
feel that is a common thread and common yearning and desire among many
people . . . to rediscover their cultural roots and heritage, and identity. Many
of us are not alone in having that feeling. It’s there for a reason. I believe that
is why this song makes us a bit happy. We are not alone in looking for old
and powerful truth, and honorable wisdom.25

And “Beanee B.” connects The Hu’s mission to his own Brazilian culture and
family:
I think that living in modern times, we forget how powerful nature, art and
belief is a thread that combines us to our ancestors. It is foolish to think we
have ‘outsmarted’ our past with modern technology because our past is forever
linked to us. We should cherish it. This [music] is so beautiful and reminds
me of my Brazilian culture and how our family links the importance of our
ancestry into our present. It reminds me to never forget and honor those who
came before us. They laid the path we follow.26

Such wide-ranging and culturally specific responses to The Hu’s music points to
the band’s ability to create musical experiences that speak to people of diverse
backgrounds and interests.

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 That the music of The Hu could even reach such a broad and diverse com-
munity is also related to important innovations in how the band disseminated
its music. Earlier generations of Mongolian popular artists and bands first built
their reputations by giving concerts, selling recordings, and touring. Later
generations added Facebook accounts, websites, and videos on television and
YouTube. While all these strategies helped many performers establish their ca-
reers domestically and to some extent internationally (particularly in diaspora
communities around the globe), Mongolian popular music never really caught
on or took off outside of its home country. Mongolian artists have long had to
contend with a global system of popular music dissemination that was decid-
edly stacked against them and other “small” nations. The transnational flows of
popular music have long been viewed as moving from a center to the periphery,
dominant cultures to marginal ones, or “developed countries—particularly the
United States—to the rest of the world” (Garofalo 1993:17). Even with the rise
of new centers of musical production in Asia, the music of the ‘peripheries’ like
Mongolia was still broadly controlled by powerful corporations that maintained
the ability to define and label what is heard in the musical mainstream.
But the rise of social media and accompanying global financial platforms in
the past decade has dramatically shifted these dynamics. Korean popular music
or K-pop used highly produced and near-cinematic quality music videos and a
convergence of international marketing and promotions connected with inter-
national sales and streaming platforms, which helped them to disseminate their
music beyond their national borders and into markets in the West in the late
2000s and 2010s (Puri 2019). That the first video to reach one billion views on
YouTube.com was Psy’s “Gangnam Style” (2012), a video sung almost entirely in
the Korean language, demonstrates the new opportunities these technological
and financial advancements give to global popular artists.
Perhaps following in line with their Korean neighbors, The Hu choose to
introduce itself via two highly produced and high-quality music videos that
were disseminated via YouTube and other forms of social media. Doing this
allowed the group to bypass the hegemonic mediators of traditional media
corporations that had so limited the music of earlier generations of Mongolian
popular artists. The Hu also leveraged the transnational character of the global
metal community. Wallace et al. argues that metal has “constituted itself as a
set of communities of fans, bands, and mediators” on a global scale that is not
defined by national borders nor shared languages (2011:46).27 Metal influenc-
ers like “Metalhead Reacts” were some of the first to widely spread the group’s
songs within the metal community in late 2018. But comments on their videos
also suggest that fans were discovering and sharing the videos with others on
their own as well.28

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 That the band had hoped for this kind of viral spread of its music throughout
this community is suggested in comments members made to journalist Zigor
Aldama of the Post Magazine. Horsehead fiddler Enkush told him, “‘We were
confident in word-of-mouth and it has worked a miracle. Our success has been
organic. There has been no promoting or using management tools to increase
visits. People are just telling friends they have to hear our songs’” (Aldama 2019).
The band has continued to expand its presence within the metal community
through media interviews and its “discover The Hu”-type videos, which allow
fans behind-the-scenes views into the lives of the band’s members. Lead singer
Jaya added, “‘We kind of expected this reaction, because we thought our music
would fit better with foreign audiences. We were born with global ambition’”
(ibid.).
While The Hu’s initial success has been extraordinary, it is still small rela-
tive to the enormous success Korean popular music groups, such as BTS, have
achieved in the same period.29 But that small Asian nations could reach this
degree of mainstream recognition and success points to how far the dynamics
of global popular music have shifted in the preceding decade, particularly with
the rise of international sales and streaming platforms. Fatima Bhutto (2019:19)
sees another reason for the wide acceptance of Korean pop music and culture,
pointing to what she describes as “a vast cultural movement emerging from
the Global South” that is increasingly creating and consuming pop culture not
specifically Western but “global in its range and allure”:
Carefully packaging not-always-secular modernity with traditional values
in urbanized settings, they have created a new global pop culture that can be
easily consumed, especially by the many millions coming late to the modern
world and still negotiating its overwhelming challenges.

Bhutto argues that this new global pop culture represents “new arbiters of mass
culture arising from the East” that threatens the continued dominance of West-
ern forms of popular culture. The degree to which The Hu’s music and imagery
diverges from its Western models, particularly in its openness to traditional
spirituality, embrace of the national, and critique of Western forms of modernity,
suggests that it too may be added to Bhutto’s list of cultural forms.
The Hu has shown itself to be especially good at reading and reacting to shifts
in the global popular music landscape. It has fashioned high-quality sounds
and images that are compelling to non-Mongolian audiences around the world,
packaged them in formats well suited to the small screens of computers and
mobile devices, and focused on cultivating a place within the transnational metal
community. The band’s success has already brought renewed attention to other
Mongolian heavy metal groups, including those of Inner Mongolian origin, such

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 as Tengger Cavalry, Hanggai, and Nine Treasures, and even Tuvan folk-metal
groups, such as Yat-Kha and Hartyga. It may be too early to measure the scope
of The Hu’s rapid and extraordinary success on Mongolian popular music as a
whole. But it is possible that the band’s unique tweaking of past practices and
innovative embrace of new ones will serve as a model for other artists seeking
to bring Mongolian music to global audiences.

Notes
1. By September 2021, these figures had reached 82 million and 58 million views,
respectively.
2. Both folk music groups have actively toured outside of Mongolia. Khusugtun
appeared at the BBC Proms music festival in 2011 and Asia’s Got Talent in 2015 (the
YouTube recordings of each have garnered over 4.8 million views and 3.4 million
views, respectively, as of September 2021). The Altai Band’s YouTube video “The
Altai Band from Mongolia” had 2.3 million views as of January 2021.
3. “Civilization VI: Mongolia Theme, Morin Khuur and throat singing by Nature,”
YouTube video, uploaded by Tengger Cavalry Official, 16:36, February 7, 2018, https://
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqkrBkITgD0; “Doom Video Game Composer Assem-
bles Metal Vocalists for ‘Doom Eternal’ Soundtrack,” Ghost Cult Magazine, March
16, 2019, https://www.ghostcultmag.com/doom-video-game-composer-assembles
-metal-vocalists-for-doom-eternal-soundtrack.
4. Carnegie Hall, “Presented by Tengger Calvary: Mongolian Nomadic Folk Mu-
sic Concert,” Concert Announcement, September 20, 2018, https://www.carnegiehall
.org/calendar/2018/09/20/mongolian-nomadic-folk-music-concert-0800pm.
5. See our companion website, www.mongoliansoundworlds.org, for additional
information on the musical traditions included in this volume.
6. In the post-socialist period, Altanzaya installed a monument in central Ulaan-
baatar in honor of the Beatles that incorporated this concept of a peephole.
7. Har Sarnai’s song “Minii nutag” (My homeland) is based on the words of a
famous poem of the same name by the twentieth-century Mongolian poet Dash-
dorjiin Natsagdorj.
8. In one scene in Mongolian Bling, Gennie begins a rap she wrote about the
status of women in Mongolia: “I’m one of the women who are the majority among
our few people, / In this society of chaos, everybody says they have equal rights, /
To be honest, there is very little truth in that” (Binks 2012).
9. As the youngest recipient of this award, the decision to select him for it was
controversial among many in Mongolia, given that it typically goes to individu-
als at the end of their careers who have made important lifetime contributions to
Mongolian society and culture.
10. In 1993, Robert Walser characterized the heavily distorted guitar sound as
“the most important aural sign of heavy metal” (1993:41). Wallach et al. further this
point by describing this sound as “a central and defining feature of heavy metal,
and a musical performance that lacks this timbre probably would not be considered
part of the metal scene” (Wallach, Berger, and Greene 2011:11).

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 11. One of the drummers for the group stated in an interview how he played on
“custom-made drums based on the size and sound of many Mongolian drums” (The
Hu, “The HU—Covid-19 Relief Effort Fundraising Concert,” YouTube video, 1:16:14,
posted by The HU, June 28, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik5qhnqIZy8.).
But it should be noted, however, that drums are not typically used in Mongolian
folk music.
12. YouTube videos are available that feature the four core members performing
acoustic versions of their songs.
13. “Metalhead, “Metalhead Reacts to ‘Yuve Yuve Yu’ by The Hu,” YouTube video, 14:13,
posted by MetalHead Reacts, November 26, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
5TjYOcWy5cc.
14. “The Hu Yuve, Yuve, Yu Reaction.” YouTube video, 9:45, posted by Patrol
Gaming, August 5, 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGWnG2lmO74.
15. “The HU, Yuve, Yuve, Yu—Reaction.” YouTube video, 8:41, posted by Bowzer’s
Reaction Pit, January 2, 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWX75BvhD3E.
16. “THESE GUYS NEVER DISAPPOINT!!!: Yuve, Yuve, Yu (The Hu) (reaction).”
YouTube video, 12:09, posted by The Nobodies Reacts, May 21, 2019, https://www.youtube
.com/watch?v=EnTMSb6ZhdY.
17. BBC World Service, “Dio’s Two-finger Gesture—What Does it Mean,” News
Magazine, May 18, 2010, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8687002.stm.
18. “Metalhead Reacts to ‘Yuve Yuve Yu’ by The Hu,” YouTube video, 14:12, posted
by MetalHead Reacts, November 26, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
5TjYOcWy5cc.
19. “The HU—Sad But True (Metallica Cover) Reaction / Review,” YouTube video,
11:14, posted by Galacticriminal, December 9, 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
rsiRtbFUisk.
20. The Hu, “Yuve Yuve Yu (Official Music Video),” YouTube video, 5:52, posted
by The HU, September 27, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4xZUr0BEfE.
21. “The HU—Wolf Totem feat. Jacoby Shaddix of Papa Roach (Official Music
Video),” YouTube video, 5:14, posted by The HU, December 13, 2019, https://www
.youtube.com/watch?v=sv29DzgiXZA.
22. “The HU—Covid-19 Relief Effort Fundraising Concert,” YouTube video, 1:16:14,
posted by The HU, June 28, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik5qhnqIZy8.
23. “Vocal Coach reacts—The HU-Wolf Totem,” YouTube video, 10:11, posted
by Rebecca Vocal Athlete, February 25, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
JdYptfDPIj0.
24. “The HU—Covid-19 Relief Effort Fundraising Concert,” YouTube video, 1:16:14,
posted by The HU, June 28, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik5qhnqIZy8.
25. “Metalhead Reacts to ‘Yuve Yuve Yu’ by The Hu,” YouTube video, 14:13, posted
by MetalHead Reacts, November 26, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
5TjYOcWy5cc.
26. “The Hu—Shireg Shireg (Acoustic Performance),” YouTube video, 5:47,
posted by Better Noise Music, July 1, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
8O7mJwuSyVA.

