Jiegu is an alternative spelling of Gyêgu the town in Qinghai

Qinghai

Qinghai ; Oirat Mongolian: ; ; Salar:) is a province of the People's Republic of China, named after Qinghai Lake...

 province
The jiegu (羯鼓; pinyin: jiégǔ; sometimes translated as "wether

Wether

Wether may refer to:*A castrated male goat*A castrated male sheep...

 drum"; also written as 鞨鼓) was a drum

Drum

The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments, which is technically classified as the membranophones. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a shell and struck, either directly with the player's hands, or with a...

 used in ancient China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

. It was hourglass

Hourglass

An hourglass measures the passage of a few minutes or an hour of time. It has two connected vertical glass bulbs allowing a regulated trickle of material from the top to the bottom. Once the top bulb is empty, it can be inverted to begin timing again. The name hourglass comes from historically...

-shaped and played with two wooden sticks.

History

The jiegu was adopted from the Central Asia

Central Asia

Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...

n region of Kucha

Kucha

Kuchaor Kuche Uyghur , Chinese Simplified: 库车; Traditional: 庫車; pinyin Kùchē; also romanized as Qiuzi, Qiuci, Chiu-tzu, Kiu-che, Kuei-tzu from the traditional Chinese forms 屈支 屈茨; 龜玆; 龟兹, 丘玆, also Po ; Sanskrit: Kueina, Standard Tibetan: Kutsahiyui was an ancient Buddhist kingdom...

 during the Tang Dynasty

Tang Dynasty

The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...

, and became a popular instrument for dancing, particularly among nobles. Emperor Xuanzong of Tang

Emperor Xuanzong of Tang

Emperor Xuanzong of Tang , also commonly known as Emperor Ming of Tang , personal name Li Longji , known as Wu Longji from 690 to 705, was the seventh emperor of the Tang dynasty in China, reigning from 712 to 756. His reign of 43 years was the longest during the Tang Dynasty...

 (reigned 712

712

Year 712 was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 712 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.- Europe :* Ansprand succeeds Aripert as king of the...

-756

756

Year 756 was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 756 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.- Europe :* Pepin the Short defeats the Lombards of...

) was known as a skilled player of the instrument . A Korean instrument derived from the jiegu called the galgo

Galgo

The galgo is a traditional Korean drum. The drum has an hourglass-shaped wooden body and two drum heads of identical diameter, similar to the janggu. Compared to the janggu, the galgo is fitted with a sound-adjusting funnel different from that of the janggu...

is still occasionally used in Korea

Korea

Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...

. In Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

, the kakko

Kakko

The is a Japanese double-headed drum. One way in which the kakko differs from the regular taiko drum is in the way in which it is made taut. Like the Shime-Daiko and tsuzumi, the skin of the heads are first stretched over metal hoops before they are placed on the body, tying them to each other and...

is also derived from the jiegu, and is still used in gagaku

Gagaku

Gagaku is a type of Japanese classical music that has been performed at the Imperial Court in Kyoto for several centuries. It consists of three primary repertoires:#Native Shinto religious music and folk songs and dance, called kuniburi no utamai...

music.

External links

• Jiegu article (Chinese)