The Bodhran has become an indispensable musical instrument used in many genres and styles of music, most notably Irish traditional. It is typically played by percussionists but can also be played by singers.

The word bodhran comes from Irish Gaelic word bodar and has additional connotations as a deaf or dull sound source.

Vowels

The name “bodhran” should be pronounced bow-rawn. Each letter a has been decorated with a fada (pronounced Faw-dah), an indented line placed over its vowels to increase sound volume and lengthen pronunciation.

Break it down into its component sounds and practice them until they can be repeated without error. Record yourself and watch back your performance; or, better still, listen to someone else pronounce the word aloud.

Vowels can be affected by the consonants that come before and after them, pulling back or pushing forward as necessary. This is particularly noticeable with rounded vowels like those found in pa, spa and father; compare them to similar vowels such as trap and bath for further insight.

Scottish English merges palm and trap into one word when spoken with a centralized [a]. If this occurs in your language, experiment by pulling back vowels such as mac/mach, casa/calm, Sam/psalm or bat/baht to separate them out by vowel lengthening;

Consonants

Pronouncing “bodhran” correctly requires keeping in mind some key aspects. First and foremost, pronunce “bow-ran”, though you might also encounter it written as booraan in some places. Keep in mind that this instrument does not resemble tambourines in any way and should never be treated as one.

Notice the letter A has what’s known as a fada over it – this indicates to elongate its sound into an aw sound; without this signpost it would likely be mispronounced as bo-ran.

To play a bodhran, start by holding it on one leg (usually your left if you are right-handed), gripping its beater/stick in your right hand just above your knee and striking downward on its goatskin drum. Practice until this becomes effortless so that you can develop rhythm and speed that suits the style of music that you are playing.

Rolling the r

Although the bodhran may resemble a tambourine, they’re different instruments altogether. A tambourine features jingles on its skin side while being played without its head; on the contrary, the bodhran features skin sides which are played using an exclusive beater stick; it may also have one or two cross bars for extra sounding effects.

A bodhran is typically placed on its player’s left thigh (if they are right-handed) with its skin facing upward, ready for attack by its beater. You can either strike with hands or knuckles; however, most often played using hand-held beaters is more popular.

The bodhran is known for its distinctive sound, and recent innovations by some innovative players and tippermakers have taken this sound even further. Seamus O’Kane introduced thin Lambeg skins that enabled him to reach higher and lower notes with crisp notes while John Joe Kelly has used his drum as an accompaniment for other instruments such as guitar, whistles, flute and piano.

Stressing the first syllable

The Bodhran is a frame drum found all around the world, though its origins remain a bit mysterious. Although similar instruments exist elsewhere such as tambourines found in southern continental Europe, its introduction may have occurred via trade routes to Ireland.

Irish words that contain both short and long vowel sounds are generally stressed equally, with slight emphasis placed on the first syllable of each syllable; examples include leanbaf (childish), which should be pronounced lanibee, and aibrean (April), which should be pronounced ibirawn.

Modern times have seen the bodhran rise to worldwide renown as an iconic Celtic musical instrument. Many bodhran virtuosos such as Christy Moore of Planxty, Peadar Mercier from The Chieftains and Johnny McDonagh from De Dannan have contributed greatly to its development by pioneering new playing techniques. In Ireland, most commonly, it is pronounced bow-rawn, although other pronunciations may also be employed; this difference does not impede playback quality or music produced with regards to its use or music creation potential.

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