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 27. Weinstein (2011:46) suggests, “Metal is transcultural, not cross-cultural. In
other words, metal is not a music tied to a particular culture, which people in other
cultures happen to enjoy as outsiders; rather, metal is the music of a group of people
that transcends other preexisting cultural and national boundaries.”
28. Metalhead Reacts’ video of “Yuve Yuve Yu,” for instance, was posted in late
November 2018, about two months after The Hu released the video, and it includes
many fan comments describing how they were made aware of the video by the You-
Tube “suggestion” algorithm or by others in their online community (“Metalhead
Reacts to ‘Yuve Yuve Yu’ by The Hu,” YouTube video, 14:13, posted by MetalHead
Reacts, November 26, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TjYOcWy5cc.).
29. BTS, which Time Magazine named the 2020 “Entertainer of the Year,” typi-
cally has hundreds of millions of views of its songs on YouTube.com.

Video Examples
Video 1: The Hu, Yuve Yuve Yu (Official Music Video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
v4xZUr0BEfE.
Video 2: The Hu, Wolf Totem (Official Music Video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
jM8dCGIm6yc.
Video 3: Tengger Cavalry—Lone Wolf (Official Video). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
7rL7-WfzdLI.
Video 4: Soyol Erdene, Tsenkher zalaa. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6m
EemDp9qo.
Video 5: Gee and Jonon, Minii nutgiig nadad uldee. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
Xr25ljRX-lY.
Video 6: D. Bold, Kheeriin salhitai ayalguu. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
Q61d4B7GCqM.

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-mongolia-rapidly-becoming-minegolia.
Marsh, Peter K. 2009. The Horse-Head Fiddle and the Cosmopolitan Reimagination of
Tradition in Mongolia. New York: Routledge.
———. 2010. “Our Generation Is Opening Its Eyes: Hip-Hop and Youth Identity in
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McCormick, Neil. 2020. “The Hu, Electric Ballroom, Review: A Galloping Triumph of a
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 Theunissen, Tirza. 2014. “Poverty, Inequality, and the Negative Effects of Mongolia’s Eco-
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 Glossary

All entries below are Mongolian-language terms unless otherwise noted.

aimag: Province (named league or chuulgan in Inner Mongolia).

aizam urtyn duu: Extended long-song.
aqyn: Kazakh poet-singer.
Ar Mongol: Northern Mongolia (Mongolia).
auyl: Kazakh residential community.
baigal’: Nature, existence.
banner (khoshuu): Regional subdivisions in Inner Mongolia that were put into place
during the Qing Dynasty.
besreg urtyn duu: An abbreviated long-song that is less demanding in terms of
musical technique.
bie/biyelgee: A form of traditional dance.
bogino duu: Short-song.
bönjignökh: A soft trill in long-song.
chimeglel: Ornaments.
choor: Skin-faced, two-string spike fiddle from eastern Inner Mongolia.
dayaarshil: Globalization.
dombyra: Two-string Kazakh plucked lute.
domog: Legend or folktale.
dörvön chikhtei khuur: Four-string spike fiddle.
doshpuluur: Three-string Tuvan plucked lute.
duuchin/duuch: Singer.
gazryn ezed: Spirit beings who are considered masters of the land.
ger: Portable, round felt tent (yurt).
igil: Skin-faced ladle fiddle from Tuva.
ikh khuur: Bass fiddle.
ikil: Skin-faced ladle fiddle from western Mongolia.

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 isgeree khöömii: Mongolian whistle-style khöömii.
jiriin urtyn duu: Medium-length long-song (lit. common song). Exchangeable with
terms such as suman urtyn duu, tügeemel urtyn duu.
kargyraa: Tuvan chest-style khöömii.
khadag: Ceremonial silk scarf presented to elders and honored guests as a sign of
respect. Also tied to a tree or post near an ovoo and on the neck of a stringed
instrument.
khalyq äni: Kazakh folk song.
khamtlag: Ensemble or band (zuhe in Chinese).
kharkhiraa: Mongolian chest-style khöömii.
khar’ltsaa duu: A repartee song.
khöömii: Throat singing (also spelled khöömei [xöömei] mainly in Tuva).
khöömiich: Performer of Mongolian throat singing (khöömeizih in Tuvan).
khuur: Fiddle (generic) or two-string spike fiddle (specific).
khuurch: Fiddler.
küi: Kazakh narrative instrumental genre.
limbe: Side-blown flute.
magtaal: Praise song.
morin khuur: Two-string horsehead fiddle.
naadam: The annual national festival in Mongolia held in July featuring horse racing,
wrestling, and archery.
nair: Celebration, feast.
Nei Menggu: Inner Mongolia in Chinese.
nugulaa: Short ornament or appoggiatura in long-song.
nutag: Homeland.
Övör Mongol: Southern Mongolia (Inner Mongolia).
ovoo: Rock cairn.
qara öleng: Kazakh lyrical song, often with improvised text.
shakhaa: Technique of vocal tension or pressed phonation used to produce dense
timbres in khöömii.
shurankhai: Falsetto used in long-song.
sihu: Chinese term for the Mongolian four-string spike fiddle (dörvön chikhtei khuur
in Mongolian).
sum: Smallest level of land-based division in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia.
sybyzghy: Kazakh end-blown flute.
tabighat: Kazakh term for nature.
tatlaga: Genre of fiddle music often used to accompany dance in western Mongolia,
uses double-stops and ostinati to imitate the sound of a horse’s gait.
terme: Kazakh vocal composition shared in social gatherings; texts record historical
and geographic information.
tögrög: Mongolian currency.
toi: Kazakh celebration.
tolghau: Kazakh vocal composition, often with reflective and philosophical lyrics.
tovshuur: Two-string plucked lute.

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 tsagaan sar: Lunar new year celebration (lit. white month).
tsam: Ritual masked dance performed as part of Mongolian and Tibetan Buddhist
ceremonies.
tsokhilt/tsokhilgo: A strong laryngeal trill in long-song; also a technique to express
percussive movement (strumming/tonguing) in instrumental music.
tsuur: End-blown flute made of wood or reed (known as modyn tsuur in Inner
Mongolia).
tughan zher: Kazakh term for homeland.
tuul’: Historical or heroic epic.
tuul’ch: Performer of epic songs.
ulaanmöchir: Traveling performing arts troupes in Inner Mongolia (lit. red branch).
ülger: Tale.
ündesten: Nationality.
urtyn duu: Long-song.
Wai Menggu: Outer Mongolia in Chinese.
xiaoshu minzu: Minority nationality in Chinese.
yastan: Sub-ethnic group (lit. bone group).
yatga: Zither with movable bridges.
yazguur: Origin.
yerööl: Prayer.
yochin: Hammered dulcimer.
yuanshengtai: Term in Chinese associated with artistic and cultural forms that
maintain connections to their roots or source (lit. original ecology).
zhaylau: Kazakh summer encampment.
zhyrau: Kazakh epic singer.
zokhiolyn duu: Composed song mostly in the country-folk style.

Glossary 275

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 Contributors

BAYARSAIKHAN BADAMSÜREN is a luthier and musician in Ulaanbaatar,

Mongolia. He has been making the morin khuur (horsehead fiddle) for over
twenty years and has also studied violin-making in the UK.
OTGONBAYAR CHULUUNBAATAR studied Mongolian Studies and Linguistics
at the National University of Mongolia in Ulaanbaatar. She works as a contracted
researcher at the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. Her research focuses on
the music, heritage, and language of the Mongolian peoples. Currently, she is
investigating song lyrics and musical instruments from the everyday culture
of the Oirad people in western Mongolia. Since her youth, she has been both a
singer of and an expert in Mongolian music.
ANDREW COLWELL is an applied ethnomusicologist with a focus on indigene-
ity, heritage-making, and globalization. He currently serves as Project Director
and Staff Ethnomusicologist at the Center for Traditional Music and Dance in
New York City. As a practicing khöömiich and multi-instrumentalist, he has
given numerous workshops and performances and has collaborated with artists
that include the ethno-rock band Altan Urag, English pianist Steve Tromans,
and others.
JOHANNI CURTET is a musician, ethnomusicologist, producer, and khöömii
teacher. His research focuses on traditional Mongolian music, transmission,
history, and intangible cultural heritage. He teaches ethnomusicology at the
University of Rennes 2, and has given guest lectures in Switzerland, the US, and
Mongolia. He is also an Artistic Director of Routes Nomades, an organization
with which he has arranged tours for Mongolian musicians since 2006. In 2010,
he participated in writing the proposal to nominate khöömii for inscription on

