"The Sarangi? No, because of its innumerable beautiful tone colours, it is verily the ‘Saurangi’– Meaning full of hundreds of colours".

According to Indian musicological tradition the Sarangi comes under the generic name Veena indicating the entire complex of stringed instruments.

The name Sarangi occurs in prominent musicological works like Sangita Ratnakar (13thC) Sangita Raja, Sangita Parijata, Sangita Narayana and others. This shows that the instrument must have been in vogue a few centuries earlier, than the 13th. A still earlier Veena called the Pinakini Veena bears a striking resemblance with Sarangi. Its description shows that it was played with a bow held in the right hand and the hair of the horsetail in a bunch was used in its formation. The body of the instrument was made out of a wooden block carved hollow and was covered with parched skin. The Pinakini Veena had gut strings and no frets. This could be logically accepted as a forerunner of the Sarangi.

The present Sarangi is the major bowed instrument of North India. Its body is carved out of a single piece of hard wood. The hollowed lower portion is covered with goatskin, the middle with wood to form a finger board and the top is a box with fixed pegs. It is played with the belly portion resting either on the ground or on the player’s lap. The Sarangi has 35 to 40 sympathetic strings providing a sonours resonance along with three main gut strings. Skillfully sliding the bow on the gut strings produces the basic sound for producing the specific notes of the melody, these are, unlike any other musical instrument, stopped side ways with the cuticles of the fingers.

The Sarangi has the unique distinction of being closest to the human voice in richness and melody, affording intense emotional expression.

Sarangi is an ideal instrument to accompany vocal music and eminently suited for solo performances.