Santal music

Onkar Prasad has done the most recent work on the music of the Santal but others preceded his work, notably W. G. Archer who collected and analyzed hundreds of Santal songs in the mid-twentieth century.

Musical instruments used by the Santhal tribes are Sarpa, Buan flute, Sarenga, Banam.

Metal rattles of various sorts are also found in many Santal musical contexts.

The Santal flute, like the widespread Bansuri, has open holes which permit the player to bend the pitch.

Introduced by the British, the harmonium is a small pump organ with a three-octave keyboard and hand bellows at the back.

Christian Santal musicians sometimes use a unique instrument called the kabkubi.

This one-stringed plucked chordophone was developed by Christian Santal as a substitute for the Tamak'.

Because the Tamak' had such strong associations with traditional religious ceremonies and was thought to invoke the presences of certain spirits, early missionaries and Christian converts began to use the kabkubi in its place.

The cadence of many Santal tunes include a unique version of hemiola—a metric feature in which divisions of 2 and 3 are placed in contrast to each other.