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 the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Human-
ity. He has also produced films and recordings of khöömii.
TSERENDAVA A DASHDORJ is a celebrated khöömii singer from Chandman’
in Khovd aimag, Mongolia. He has performed widely, not only in Mongolia but
also in other Asian regions and in Europe.
CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN is a faculty member in the Department of Music at
Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, NY. She focuses her research on music,
ethnic identity, musical borderlands, and heritage politics in Inner Mongolia,
China. Aside from her academic work, she considers herself a lifelong student
of the Chinese erhu, Mongolian morin khuur, Irish fiddle, and classical viola.
TAMIR HARGANA is a Chicago-based musician and award-winning performer
of Mongolian and Tuvan music. He grew up in Inner Mongolia and received
an MA in World Music Performance from Northern Illinois University in 2017.
PETER K. MARSH focuses his scholarly work on issues related to musical tradi-
tion and modernity in Mongolia, with particular emphasis on two-string folk
fiddles and popular music. He is an ethnomusicologist and music historian
with broad interdisciplinary training and experience as a teacher, scholar, and
administrator. He is also a specialist in the area of Asian music and culture.
A Professor in the Department of Music at California State University, East
Bay, Peter served as Founding Resident Director of the American Center for
Mongolian Studies, an academic-oriented nongovernment organization based
in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
K. OK T YABR spent his childhood and young adulthood in Deluun sum in
Bayan-Ölgii province in Mongolia as a herder and poet-musician. He moved
from the countryside to Ölgii city in 2008.
REBEK AH PLUECKHAHN is a McArthur Research Fellow in Anthropology at
the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Her
research discusses emerging urban politics and ethics of ownership in Ulaan-
baatar, Mongolia, as well as explorations of sociality and performance. Prior to
joining the University of Melbourne in 2019, Rebekah worked as a postdoctoral
Research Associate for four years at University College London—Anthropol-
ogy (UCL).
JENNIFER C. POST engages in scholarly research on Central and Inner Asian
music and musical instruments and their production. Her studies in Mongolia
with Kazakh pastoralists living in the Altai Mountain region address music in
relation to homeland and place, new mobilities, well-being, and environmental
change. Recent work also explores sound and music as expressive forms that are

278 Contributors

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 sources for sustaining traditional ecological knowledge in social, cultural, and
ecological systems in Mongolia and other locations. She teaches ethnomusicol-
ogy at the University of Arizona.
SUNMIN YOON’S research focuses on the Mongolian oral traditions and music-
making involved in a broad range of folk song traditions, particularly urtyn
duu (long-song). Her work covers rural/urban dialogues, sensory/ecological
connections to local oral performance practices, and the ideological dimension
of music during the socialist and post-socialist eras. She is currently teaching at
the School of Music and the Department of Languages, Literatures & Cultures
at University of Delaware.

Contributors 279

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 Index

Page numbers in italics refer to figures. 220; marriage and motherhood, 116; musi-
cal knowledge in, 117–118; musical practice
Abu-Lughod, Janet, 229 of, 113–115; tovshuur and, 159, 166n4; as
agriculture, sedentary, 25, 64, 73 yastan (sub-ethnic group), 123n4. See also
Aikawa-Faure, Noriko, 221 Oirads; Uriankhai ethnic group
aizam (“difficult, skilled”) urtyn duu, 85, 86, “Altan aaruulyn amt” [The golden taste of
94, 104; defined, 108n1; ethnicity issues and, aaruul] (Zakhchin song), 103
92; feast songs, 102; professionalism and, Altan Urag [Golden Urag] (ethno-rock band),
106. See also urtyn duu 223, 243, 251
Alashan Plateau, 25, 26 Altan üyeiin ankhdachid (album of heritage
Aldama, Zigor, 267 khöömii), 217
Alimaa, A., 90, 98, 100 Altanzaya, 254, 268n6
alpine ecosystems, 23 “Altargana” (Buriad song), 76
“Alsaas domog duu” [A song of a legend from alternative rock, 231, 257, 258
far away] (song), 112 aman khuur (jaw harp), 77
Alshaa ethnic group, 33 “Amraa” [Sukhbaatar Amarmandakh] (Har
Altai, Republic of (Russia), 164, 205, 221 Sarnai member), 258
Altai Band, 251, 268n2 Amur-Heilong ecoregion, 26
“Altai magtaal” [In praise of Altai] (Luvan- Anda Union ensemble, 12, 56, 62, 68, 79–80,
sharav), 212, 213 149; “Buriat” song, 76–77; “Derlcha” song,
Altai Mountains, 17, 23, 37, 76, 103, 108; drone 74–75; documentary film about, 72; “Drink-
sound emitted by, 197; ethnic groups of, 155; ing Song,” 77–79; formation of, 70–72;
geography as source of local musical talent, “Holy Mountain” song, 75–76; Homeland
207; imagined for foreigners through mu- album (2016), 70, 75, 77; “Jangar” song, 75;
sic, 242; Oirad traditions in, 165 as neo-traditional ensemble, 62, 70; “Su-
Altain Khökhii mountain, 102–103 maro” song, 72–73; as “voice of Inner Mon-
“Altai Praise-Song,” 235, 241, 242 golia,” 69, 75, 79; Wind Horse album (2011),
Altai-Sayan ecoregion, 31, 34, 76, 205 70, 72; yuanshengtai movement and, 70
Altai Tavan Bogd National Park, 34 Anda Union: From the Steppes to the City
Altai Uriankhai ethnic group, 12, 13, 23, 41, (documentary film, 2011), 72, 73, 74, 78
89, 155; in Bayan Ölgii aimag, 34, 36; epics animals, domestic, 17, 21, 43, 147; health of,
(tuul’) of, 29–30, 121, 122; gendered musi- 37; herders’ communication with, 30–31,
cality and, 111; ger tents of, 27; khöömii and, 38; as part of extended family, 28; sounds

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 of, 32, 198–199; young animals, 37. See also Beckwith, Christopher, 229
livestock Berger, Harris, 262
animism, 29, 63, 114, 205, 207 besreg urtyn duu (simplified long-song), 85,
Anthology of Mongolian Khöömii (Curtet and 93, 102; defined, 108n1; ethnicity issues
Nomindari, 2017), 209 and, 92; professionalism and, 106. See also
Anxi Nature Reserve (Inner Mongolia), 25–26 urtyn duu
aqyn (Kazakh poet-singer), 39, 173 Between the Sky and Prairie (Ho album), 77
argali (wild mountain sheep), 23, 34, 37, Bhutto, Fatima, 267
178–179 bie/biyelgee (dance/gestural form), 32, 90
Ariunaa, T., 257 Binks, Benj, 253
Ariunbaatar, G., 8 biodiversity, 25, 26
Arkhangai aimag (Mongolia), 98 birds, 32, 37, 199; calls of, 39, 40; khöömii as
Ar Khorchin region (Inner Mongolia), 64, imitation of birdsong, 205, 207; bar headed
72, 74 goose, 37; black grouse, 23; crane, 26; cuck-
art music, Western, 3, 6, 8, 10, 68, 141, 213, 216 oo, 32, 39; owl, 39; ruddy duck, 37, 40
“art of inquiry,” instrument makers and, 171 bluegrass music, 58
Asia Society (New York City), 238, 238 body language, 31
Askew, Robin, 263 bogino duu (short-song), 212, 2, 97, 103, 109n7,
Atwood, Christopher, 97, 103, 123n4 115
Aubin, François, 213 Böken tau (Antelope mountain), 42
authenticity, 221, 238 Bold, D., 260, 261
Ayuurzana, E., 208 Buddhism, 10, 29, 63; epics (tuul’) and, 115,
163; lamas, 144; in pre-revolutionary Mon-
Badraa, J., 213, 234, 214, 216, 237 golia, 137; suppressed during socialist pe-
baigal’ (nature, existence), 199, 228, 231, 244 riod, 136; Tibetan, 101, 134n1, 160
“Bakharahal” [Pride] (Hurd song), 258 “Building an Iron and Steel City on the Grass-
balalaika, 156 land” (1958), 66
Balgan (fiddler), 144, 145, 153n2 Bulag, Chi, 137, 142–143, 143, 145, 146–147, 240
Baotou, city of (Inner Mongolia), 27, 70, 78 Bulag, Uradyn, 91, 105, 107, 109n6
Baranovitch, Nimrod, 67 Buriad ethnic group, 1, 63, 77, 79, 88; Chinese
Barga (Ba’erhu) Banners, 63 minorities classification system and, 76;
Bashkortostan, Republic of (Russia), 205 in Mongolia, 88, 108n3; in Russia, 108n3;
Batchuluun Ts., 151–152, 235 urtyn duu and, 92
Bates, Eliot, 172 Buryatia, Republic of (Russia), 205, 223n10
Batmunkh, B. (tovshuur maker), 156, 157, 158 Buyandelger, Manduhai, 115
Batsükh, D., 210, 220, 222
Bayad ethnic group, 23, 89, 99–100, 101, 104, camels, 5, 18, 36–37; herders’ vocalizations to,
155; khöömii masters, 210; tovshuur and, 199–200; skin used for instruments, 166n4;
162–163. See also Oirads sounds of, 32; wild camels, 23
Bayankhongor aimag (Mongolia), 104 Camerton (boy band), 257–258, 260
Bayan Ölgii aimag (Mongolia), 1, 12, 20n1, capitalism, 165, 216, 217, 228; Cold War and,
86, 114; Altai Mountains, 17; dombyras 233; globalization and, 227, 228, 230
made in, 181, 183, 191; domestication songs Carrizo, Liliana, 32–33
in, 32; eagle seal/emblem of, 170, 186; eth- cattle/cows, 5, 101
nic groups of, 34; instrument makers in, Central Asia, 10, 27, 173, 244; personality cults
13; Kazakhs in, 172–173; khöömii in, 210; of post-Soviet leaders, 88; Russian imperial
Oirads of, 155; sound worlds in, 36–39; ties expansion in, 36
to China and Kazakhstan, 189. See also Central Conservatory (Zhangjiakou), 65
Ölgii city Central Theater (Ulaanbaatar), 141
Bayarmagnai, B., 253, 254 Chakar Khaghans, 89
Bayarsaikhan, B., 8, 13, 129–130, 130–133, 134 Chandman’ nutagtaa örgökh shüleg [Poem of
Beatles, the, 240, 241, 255, 268n6 offering to Chandman’] (anonymous), 203

