The Cimbalom

This section has some information I pulled together in response to a recent gift of a Schunda system cimbalom built in Budapest sometime before 1874. Dampers for cimbaloms were invented in 1874 by Schunda Vencel Jozsef. Since this instrument does not have dampers, the date of origin would be sometime before that year. Unfortunately the label has disintegrated so much, I can't make it out. I thought it would be helpful to those of you who might be interested to provide a bunch of photos, the tuning scheme, vibrating lengths, string gauges and dimensions. The instrument itself is in such bad shape that I probably won't be rehabilitating it. If anyone who reads this has anymore information to contribute, please drop me an email. Do a search on youtube if you'd like to hear and see cimbaloms.