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History

The Santur is a very old instrument. It is used all around the world. Santur is very old to Iranian culture too. There are a 1000 years old Iranian poems which the name of the Santur is mentioned in it. Old time Santurs have had joined bridges(Kharaks)and more strings than the new generation of the Santur. Old time Santurs had 24-30 bridges. We do not now much about the history of Iranian Santur and it's playing style before 1850 AD. At the present time there are two different styles in playing the Santur in Iran. The first style is called " The Traditional Style"which means the official and sabbatical style of playing with well known etudes and studies. The second style is called "The Sweet Style"which means you play whatever you want even without traditional studies. The official and traditional Santur we use in Iran at the present time has 18 individual portable bridges and first time was used and taught in Iran about 150 years ago by a Santur player who was from India. He was the king Mohammad's private musician. We still do not know his name. He taught his style to an Iranian young student name Hassan Khan/Santur Khan. The best student of Hassan Khan was named Mohammad Sadegh Khan. Somae Hozur was one of the best students of Mohammad Sadegh Khan and studied all his perfect style. All these 4 generations were the private musicians of the Ghajar kings since at that time music was forbidden to the public in Iran. Somae hozur taught his style to his son Habib Somai. The style of Habib Somai is transferred to the new generation of Santur players of Iran by three of his friends and students who used the European music notation to write his works. These three people are Hosein Saba, Nurali Boromand and the most important one Abolhasan Saba. Most of the new generation of the Iranian Santur players are related to one of the three mentioned people.