282 Index

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 Chandman’ sum, 204–205, 207, 213, 223, 236, Daniyal (dombyra maker), 175, 179–183, 182,
243, 243–244; as “birthplace of khöömii,” 186, 193n20
203, 217; institutional implementation Dariganga ethnic group, 23–24, 86, 90
of heritage-making in, 217–221; khöömii Darkhad ethnic group, 92, 96–98, 104, 23, 89,
masters in, 209–210; kinship networks in, 107
223n10. See also Khovd aimag Darkhan, city of, 24
Charles-Dominique, Luc, 221 Dasbalbar, O., 87
children, 28, 37, 116; development of voices, Dashka (B. Dashdondag), 262
200; hair-cutting ceremony, 113, 114, 119; Dashtseren, E., 243
khöömii technique and, 207 Daur ethnic group, 26, 55, 60n2, 76, 80n3
Chimeddorj G., 208, 210, 212–213, 234–235 Davaajav R., 208, 209, 213
China, imperial. See Qing (Manchu) Dynasty Dawe, Kevin, 172
China, People’s Republic of, 2, 11, 24, 26, 88, Dayan köl (Dayan nuur), 38
173; Altai Sayan ecoregion, 34; decline Decree of the President on the Development of
of spiritual/ecological knowledge in, 30; the Art of Khöömei (2006), 216
minority musicians since Mao era, 65–67; “Deltei tsenkher” [Light grey horse with a
Mongolia’s border with, 37; Qinghai region, mane] (song), 96
155; UNESCO Representative List of ICH democracy, 108, 165, 227; globalization and,
and, 68–69. See also Inner Mongolian 230, 239; “Khonkhny duu” song as anthem
Autonomous Region; Xinjiang Uyghur of, 256; transition to, 229, 239
Autonomous Region desert, 5, 23
Chinese (Mandarin) language, 65, 66 desert steppe, 23, 25
Chineseness, 64 Desjacques, Alain, 213
Chinggel (Anda Union member), 75–76, 77 D’Evelyn, Charlotte, 33, 12, 13, 149
Chinggis Khan, 6, 87, 138, 253, 258, 260 dombyra (two-string Kazakh lute), 2, 13, 156;
“Chinggis Khan” (Jargalsaikhan song), 256 in Bayan Ölgii aimag, 36; as iconic instru-
Chirgilchin (Tuvan ensemble), 71 ment of Kazakhs, 173–174; of Oktyabr, 17;
Choibalsan, Kh., 167n12 qara öleng accompanied with, 41; in small
choor (skin-faced box fiddle), 74, 144, 145 theater orchestras, 42
Chuluunbaatar, Otgonbayar, 13 dombyra making/makers, 13, 171, 191–192;
chuulgan (“leagues” in Qing system), 73 cut paper designs, 184, 187, 193n23; Dani-
Clifford, James, 228 yal, 179–183, 182, 186, 193n15; drawing of
climate change, 26, 172, 200 dombyra types, 177; Medixat, 186–189, 187,
Colwell, Andrew, 13, 206 190, 191; physical construction, 175, 181,
communism, 2, 140 187; Säken, 183–186, 185; social lives of,
Confucianism, 44n2 170–171, 191; soundboard designs, 170, 178;
Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intan- Sultanbai, 176–179, 178; tree species used
gible Cultural Heritage (UNESCO), 216, 221 for wood, 175–177, 180, 181, 183, 184, 186, 187,
Crossley, Pamela, 89 191, 192n12
cultural heritage, 18, 22, 26, 29, 33, 130, 134, 184, domestication songs, 32
228, 254, national programs and registries, domog (legend, folktale), 4
2, 65, 67–69, 80, 114–115, 211–212, 215–223, dongbei minge (Mandarin: “eastern folk
223n11, 224n12, 224n13, 230, preservation of, songs”), 73
204, 244–245, revival of, 258, 262, 265 Dorjdagva, Myagmarsürengiin, 101, 102
Cultural Revolution, 6, 66, 145 Dorjdagva J., 213
Curtet, Johanni, 13, 31, 234 Dornod aimag, 60n1, 141
Dörvöd ethnic group, 23, 36, 89, 100, 103,
Dala köl (Tal nuur), 35 108n3, 155; as historically Uigaryn Mongols,
dallaga ritual, 161 101; singers in Khovd aimag, 101–103. See
Damdinsüren, B., 8, 14n5, 234 also Oirads
Damdinsüren, Ts., 14n6 dörvön chikhtei khuur (sihu, skin-faced cylin-
dance, 32, 90, 232, 258, drical spike fiddle), 74, 144, 145

Index 283

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 doshpuluur (Tuvan plucked lute), 57, 71, 150 forests, 23, 34, 37, 43, 186; coniferous, 26; de-
Dugarjav, M., 8 struction of old-growth forests, 184
Dukha ethnic group, 23, 31 Frank, André, 229
Dundgov’ aimag, 33
“Galloping horses” [Mandarin: Wanma Ben-
ecological environments, 29, 95, 107, 175, 179; teng] (Chi Bulag), 146–147
health and well-being, 22, 29, 41; impact, Ganbold, M., 101
changes and challenges, 27, 28, 34, 41, 172, Ganbold, T., 208, 213, 223n3
175, 231; knowledge, 30, 40, 43; markers, 88, Gandan Monastery, 10
162; ecological support, 21 Ganganbaigal, Nature, 59, 251
economic system, 24, 173, 191, 230; benefits Gee (rapper), 260, 261
(of mining), 24, 184; changes, 24, 173, 227, gender, 28, 37, 111, 115–117. See also men;
257; dependency/interdependency, 227, 229, women
231; growth, 140, 221; market economy, 24, “Gennie” (Gennie Bolor), 259, 261, 268n8
165, 170; opportunities, 27, 28, 155, 165, 175, ger (yurt) camps, 5, 21, 27–28, 117; Chinese
222, 228, 239; policy, 231, 239; power, 27, 258; tourism in Inner Mongolia and, 66; con-
problems, 36, 135, 189, 257; success, 28, 34; ception of space in, 205; as cultural marker
support, 21, 239 of Mongolia, 203; fiddles and gendered
Egschiglen ensemble, 13, 239–244 structure of, 147–148; fiddles seized by
Eljigen (Eljigin) Khalkh ethnic group, 98–99, communist soldiers from, 136; as interspe-
100, 102, 104, 108n3 cies social/sonic spaces, 37; Kazakh, 37–38,
Empson, Rebecca, 115–116 173; musical instruments in, 163, 166n5, 184;
Enebish, J., 136, 147, 244 as pan-nomadic symbol, 244
Enkhbalsan, T. (tovshuur maker), 156, 158, 161, geriin surguul’ (home school), 207
166n8 Germany, Mongolian music in, 240
Enkhbat, A., 8 Gills, Barry, 229
Enkhbayar, Se., 6 gingoo song, 4
epic singing (tuul’), 2, 13, 90, 103; epic custodi- Ginsburg, Tom, 233
ans (tuul’ch), 121, 122, 138; gendered musical global economy, 231, 240, 242, 243
practice and, 112, 149; men’s inherited right globalization (dayaarshil), 13, 165, 201, 239,
to perform, 115, 120; praise-song, 212; pres- 242; complicated nature of, 227–229; glo-
ervation of, 164, 167n13; tovshuur and, 155, balism compared with, 229–231; Mongol
156, 162, 164, 219; women’s musical knowl- peoples’ role in engendering, 229; “original
edge and, 113, 121–122, 157, 160 folk art” combined with, 244–245; as pro-
Erdenet, city of (Mongolia), 24, 96 cess and discourse, 229
Erdenet copper mine, 24 goats, 18, 36, 147; herders’ vocalizations to, 31,
erhu (Chinese two-string fiddle), 61, 144 198; skin used for instruments, 166n4
estrad (Russian: “staged”) music ensembles, 255 Gobi (Egschiglen album), 242
ethnic diversity, 91, 108, 86, 87–88, 104 “Gooj Nanaa” song, 4
“ethno-punk,” 135, 152 Gov’ (Gobi) Desert, 259, 24, 25, 63, 144
ethno-rock, 222–223 Gov’-Altai aimag (Mongolia), 100, 103,
Eurocentrism, 229, 237 109n3
Evenki (Ewenke) ethnic group, 26, 76, 80n3 Grasslands. See steppes
Great Lakes Depression, 23
Fijn, Natasha, 28, 31 Great Leap Forward, 66
film music (kinoni khögjim), 6 Greene, Paul, 262
Fine Arts School [Uran saikhany surguul’]
(Ulaanbaatar), 141 Hailar, city of (Inner Mongolia), 55, 60, 70
folklorization, socialist, 212 Han Chinese, 11, 63, 65, 78; dominance in cit-
folk music, 3, 65, 254; National Academic ies of Inner Mongolia, 27; instrument mak-
State Ensemble and, 9; revival of, 68, 70; ers, 145; touristic fascination with minority
Soviet emphasis on promoting, 234 “other,” 66–67, 71

