Violin pitches on an instrument that behaves nothing like one
The four-string Iranian kamancheh is usually tuned in fifths — G3, D4, A4, E5 — the same four pitches a violin uses. That is where the resemblance stops. The kamancheh is a spike fiddle: a small round body on a metal spike that rests on your knee or the floor, with a belly of stretched skin rather than a carved wooden plate. Both of those change what tuning it involves.
Two caveats before the reference tones. Fourths-based tunings are genuinely used as well as fifths, and retuning for a dastgah is ordinary practice rather than an exception — so treat the set below as the common modern default and check what your teacher or the piece is asking for. And the Azerbaijani kamancha and the Turkish kemençe are related but separate instruments with their own conventions; the kemençe is a different shape with three strings.
Bow or pluck each string and centre the needle. Start with the A, as you would on any bowed instrument — every other string is checked against it.
The body turns, not the bow
This is the mechanical fact that makes kamancheh tuning different from violin tuning. You do not cross the bow from string to string. You rotate the instrument on its spike so that the string you want comes round to meet a bow that stays where it is.
Which means the pegbox is moving the entire time you play — turning against your palm, your sleeve, your knee. A peg that is merely resting in its hole rather than properly wedged does not need a knock to shift; it just needs a phrase. If a kamancheh keeps going flat on one string in performance and holds fine on the stand, this is almost always why.
A skin belly moves with the weather
The kamancheh’s soundboard is a stretched membrane— traditionally fish skin, often lamb skin now — and the bridge stands directly on it with nothing rigid underneath. Skin is far more responsive to humidity than wood. A damp room slackens it and the bridge sinks; a dry one tightens it and the bridge rises. Either way the speaking length and the downward load change together, and the instrument’s whole pitch level moves with them.
The diagnostic is simple: if every string has drifted in the same direction by a similar amount, that is the weather, not the pegs.Retune to where the instrument now wants to sit. Fighting it back to yesterday’s pitch every morning puts load on a membrane that is already doing something, and the pitch will go straight back.
It is also why string choice matters more than the note names suggest. Violin strings will reach these pitches on a kamancheh, and plenty of players use them — but the scale length is shorter, so a set that is comfortable on a violin can arrive at G3 under quite different tension and press harder into the skin than the instrument was built for. Distortion around the bridge foot means the strings are too heavy regardless of what the dial says.
Tuning routine
- Check the bridge before the pegs. It stands on skin with no soundpost holding it, so it walks. A bridge leaning toward the fingerboard has changed every string length at once and no amount of tuning will fix that.
- A first, at whatever level the instrument is sitting. If it has drifted as a set, follow it rather than forcing it.
- D below the A, then G below the D, then E above the A — outward from the reference.
- Round again, twice. Four strings pressing on a membrane is a soft foundation; every string you bring up lets the previous one down slightly.
- Then stop a note and check your own intonation. The instrument is fretless, so the open strings are the only part a peg can fix. Everything above them is your hand.
Fretless, which means the neutral intervals are yours
Nothing on a kamancheh stops a string except a finger, so every interval a dastgah asks for — including the neutral seconds that fall between the semitones of a keyboard — is placed by hand and held by ear. The cents readout is the tool for that: stop the note, hold it, and read how far from the nearest semitone you are sitting.
What no tuner can supply is the target. Persian neutral intervals are a range rather than a value, and they move with the performer, the teaching line, and where in the mode the note falls; our tuning-systems page sets out how large that variation actually is and why 24 equal quarter tones is a notation rather than a measurement. Use the dial to find out what you are doing, not to be told what to do.
Frequently asked questions
How is a kamancheh tuned?
The modern four-string Iranian kamancheh is most often tuned in fifths — G3, D4, A4, E5 — which is the same set of pitches as a violin. Fourths-based tunings are also used, and retuning for a particular dastgah is normal practice rather than an exception, so check what your teacher or the piece asks for before assuming fifths. The Azerbaijani kamancha and the Turkish kemençe are related but distinct instruments with their own tunings; the kemençe in particular is a different shape with three strings.
Why does my kamancheh go out of tune overnight when nothing has touched it?
The belly is skin, not wood, and the bridge stands directly on it. Skin responds to humidity far faster and further than a spruce plate: a damp room slackens the membrane and the bridge sinks into it, a dry one tightens it and the bridge rises, and either way the string tension changes without anyone touching a peg. The tell is that everything has moved in the same direction by a similar amount. When that happens, retune to where the instrument now sits rather than dragging it back to yesterday’s pitch.
My pegs keep slipping mid-piece.
Partly the usual friction-peg problem, and partly a kamancheh-specific one: the instrument rotates in your hand. You do not cross the bow to a new string, you turn the body so the string comes to the bow — which means the pegbox is moving throughout, sometimes against your palm and sometimes against your sleeve. A peg that is merely resting rather than properly wedged will be nudged. Push each peg firmly inward toward the pegbox as you turn it, and approach every note from below so the string settles under tension.
Can I use violin strings on a kamancheh?
Many players do, and the pitches above are the reason it works. It is not a free swap, though — the scale length is shorter than a violin’s and the belly is a membrane rather than a plate, so a set that is right on a violin can arrive at the same pitch under noticeably different tension and press harder on the skin than the instrument wants. If the belly starts to look distorted around the bridge foot, the strings are too heavy, whatever the dial says.
How do I check the quarter tones?
With the cents readout, not the note name. A kamancheh is fretless, so every neutral interval is placed by your hand and there is nothing on the instrument to catch an error — which is exactly the situation a cents display is for. Stop the note, hold it, and read how far from the nearest semitone you are sitting. What the dial cannot do is tell you the right number, because Persian neutral intervals are a range rather than a value and move with the performer and the school; our tuning-systems page covers what varies and by how much.