One Last Music Culture: Mongolian Long Song

Mongolia is on the continent of Asia, and is located in north central Asia between Russia and China, and has been heavily influenced by these two countries. The capital of Mongolia is Ulaanbaatar. Mongolia has longer colder winters with short cool/hot summers and has many deserts, semi-deserts, and upland steppes, which are higher altitude large areas of grasslands that are unforested. Mongolia itself rests at a high altitude and is brought to even higher heights with the Mongolian Mountains in the southwest. Most of Mongolia's grasslands are used as pastures for livestock and not as areas for crops. 

Most of the people in Mongolia speak Mongolian. The Mongols had traditionally practiced shamanism as their form of religion, but Lamaism (Tibetan Buddhism) with some additional shamanistic aspects is now broadly practiced. About 25-30% of the Mongolian people have a nomadic lifestyle. The arts in Mongolia have developed from a long history of oral traditions such as oral heroic stories, and multiple genres of poetry, and they reflect the Mongolian's "good-humored love of life" (Britannica). 

The Mongolian folk singing, dance, and music is abundant and beautiful. There are many traditional Mongolian music types, and some of the most prominent are overtone singing (Mongolian throat singing), short song, and long song. Some Mongolian instruments include the morin khurr (horse-head fiddle), shants (lute-like), khuuchir (bowed spike fiddle), yatga, and the bishur (clarinet-like) (Discover Mongolia). 

The Urtiin duu, which means "long song", is one of the major types of Mongolian songs. The Urtiin duu is a type of song that is widely used at celebrations. Such celebrations include things like weddings, the use of a new house when someone gives birth to a child, festivals that are highly attended, and various events with livestock, such as the branding of a young horse, which would be a social event celebrated by traditional nomadic Mongolians (Urtiin Duu). 

The long song is one of the most complicated types of folk song and is said that the singer of the long song needs to have a vocal range that spans three octaves. The Urtiin duu can be sung by both women and men, and they are normally accompanied by traditional Mongolian instruments such as the morin khurr. The singers of the long song will normally be in Mongolian traditional dress when they are performing. 

The morin khurr. The morin khurr is considered the national instrument and is used to accompany singers and dancers, and is even said to be used to tame horses. Horses hold a respected position in ancient, traditional, and nomadic Mongolian society. They have been used in hunting, herding, travel, and sport. It is a source of joy and pride for the Mongolian people. Traditionally, the sound box of the morin khurr was made from the head of a beloved horse that had recently passed, and the strings were its hairs (Morin Khurr). 

Traditional Mongolian dress, men. 

Norovbanzad Namjil, famous long song singer, woman in traditional clothing. 

The long song is exactly that. It is a long song. The reason that the Urtiin duu is so long is because of how the lyric of the song are sung and the tempo of the song. The Urtiin duu reflects the slow-moving, grazing lifestyle of the nomadic Mongolians that live in the steppes of Mongolia. One Urtiin duu, or long song, that has only twelve words can be sung in a way were the song lasts 5 minutes. Certain long song can last up to three hours. 

The Urtiin duu has a slow tempo that sets the tone for the long melodic lines. The long melodic lines are complex in their composition, and have very wide pitch intervals, and do not follow a set rhythm. The Urtiin duu allows for improvisation of the words of the long song, with each word of the song being drawn out and explored, and it contains many melismas, trills, or yodeling-like effects. Additional vowel sounds are added to draw out the singing of a word. The longer a singer can hold out a word, the longer that a singer can make a long song last, and the more appreciated and celebrated they are. It s an honorable song that is desired to be as drawn out as possible in the more skilled way (Bars).

Norovbanzad Namjil (1931-2002) is recognized as a spectacular long song singer and is considered to be one of the people who introduced the long song to the global people. She was a very successful and award-winning Urtiin duu singer. She has performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, La Scala in Milan, and was presented an Asian Cultural Award in Japan in 1993. 

One way in which the Mongolian long song is different from both Western music styles and Middle Eastern styles is that the Mongolian long song uses a five-note pentatonic scale. This means that they do not use semitones, or a half step, like Western styles of music, and definitely do not use microtones like middle eastern music (Bars). 

The urtiin duu has a rich history, displays many themes and meanings, and can hold messages of various avenues, such as history, romance, celebration, or even religion. One ancient origin story of the Urtiin duu is about a woman, her child, and nature. The story goes that one day a young woman gave birth to a little boy alone on a vast steppe (the grasslands) during a snowstorm that was occurring during one of Mongolian long, cold winters. In order to save the life of her child, the woman wrapped her newborn baby boy in her clothes, and because of this died. The little boy was found by some wolves, and the wolves took this little boy in and cared for him for three years. The wolves cared for him, kept in warm with the skin of sheep they had killed, fed him, and soothed him to sleep every night with their howls. One day some shepherds find this boy, and they take him in. The boy was sad in the shepherds' house, yet was soothed by the wolves who howled as they experienced the grief of losing their adoptive brother. The next night when the boy was crying, the shepherds, realizing the wolf howl was soothing this boy, mimicked the howling of these animals to soothe the child into sleep (Bars). 

This is one of the stories that show the origin story of the long song. The long, drawn-out sounds of a wolf's call closely resemble the urtiin duu, and hold the message that the urtiin duu is sometimes meant to be a soothing song that calms the soul and brings us together as one. The Urtiin duu, or long song, is a beautiful musical tradition from Mongolia and is a type of song that is meant to celebrate life, with all of its beautiful and ugly facets, in a complex way with a long-lasting message. 

Bars, Battushig. "Features of Mongolian Traditional Folk Song - the Urtiin Duu". Mongolianz. Nov. 28, 2018, https://www.mongolianz.com/post/2018/11/28/features-of-mongolian-traditional-folk-song-the-urtiin-duu/.  

Mongolia, Discover. "The Impressive Story of Mongolian Music". Discover Mongolia Travel, April 23, 2020, https://www.discovermongolia.mn/blogs/the-impressive-story-of-mongolian-music. 

Sanders, Alan J.K. , Harris, Chauncy D. and Lattimore, Owen. "Mongolia". Encyclopedia Britannica, 28 Apr. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/place/Mongolia. Accessed 6 May 2023.

"Morin Khurr (horse head fiddle)". Royal Collection Trust, 2004, https://www.rct.uk/collection/95705/morin-khuur-horse-head-fiddle#:~:text=Morin%20khuur%20roughly%20translates%20as,and%20are%20part%20of%20the. 

"Urtin Duu, traditional folk long song". UNESCO, 2008, https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/urtiin-duu-traditional-folk-long-song-00115.