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 Hanggai (folk-rock ensemble), 70, 268 Hurd (heavy metal band), 257, 258
Haranga (hard rock band), 257 Huun Huur Tu [Kungurtuk] (Tuvan ensem-
Hargana, Tamir, 12, 53–60, 54, 149–151 ble), 71, 241
Harrison, David, 31, 32 hybrid musical forms, 3, 33, 74–75
Har Sarnai [Black Rose] (techno-rap group),
258, 268n7 ibex, Siberian, 23, 37, 161, 166n8
Hartyga (Tuvan folk-metal group), 268 identity, national, 87, 88
Haslund-Christensen, Henning, 136, 137, 138, igil/ikil (skin-faced fiddle), 32, 57, 64, 71, 77,
139–140 144, 150–151, 164
Haya (fusion ensemble), 70 ikh khuur (bass horsehead fiddle), 77
heavy metal, 257, 59, 70, 135, 153, 231, 240. See ikh uchirtai (songs with great significance),
also The Hu; Tengger Cavalry 114–115
Heissig, Walther, 163 industrialization, 24, 217, 230
herders, 4, 17, 40, 114, 165; coexistence with Ingold, Tim, 171, 172
landscape, 27–28; connection to natural Inner Mongolia Art Academy, 65–66
and spiritual environment, 138; cultural Inner Mongolia Art College (IMAC), 56, 58,
heritage and, 204; as folk artists, 144; as 71, 80
khöömii masters, 209–210, 236; market Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region (Chi-
economy and, 21, 24; relationship with ani- na), 2, 3, 135; Alashan (Alshaa) region, 33,
mals and land, 18, 42; search for wandering 64; Ar Khorchin region, 64, 72, 74, 79; Barga
flocks, 197–198, 198; sound worlds and, 30; region, 12; comparison with Mongolia, 61;
vocalizations of, 37. See also animals, do- cultural diversity of, 1; enclosure of land in,
mestic; pastoralism, nomadic 11; ethnic and regional diversity in, 62–65;
“Herders Sing of the Communist Party” fiddle revolutionaries in, 142–149, 143, 148;
(1972), 66 geography of, 25–26; growth of urban popu-
hierarchy, musical, 68 lation in, 21; Hinggan region, 136; Hulunbuir
hip-hop, 257, 259, 135, 227 (Khölönbuir) region, 5, 25, 60, 60n1, 74, 76;
Hohhot (Höhhot, Khökhkhot), city of (Inner institutional trends and cultural heritage,
Mongolia), 1, 26–27, 55, 60, 70, 221 67–69; Japanese invasion of China and, 135;
Homeland (Anda Union album, 2016), 70, khöömii in, 31, 205, 221; Khorchin region, 64,
75, 77 74, 79, 136, 144; landscape of, 25; language
Hong Jiang, 26 education policy, 80n1; minzu (minority)
horsehead fiddle. See morin khuur category, 63, 64, 66, 67, 69, 142; Mongol as-
horses, 5, 18, 36, 138; in folk songs, 163–164; similation into Chinese culture in, 64; music
herders’ vocalizations and, 38; horse-head styles unique to, 62; new generation of fid-
fiddlers and, 147, 148; sounds of, 32, 198 dlers in, 149–153, 151; Old Barga and New
The Hu (folk metal band), 14, 152–153, 243; Barga Banners, 53; Ordos region, 64, 77, 79;
“The Great Chinggis Khan,” 264; Order of population of, 62; Shilingol region, 64, 68,
Chinggis Khaan awarded to, 135; penetra- 74; urtyn duu in, 33. See also Hohhot
tion into Western popular music, 250–251; Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Theater
plan for global conquest, 261–268; “Sad (Neimenggu Gewujuyuan), 57, 58, 70–71,
But True,” 264; viral YouTube videos, 59, 75, 145
70, 250; Western critical response to, 263; insects, 37, 199
“Wolf Totem,” 250; as world phenomenon, Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH), 68–69,
223; YouTube comments by English-speak- 204, 215, 219, 221
ing fans, 264–265; “Yuve yuve yu,” 250, internationalism, Soviet, 13, 232–236
251–254, 263, 264, 265, 270n28 intonation, 68, 142
huibao yanchu (concerts of ethnic song and Irkutsk (Russia), 31
dance), 65 Islam, 179
Hulunbuir Art Institute (Inner Mongolia), 55
Humphrey, Caroline, 115, 120 Jalasen (master storyteller), 74
Hünnü era, 108 Jamiyan, G., 137, 141–142, 145, 151

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 Jangar epic, 160, 161 Khentii aimag (Mongolia), 3, 5
Jangar Khan, 75 Khentii Mountains, 23
janggarch (singer-storytellers of Janggar), 75 Kherlen, Lkhavsüren, 244
Jantsannorov, N., 3, 214, 237, 238 Kherlengiin bar’ya (Sharav), 5
Japan, Imperial, 135, 139 “Kherlengiin bar’ya” [The banks of the Kher-
Japan, postwar, 236–237 len river] (long-song), 5
Jargalsaikhan, D., 257, 256 Kherlen River, 5
Javkhlan, S., 87–88, 108 khiil khuur (box fiddle), 64, 139, 144, 148
jazz, 257, 58 Khogjilt, 144
Jigmed khuurch, 140 khögjimchin (musicians), 113, 118–119
Jirem league [Tongliao Municipality] (Inner kholoin tsuur (“throat flute”), 76
Mongolia), 64, 73, 74 Khongorzol, G., 5
Jonon (rapper), 260, 261 Khonkh [Bell] (pop-duo), 256
Ju’uda league [Chifeng Municipality] (Inner “Khonkhny duu” [Sound of the Bell]
Mongolia), 73, 74 (Khonkh song), 256
khöömii (“throat singing”), 2, 4, 34, 38, 90,
Kalmykia, Republic of (Russia), 155, 156, 205 151, 197; amateur and professional per-
Kalmyks, 1, 88 formers, 222; Anda Union and, 71, 75,
Kam people (China), 69 80; bel canto technique adapted to, 213;
Kaplonski, Christopher, 91 davkhar öngö (superimposed colors), 206;
kargyraa (Tuvan chest style of throat-sing- definition and description of, 205–208;
ing), 74, 76, 57, 59, 71 early international presence of, 237; ez-
Kazakh language, 17, 20n1, 36, 179 engileer (Tuvan style), 57, 74; global popu-
Kazakh music: on CDs/VCDs, 39, 44n12; pas- larity of, 203, 204; in heavy metal bands,
toralism and nature in, 39–43 251; heritage-making and, 215–217, 224n13;
Kazakhs, Mongolian, 1, 2, 12, 23, 88; in Bayan The Hu and, 251, 262; institutionalization
Ölgii aimag, 12, 34, 36, 172–173; as eagle of, 204, 211–214, 217–221; isgeree (whistle-
hunters, 170; ger tents of, 27, 37; herders, style, overtone), 56, 58, 71, 206, 207, 212;
17; in Khovd aimag, 172–173; as percentage kharkhiraa (“guttural” style), 207; khöö-
of Mongolian population, 192n5; spiritual mei (Tuvan style), 71, 79, 215; khosmoljin
beliefs of, 30; summer settlements at Dala (“combined”) style, 213; learned in urban
köl, 35 places, 228; musical techniques of, 13; nat-
Kazakhstan, 13, 34, 43, 172, 181; dombyra in, ural sounds referenced by, 31, 199, 205, 207;
174, 183, 189, 191, 192n7; Mongolian Kazakhs “original quality” of, 244–245; pastoralism
and, 172, 173; post-Soviet, 39, 42; qara öleng and, 198–199; politics of heritage and, 80,
in, 41 211; popular music and, 258; practice tech-
Khakassia, Republic of (Russia), 205, 221 niques and training, 208–211; recordings
Khalkh ethnic group, 1, 24, 27, 155, 222; lo- of, 204, 209; shakhaa (constricted throat
cal knowledge of, 105; long-songs, 9; as technique), 71, 74, 77; shingen (“high” or
“Mongol of Mongols,” 91; Oirads as Other “fluid”) style, 213; socialist-era transfor-
to, 89–92; “Soviet modernism” and, 88, 91; mations of, 232; stone inscription near
züün ayalguu (east-melody) and, 86 Jargalant Khairkhan, 218, 219; suur’ öngö
khalyq äni (Kazakh folk song), 39 (“basic color”; vocal drone), 206; sygyt
Khamag Mongol [Every Mongol] (Javkhlan, (Tuvan style), 71; tsuurai (echoes), 206;
2016), 87–88, 108 Tuvan, 31, 235, 240–241; women’s participa-
Khangai Mountains, 23 tion in, 149, 210, 211
Khangai region (Mongolia), 28, 96, 98, 99, 105 “Khoor nutgiin erkh” [The power of two
“Khan uulyn oroi” [The peak of Khan uul] homelands] (Altai Uriankhai song), 117–118
(Zakhchin song), 103 Khorchin region (Inner Mongolia), 63, 64, 74,
khar’ltsaa duu (repartee songs), 98 79, 144
Khaznadar, Chérif, 221 Khoshuud ethnic group, 155
“Kheeriin salkhtai ayalguu” [Melody of the Khotgoid ethnic group, 96, 99, 104, 108n3
windy steppe] (Mongol Pop song), 260 Khoton ethnic group, 101, 100, 103, 104, 108n3

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 Khovd aimag (Mongolia), 32, 89, 104, 109n3, Mao Zedong, 66, 65
114; dombyras made in, 183; Dörvöd and Marco Polo (Netflix series, 2014–2016), 251
Myandad singers in, 101–103, 104; as Marsh, Peter, 13–14, 233, 239
frontier under Qing rule, 89; Kazakhs in, Marxism, 135–136, 137
172–173, 191, 193n16; Musical and Drama Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideology, 44n2
Theater, 210, 212, 213, 214, 236; Oirads of, McCormick, Neil, 263
155; Zakhchin singers in, 103–104. See also meadow steppe, 25
Chandman’ sum meditative poems (tolghau), 39
Khövsgöl aimag (Mongolia), 23, 31, 89, 105, Medixat (dombyra maker), 175, 186–189, 187
108n3; Darkhad and Khoitgid singers in, men, 28, 147; inherited rights to perform ep-
96–98, 104, 106; as frontier under Qing ics (tuul’), 115; patrilineal lines and musical
rule, 89, 90; as part of Tannu Uriankhai performance, 111; vocalizations of, 30
Frontier, 109n4 Mend-Ooyo, G., 4
Khukh Mongol ensemble (Ingolstadt, Ger- mineral springs, 30
many), 210, 241, 242, 243 Minii Ikh Ornoo [My great country] (Mör-
Khusugtun (band), 232–233, 251 dorj), 8
khuuchir (four-stringed fiddle), 138 “Minii nutag” [My homeland] (Har Sarnai
khuurch (fiddle player), 74, 136, 139 song), 268n7
Knapp, Lauren, 258, 254–255, 256 “Minii nutgiig nadad uldee” [Leave my home-
komuz (Kyrgyz three-stringed lute), 181 land to me] (Gee and Jonon), 260
Kondratsev, C. A., 93 mining, 24, 26, 27, 244, 259–260
K-pop (Korean popular music), 266 modernism, 10, 88, 230
Krueger, John R., 156 modernity/modernization, 2, 6, 145, 233
küi (Kazakh narrative instrumental composi- Mollesen, Ken, 9
tions), 39, 173, 192n8 Mongol Empire, 1, 253, 261
Kunanbaeva, Alma, 41 Mongolia, 2, 65; Altai Sayan ecoregion, 34;
Kyrgyzstan, 181 diverse lands and ecosystems of, 23–24;
ethnic and regional debates in post-social-
lakes, 95, 100, 207 ist period, 87–88; ethnographic fieldwork
Lascelles, Sophie, 72 in western aimags, 94–104, 95; geography
Legrain, Laurent, 207, 223 of, 5, 23–24; Khövsgöl region, 89, 108n3;
Levin, Theodore, 31, 228, 244 landscape of, 22, 34; national anthem of,
Lhajav (Hazhabu), 68 8; “national art” of, 199–200; nature-based
limbe (side-blown flute), 32 heritage of, 22; population of, 24; post-
Live from UB (documentary film, dir. Knapp), socialist (after 1990), 9, 106, 108, 115, 183;
254–255 rural-to-urban migration in, 21; social
livestock, 6, 21, 36, 184, 191; kinds of, 18, 19; spaces in, 27–28; urban modernity in, 11.
livestock markets, 4; lost to disease, 185; See also specific aimags (provinces)
overgrazing by, 25; plant species for graz- Mongolia Ensemble, 149
ing, 23; seasons for grazing, 17; sounds of, Mongolian Bling (documentary film, dir.
30. See also animals, domestic Binks, 2012), 253, 268n8
Lkhavsüren, D., 236 Mongolian Khöömei Association (Mongol
local knowledge, 4, 43, 105 Khöömein Kholboo), 216, 217
long-song. See urtyn duu (long-song) Mongolian language, 27, 100, 222; The Hu
lullabies (buuvei), 4 songs sung exclusively in, 264; Khalkh,
Luvsan khuurch, 140 114, 233; primary schooling in, 64; vertical
Luvsansharav, D., 204, 212 script (Mongol bichig), 205
Mongolian National Broadcasting (MNB);
Ma, Yo-Yo, 4 Mongolian National Radio, 96, 204
magtaal (praise-song), 32, 212, 213, 242 Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party
Maisar, D., 93 (MPRP), 140, 254, 255
Mao era, 12, 26, 60n2, 62, 142; end of, 145; Mongolness, 1, 64, 88, 239; drinking culture
music as political tool during, 65–66 and, 78; khöömii and, 229

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 Mongol Pop, 260–261 “Naiman sharga” [Eight chestnut horses]
Mongols, 1, 10, 26; Barga clan, 53, 63, 90; (Enkhbayar, 1998), 6
broad definition of, 1–2; Chakhar clan, 63; nair (feasts, ceremonies, celebrations), 106,
ger tents of, 37; Torguud clan, 23, 63, 103, 113, 119
155, 160; Üzemchin clan, 63, 86. See also nair naddmyn surguul’ (festival school), 207
Khalkh ethnic group nairyn duu (feast song), 102
Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan (film, Nanai ethnic group, 26
2007), 251 narrative songs (shuochang), Chinese, 74
Mongolyn ündestnii duu (national songs), 115, narrative songs (ülger, kholboo), 64
122 Nars (Anda Union member), 56–57, 72, 73,
Monguor ethnic group, 80n3 74, 77, 79
Moore, Sally, 117 National Academic Drama Theatre (Ulsyn
moral personhood, 111–112, 122 dramyn erdmiin teatr), 7
Mördorj, L., 8 National Academic State Ensemble, 9, 10
morin khuur (two-string horsehead fiddle), National History Museum, 9
2, 4, 32, 34, 55; academic institutionaliza- nationalism, 2, 64, 144
tion of, 214; Anda Union and, 70, 75, 77; National Morin Khuur Ensemble, 10
in central regions of Inner Mongolia, 64; National Song and Dance Ensemble (Ulaan-
in European-influenced orchestras, 164, baatar), 214
212; f-holes added to, 184, 233; gender and, National Young Singer’s Competition (TV
148–149, 150; The Hu and, 253; as icon of program, Inner Mongolia), 70
Mongolian national identity, 135, 192; mak- nation-building, 29, 108
ers of, 13, 129–134, 129–133; master (profes- Natsagdorj, D., 7, 14n6, 258, 268n7
sional quality), 129, 133; modernization nature, 24, 26, 43, 44; in Bayan Ölgii aimag,
of, 143–144; pre-revolutionary fiddlers, 34, 35, 36; “destruction” of nature in social-
137–140, 139; revolutionary-period fiddlers, ist period, 183–184; importance of connec-
140–141; as shared instrument of Mongolia tion to, 208; in Mongolian Kazakh music,
and Inner Mongolia, 61; suppressed during 39–43; sound worlds and, 30; urban songs
socialist period, 136–137; university courses and, 34; values and beliefs about, 29–30.
in, 56; wood-faced, 142, 143, 143 See also baigal’
mountain forest steppe zone, 23 neoliberalism, 228, 229
mountain taiga, 23, 99 New Year’s festival (tsagaan sar), 162
Mullaney, Thomas, 67 Niciton (hard rock band), 257
Murat, Bayan, 176 Nine Treasures (heavy metal band), 70, 268
musical knowledge, 58, 113; elder authorities Nisvanis (alternative rock band), 258
of, 117–118; gender and, 13; of women, 117– nomadic culture. See pastoralism, nomadic
118; women and the fostering of, 120–122; nomadism, 10, 231, 239, 242
women’s musical practices and, 112 Nomindari, Shagdarsüren, 215
Music & Dance College [Khögjim büjgiin Norovbanzad, N., 235, 237
dund surguul’] (Ulaanbaatar), 141, 149, 151 North Da Xing’anling (Hinggan) Mountains,
musicking, 1, 2 26
music teachers: in Inner Mongolia, 11, 31, Northern Illinois University (NIU), world
53–57, 67, 68, 71, 75; in post-socialist Mon- music program at, 58–59
golia, 151; in socialist-period Mongolia, 141; Northern Wind Trio, 59
Soviet, 4 nostalgia, 33, 43, 108, 223
Myadar, Orhon, 88 notation, musical, 141
Myangad ethnic group, 101–103, 23, 32, 89, November Chinggis Khan Ceremony (Prince-
104, 108n3, 155. See also Oirads ton, New Jersey), 59
nutag (homeland), 5, 24, 33
Naadam (annual summer festival), 4, 6, 10;
in Bloomington, Indiana, 59; sound worlds O’Connor, Roison, 263
and, 30 Odsüren, B., 71, 75, 210, 214, 223n10; on at-
Nachin (Tuvan throat singer and fiddler), titude of performers, 208–209; khöömei
55, 57 classroom of, 215

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 Oirads (western Mongols), 1, 13, 63, 75, 79, Pegasus [formerly Zeebad] (Bayarsaikhan’s
108; baruun ayalguu (west-melody) and, workshop), 130, 130–132
86; ikil fiddle of, 32; local knowledge of, Pegg, Carole, 32, 91, 101, 105, 121, 166n4; on
105; Othered vis-à-vis Khalkh identity, fiddle playing by women, 148–149; on
89–92, 107; regions and tribes of, 155; Mongol traditions maintained by men, 147;
tovshuur as iconic instrument of Oirad on music teaching methods, 207; on politi-
epics, 155–156, 165–166, 167n14; yastan cal persecution in socialist period, 137
groups, 114 People’s Folk Song and Dance Ensemble
Oktyabr, 12, 18; song about the steppe, 17–20 [­PFSDE] (Ardyn duu büjigiin ulsyn chuul-
Old Town School of Folk Music (Chicago), 59 ga), 240
Ölgii city, 36, 39, 43, 44n12; dombyra culture petroglyphs, 34, 44n10
in, 170, 174, 176, 180–182, 186, 187, 188, 189, piano, 4, 142
192n10; Music and Drama Theater, 42 pitch, 98, 141, 153n2, 206
“Önchiin tsagaan botgo” [Orphaned white plant life, 23, 30
camel] (folk song), 4, 6 Plueckhahn, Rebekah, 12–13
“Öndör khökhii” [High and dark] (song), popular music, urban, 2, 7, 14; global flows
102–103 of, 251; khöömii (throat singing) and, 31;
“On the Shore of Flower Lake” (Sükhbaatar), Khotgoid singing arranged as, 96; Mongo-
242 lian pop music’s embrace of past tradition,
Ööld ethnic group, 23, 103, 155. See also Oirads 259–261; Mongolian pop music’s embrace
opera (duur’), 3, 6, 213; legacy of Mongolia’s of the West, 256–258; musicians of Bayan-
first opera, 6–9; as Soviet-developed musi- Ölgii and, 42–43; syncretic nature of
cal phenomenon, 11; Western opera, 8 Mongolian pop music, 261; tovshuur and,
oral tradition, 108, 207–208, 230 165; Western/Anglo-American, 240, 254,
Ordos region (Inner Mongolia), 64, 77, 79 255, 257
orientalism, 107, 231, 239 Post, Jennifer, 12, 13
Orientalism (Said, 1978), 86 praise-song. See magtaal
originality, folk practice and, 237–238, professionalism, musical, 215, 67–68, 105–106,
244–245 145, 212
Orochen [Oronchon] ethnic group (Inner
Mongolia), 26, 76, 80n3 qara öleng (Kazakh song form), 39, 41, 42
Otai (Khorchin prince), 136, 138 Qiang people (China), 69
Othering, in urtyn duu tradition, 86, 107 Qing (Manchu) Dynasty, 53, 63, 73, 144; ad-
ovoo (sacred cairns), 30, 197 ministrative units of Mongolia under, 89,
Övörkhangai aimag (Mongolia), 98 109n4; Mongol—Chinese conflict at end
Oyu Tolgoi mine, 24, 259 of, 139; Oirads defeated by (1757–1759), 156;
Sangrup’s performances in Peking, 138;
Paganini, Niccolò, 146 tovshuur (tuobushu’er) and, 166n3
Paine, Robert, 241 Qinghai region (China), 155
Papizan, B., 210, 220, 222 qobyz (two-string Kazakh bowed instru-
pastoralism, nomadic, 2, 4, 11, 186, 245; capi- ment), 42, 193n20
talist relation to, 230; dislocation from, 64;
embedded history of, 21; in Inner Mon- Rae, James Deshaw, 88
golia, 26, 63; Marxist view of, 135–136; as railway networks, 24
memory or imagined history, 24; Mongo- Rees, Helen, 69
lian identity and, 26; in Mongolian Kazakh reindeer, 31
music, 39–43; music and instruments asso- Reichl, Karl, 121
ciated with, 34; as nation-building tool, 29; revolutionary songs, 9
relationship with nature and, 29; seasonal Routes Nomades, 208
sound and music of, 5; sound worlds and, Rupprecht, Tobias, 233
30; stereotyped discourse about, 231–232; rural–urban relationship, 12, 21, 24, 44; sound
tsatslyn khalbaga (wooden milk spoon), worlds and, 30, 34; urbanization plans and,
161; uncertain future of, 200 27; urtyn duu and, 32, 33
Pearce, Tim, 72 Russian Federation, 88, 108n3, 109n4; Altai

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 Republic, 164, 205, 221; Altai Sayan ecore- dombyra makers in, 174–175, 192n10; end of,
gion, 34; Bashkhortostan Republic, 205; 227; ethnic delineation during, 86, 107, 114;
Buryat Republic, 205, 223n10; Kalmyk Re- globalization in early stage and, 228–229;
public, 155, 156, 205; Khakass Republic, 205, horsehead fiddle in folk music during, 135;
221. See also Tuva Republic khöömii institutionalized during, 211–214;
Mongolia’s relationships with nonsocialist
Said, Edward, 86, 107 nations, 236–237; People’s Revolution (1921),
saiga antelope, 23, 26 135, 254, 261; popular music and youth
Saikhannakhaa (Anda Union member), 77, transgressions, 254–256; professionalization
78, 149 of musical culture during, 105–106, 118; re-
sain duuchin (“good singer”), 119–120 strictions on animist practice, 115; tovshuur
Sain Noyon Khan (aimag under Qing rule), considered an obsolete instrument, 164,
89, 90 166; urban industrial growth in, 24
Säken (dombyra maker), 175, 183–186, 185 Socialist Realism, 14n6
Sampildendev, Kh., 92–93 social media, 8, 62, 135, 232, 262, 266
Sangdureng, 137, 142, 145, 146 Song about Zhalghyz Aghash Mineral Spring
Sangrup (“The All-Knowing”) khuurch, 136, (Zhalghyz Aghash Arasan Tolghau), 19–20
137, 138–140, 139 Song Dynasty (China), 144
Sarantuya, B., 257 “Song of Mongol-Han Unity” (1948), 66
Sedaa (band), 243 Sorgog, 149, 150
Seeger, Anthony, 112–113 sound mimesis, 31
Sengedorj, N., 208, 210, 213, 236 sound worlds, 10, 12, 21, 22, 23; in Bayan Ölgii
Serashi (fiddler), 144, 153n2 aimag, 36–39; pastoralism and nature in
“Serenade” (Jambal), 242 relation to, 30–34
Sersen Tal [Awakened steppe] (Sharav), 3–4, Soviet Union (USSR), 3, 142; collectivization,
10 24; dissolution of, 2, 230, 239; Eurocentrism
shamanism, 29, 59, 63; epics (tuul’) and, 115; in of, 237; folklorists from, 90, 92–93; Khalkh
pre-revolutionary Mongolia, 137; swan as ethnic identity and, 88, 91; Mongolian
ongod symbol, 161 People’s Republic (MPR) and, 233; musical
shanagan khuur (ancient ladle fiddle), 144 training in, 8; People’s Revolution (1921)
Sharav, B., 3–5, 10, 152 in Mongolia and, 135; professional musical
Sharkhüükhen, Ch., 5 culture influenced by, 105; “Soviet cosmol-
sheep, 18, 36, 147, 198; herders’ vocalizations ogy,” 91–92; Western popular music seen as
to, 31; used for barter, 184 threat in, 254
“Shild n’ orson tsas” [Snowfall on the ridges] Soyol [Culture] (journal), 235
(regional song), 102 Soyol Erdene [Cultural Jewel] (band), 258,
shoor (Tuvan end-blown flute), 76 255, 256
Siberia, 63, 10, 23, 31, 76 spiritual entities (gazryn ezed, “land mas-
Siilkhemiin Nuruu National Park (SNNP), 34 ters”), 29, 33
Silk Road, The: A Musical Caravan (Ma, spirituality, 12, 32–33, 265
2002), 5 spiritual meaning, 85, 208, 265; spiritual con-
Sinification, rejection of, 68 nections, 38–39, 138, 161–162, 205, 211; spiri-
Sino-Soviet split, 65, 142 tual knowledge, 30; spiritual practices, 63,
Smirnov, Boris F., 8, 14n5 111–115, 120–121; spiritual support, 21
Sneath, David, 88 Stalin, Joseph, 233
snow leopards, 23, 34, 40 State Folk Ensemble, 7
socialism, 2, 28; Indigenous aesthetics in con- State Horsehead Fiddle Ensemble, 149, 261
flict with, 236; Soviet influence and, 30 State Opera and Ballet Academic Theater
socialist period (1921–1990), in Mongolia, (Ulsyn duur’ büjgiin erdmiin teatr), 7
1, 21, 31, 42, 96, 113; “cultural revolution” state theater, national folk ensemble in, 3
(soyoliin khövsgöl), 140; “destruction” of steppes (grasslands), 5, 22, 23, 26, 34, 43, 99,
nature during, 183–184; development of 105; aesthetic of, 33; in Inner Mongolia, 25;
national culture and, 204, 212, 232–236; temperate, 25

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 Stokes, Martin, 227 “Tsagaany tsookhor” [White-speckled horse]
“Sukhaityn chin’ argal” [Wild sheep among (Zakhchin song), 103
the tamarisk] (regional song), 102 Tsambagarav Uul National Park, 34
Sultanbai (dombyra maker), 175, 176–179, 178, tsam dance, 10
183, 192n15 Tsedee, S., 212, 213
sums (districts), 13, 39, 93, 95, 108 “Tsenkher zalaa” [Sky-blue crest] (Soyol
Sundui, D., 208, 213, 214, 217, 237 Erdene song), 255
Süzükei, Valentina, 31 Tserendavaa D., 213, 222, 245; as herder,
sybyzgy (Kazakh end-blown flute), 76 197–198, 198, 209–210; interview with,
syncopated rhythms, 71 197–201, 218, 219; as khöömii teacher, 208;
Szmyt, Zbigniew, 88 in New York City (1988), 238–239, 238; son,
Tsogtgerel, 222
Tannu Uriankhai (frontier under Qing rule), Tserendendev, A., 8
89, 109n4, 113 Tsetsegmaa (Anda Union member), 76–77
tatlaga (fiddle music genre), 32, 146 Tsetsen Khan (aimag under Qing rule), 89, 90
Tavan Bogd Mountains, 35 Tsetsentsolmon, Baatarnarany, 91–92
Tchaikovsky Conservatory, 8 Tsing, Anna, 228
technology, 28, 190 Tsogzolmaa, L., 8, 14n5
Tengger Cavalry (fusion metal band), 268, 59, tsuur (end-blown flute), 75–76, 90, 161, 164
151, 251; “Lone Wolf,” 251 Tumat, G., 240–241
terme (Kazakh vocal composition), 39, 40 “Tümen ekh” [The best of the many] (folk
Tibetans, 69 song), 4
Tofa ethnic group, 31 tuning, 68, 141; fiddle making and, 130; Mon-
Toivgoo E., 210 golian national style, 146; standardized, 143;
Töv aimag (Mongolia), 151 tovshuur tuning pegs, 157, 158, 159
tolghau (Kazakh vocal composition), 39 Turkey, 43, 173
tömör khuur (jaw harp), 253 Turkic languages, 23, 31
Tongliao City (Inner Mongolia), 70 Turkic peoples/nations, 1, 244
Torguud ethnic group, 160, 23, 63, 103, 155. See Tüsheet Khan (aimag under Qing rule), 89, 90
also Oirads tuurgatan (“people of the felt tent”), 244
“Torguud nutag” [Torguud homeland] (Oirad Tuvans, Mongolian, 1, 23, 88, 210; in Bayan
folk song), 4 Ölgii aimag, 34, 36; ger tents of, 27, 37; Tu-
tourism, 13, 66–67, 69, 78, 161, 217, 221; after van settlement in western Mongolia, 35
fall of socialism, 243; focused on nomadic Tuva Republic (Russia), 31, 32, 88, 113, 205;
culture, 227; rural herders as entrepreneurs Egschiglen ensemble in, 240–241; folk
in, 231 songs about tovshuur in, 164; Interna-
tovshuur (two-string lute), 2, 13, 71, 150, 219; tional Throat-Singing Competition in, 57;
Anda Union and, 75, 77; in contemporary khöömii in, 221
use, 164–165; The Hu and, 137, 253, 262,
263; iconic meaning of instrument parts, Uchirtai gurvan tolgoi [Three fateful hills]
160–161; makers of, 156–157, 158–160, 160; (Damdinsüren opera, 1944), 7–9, 7
Oirad ethnic identity and, 90, 155–156, ugsaatan (small ethnic minorities), 109n6
161–162; physical construction of, 156–157, Ulaanbaatar, 1, 3, 43, 94, 135, 204; folk music
166n4; shanagan tovshuur (ladle tovshuur), performances in, 9; Grand Folk Arts Fes-
156; social relationships of, 161–163; stories tival, 222; in The Hu videos on YouTube,
involving, 163–164 252; Kazakhs in, 173; Khalkh Mongolian
Tozhu ethnic group, 31 spoken in, 114; khöömii performed in, 212;
tradition (ulamjlal), 5 Mongolian State University of Culture and
Traditional Mongolian Song [Traditionelle Arts (Soyol Urlagiin Ikh Surguul’), 6; music
mongolische Lieder] (Egschiglen album), 242 schools in, 141; National Song and Dance
TransMongolia ensemble, 71, 243 Ensemble, 214; population of, 253; privately
Trans-Siberia Express, 10 owned media in, 257; rural exodus to, 24;
Tsagaan Sar (Lunar New Year), 111 Soviet-influenced musical culture of, 105,

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 107; Sükhbaatar Square, 6, 7, 10; summer khöömii in, 210; landscape of, 105, 106;
travelers in, 11 Oirads of, 155
Ulaanchab, city of, 27 Uyghurs, 69
ulaanmöchir (arts troupe in Inner Mongolia), Üzemchin ethnic group, 63, 86, 90
53–55, 60n2, 65
ülger (tale), 4, 64 violin, 144, 146
Undarmaa, A., 210, 211 violoncello, 141, 142, 144, 149
ündesten (root, nation), 88, 91, 109n6 Vladimirtsov, B. Ya., 92–93, 156, 162–163
UNESCO “Representative List of the ICH of
Humanity,” 68–69, 204, 215, 216, 217, 224n13 Wagner, Rudi, 241
United States: diplomatic ties with Mongolia Wallach, Jeremy, 262, 264, 266
established (1988), 238; Mongolian music Walser, Robert, 268n10
in, 58, 60, 80, 150, 152 water, sounds of, 31, 37, 205
urbanization, 26, 200, 217, 231; forgetting of waterfalls (khürkhree), sounds of, 207
customs and, 253; in Inner Mongolia, 64 Weina, Oyuna, 33
Urgen (Anda Union member), 74, 77 well-being, 22, 29, 43
Uriankhai ethnic group, 27, 34, 41, 108n3; Westernization, 68, 217
Turkic origin of, 113; urtyn duu singers, 103, whistling, 199, 200
104. See also Altai Uriankhai ethnic group White, Bob, 228
Urtnasan, G. (Urtaa), 151–152, 151 wildlife, 18, 23, 30, 34, 43; destruction of old-
urtyn duu (long-song), 2, 5, 6, 98, 108; adapt- growth forests and, 184; health of, 37; repre-
ed to concert stage, 212; at Altai Uriankhai sented on dombyra soundboards, 170, 178;
weddings, 116; baruun ayalguu (right side, represented on tovshuur headstocks, 161,
west-melody), 85, 86, 92, 104, 105; as “clas- 166n8, 167n9; sounds of, 37
sical” art, 216; Darkhad, 97; ethnicity and, Wind Horse (Anda Union album, 2011), 70, 72
12; in Inner Mongolia, 54–55; jiriin [sumun] winds, sound of, 31, 37, 138, 205
(medium-length) urtyn duu, 93, 94, 102, wolves, 18, 28, 31, 40
106; Khalkh, 9; Khovd aimag as origin women, 28, 37; fiddle playing by, 148–149, 150,
place of, 101; nomadic way of life and, 199; 153n3; fluidity of women’s roles, 115–117;
opera and, 9; Othering and, 86, 107; pas- gendered musicality and, 112; gendered
toral traditions and, 32, 34; popular music structure of ger and, 148; Kazakh women
and, 258; regional and ethnic styles, 64, milking yaks, 38, 38; khöömii and, 210, 211;
85–87, 95; as shared practice of Mongolia mothers/motherhood, 116, 120, 123; musi-
and Inner Mongolia, 61; socialist notion of cal knowledge and, 117–118, 120–123, 157,
culture and, 236; Soviet researchers and, 160; musicians and “good singers,” 118–120;
92–93; spiritual dimension of, 33; trans- qara öleng sung by, 42; as tovshuur players,
formed with decline in pastoralism, 73–74; 157, 160; veneration of musical exemplars,
züün ayalguu (left side, east-melody), 85, 112–113, 123n2; vocalizations of, 30
86, 92, 104, 105. See also aizam; besreg World Youth Festivals, 233, 234, 236
urtyn duu (long-song) techniques: bönjignökh
(soft trill), 94, 100, 104; chimeglel (impro- Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
visatory ornaments), 93, 94, 104; gulsakh (China), 1, 13, 89, 114; Altay Prefecture, 75,
(small intervallic downward slides), 102, 179; Bortala Prefecture, 75; dombyra in, 174,
103; khadgalakh (small intervallic upward 189; Kazakh music CDs/VCDs in, 44n12;
slides), 102; nugalaa (short appoggiatura), khöömii (throat singing) in, 205; khöömii
94, 100, 104; örgölgt (some upward empha- in, 221; Mongolian Kazakh links to, 172, 179,
sis), 102, 103; shurankhai (falsetto), 93–94, 189, 192n4; Mongol singers’ “commute” to,
99, 104, 107; tseejnii tsokhilt (chest voice/ 2; Oirads in, 63, 75, 155; Uigaryn Mongols
breathing), 99; tsokhilt [tsokhilgo] (laryn- of, 101
geal trill), 93–94, 99, 104, 107 xiqin (Chinese Song Dynasty fiddle), 144
Uvs aimag (Mongolia), 89, 109n3; Bayad and
Khoton singers in, 99–100, 104; Eljigen yaks, 18, 36, 38
(Eljigin) Khalkh singers in, 98–99, 104; Yan’an Talks on Literature and Art (Mao), 65

292 Index

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 yastan (sub-ethnic group, “bone group”), 63, Zakhchin ethnic group, 23, 89, 100, 108n3,
80, 91, 109n6, 114 155; historical military role of, 103; khöömii
yatga (zither), 149, 255 and, 220; singers in Khovd aimag, 103–104;
Yat-Kha (Tuvan folk-metal group), 71, 268 tovshuur and, 158, 163, 167n11. See also
Yatskoviskai, Kh., 92–93 Oirads
yazguur (roots, origin), 5, 13, 152, 231; ardyn “Zambuu tiviin naran” [The sun over the
yazguur urlag (“authentic folk art”), 237; world] (folk song), 4
dialogue with foreign influences and, 245; Zangad, 235
Egschiglen ensemble and, 241, 242; foreign- Zasagt Khan (aimag under Qing rule), 89, 90
ers’ exposure to, 243; originality and, 238; as Zavkhan aimag, 208, 210, 212–213
post-colonial notion, 228 “Zes guai” [Mr. Zes] (song), 99
Yin Mountains (Inner Mongolia), 25 zhaylau (Kazakh summer encampment), 38,
Yo (master fiddle teacher), 151 40, 41
Yoon, Sunmin, 12, 33 zhyrau (Kazakh epic-singer), 39
youth culture, cosmopolitan, 252 zokhiolyn duu (composed songs in folk style),
yuanshengtai (“original ecology”) movement 2, 6, 254
(Inner Mongolia), 69, 70, 152 Zungarian Empire, 164
“Zunyn delger sar” [In high summer] (feast
song), 102
Züüngar State (1636–1755), 89

Index 293

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 The University of Illinois Press
is a founding member of the
Association of University Presses.

University of Illinois Press

1325 South Oak Street
Champaign, IL 61820-6903
www.press.uillinois.edu

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 “Insights into musical place, practice, identity, and heritage that arise
during moves from steppes to stage, Chinggis Khan’s empire to
globalization, and traditional throat-singing and horsehead fiddle
to heavy metal fusion will—as with the Mongolian sound worlds so
vividly portrayed—reverberate far beyond the borders of Mongolia.”
—CAROLE PEGG, author of Mongolian Music, Dance, and Oral Narrative:
Performing Diverse Identities

Music cultures today in rural and urban Mongolia and Inner Mongolia emerge
from centuries-old pastoralist practices that were reshaped by political move-
ments in the twentieth century. Mongolian Sound Worlds investigates the
unique sonic elements, fluid genres, social and spatial performativity, and
sounding objects behind new forms of Mongolian music—forms that reflect
the nation’s past while looking towards its globalized future. Drawing on
fieldwork in locations across the Inner Asian region, the contributors report
on Mongolia’s genres and musical landscapes; instruments like the morin
khuur, tovshuur, and Kazakh dombyra; combined fusion band culture; and
urban popular music. Their broad range of concerns include nomadic herd-
ers’ music and instrument building, ethnic boundaries, heritage-making,
ideological influences, nationalism, and global ci culation.
A merger of expert scholarship and eyewitness experience, Mongolian Sound
Worlds illuminates a diverse and ever-changing musical culture.

JENNIFER C. POST is a senior lecturer in the School of Music at the Uni-

versity of Arizona. SUNMIN YOON is an adjunct assistant professor in the
School of Music and Department of Languages, Literatures & Cultures at the
University of Delaware. CHARLOTTE D’EVELYN is an assistant professor in
the Music Department at Skidmore College.

Cover image: Festival bringing together 3,000 long-song singers and 3,000 horse­head
fiddle players, Dundgov’ p ovince, Mongolia, 2019. Photo by Sunmin Yoon.
Cover design: Jim Proefrock

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