| Name | Image | Tradition | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cencerro |  | Cuba | A clapperless cowbell is called a cencerro in Cuban music and often played by the same player as the bongos. Clapperless cowbells made of metal are an important element in Latin-American and go go music. These cowbells are struck with a stick - the tone being modulated by striking different parts of the bell and by damping with the hand holding the bell. |
| Çeng |  | Turkey | The çeng is a Turkish harp. Descended from ancient Near Eastern instruments, it was a popular Ottoman instrument until the last quarter of the 17th century. The word comes from the Persian word "chang," which means "harp" (and also "five fingers"). The çeng is an angled harp. Its strings are stretched between the peg box and the resonator. There is nothing in front of the longest (and deepest) string. |
| Chabreta |  | France | Chabreta is a mouth blown bagpipe from Lemosin (France). It is a pipe with a triple-bored bass drone played across the player's arm rather than over the shoulder. The form of the chabrette chanter appears similar to early oboes, including a swallow-tail key for the lowest note which is placed under a fontenelle. |
| Chalumeau |  | France | The chalumeau (plural chalumeaux; from Greek: κάλαμος, kalamos, meaning "reed") is a woodwind instrument of the late baroque and early classical era. It has an approximately cylindrical bore and a mouthpiece with a single reed. The clarinet was developed from the chalumeau. The word "chalumeau" was in use in French from the twelfth century to refer to various sorts of pipes, some of which were made of cane and featured a single "reed" cut into the side of the cane itself. |
| Chamber Organ |  | United States | A chamber organ is a small pipe organ, often with only one manual, and sometimes without separate pedal pipes, that is placed in a small room, that this diminutive organ can fill with sound. It is often confined to chamber organ repertoire, as often, the organs have too little voice capabilities to rival the grand pipe organs in the performance of the classics. The sound and touch are unique unto the instrument, sounding nothing like a large organ with few stops drawn out, but rather much more intimate. They are usually tracker instruments, although the modern builders are often building electropneumatic chamber organs. The image shows a chamber organ in a church of Williamsburg, Virginia. |
| Chanz |  | Mongolia | Chanz is a Mongolian long-necked spiked lute with an oval wooden frame and snakeskin covering stretched over both faces. The three strings are fixed to a bar, which is inserted in the body. The instrument is struck or plucked with a plectrum made of horn or with the fingers. |
| Chanzy |  | Tuva | A chanzy is a three-stringed lute instrument from the Tuvan Republic. It is most commonly used to accompany throat singing. |
| Chapey Dang Veng |  | Cambodia | The chapei dong veng is a two-string guitar with long neck from Cambodia. It is a plucked guitar with frets. |
| Chapman Stick |  | United States | The Chapman Stick is an electric musical instrument devised by Emmett Chapman in the early 1970s. He set out to create an instrument designed for the "Free Hands" tapping method of both hands parallel to the frets that he invented in 1969. The first production model of the Stick was shipped in 1974. Superficially, a Stick looks like a wide version of the fretboard of an electric guitar, with 8, 10 or 12 strings. It is usually played by tapping or fretting the strings, rather than plucking them. |
| Charango |  | South America | The charango is a small South American stringed instrument of the lute family, about 66 cm long, traditionally made with the shell of the back of an armadillo (not to be confused with a Cuban style of music called "charanga"). It typically has 10 strings in five courses of 2 strings each, although other variations exist. Traditionally made with a dried armadillo shell for the back and wood for the soundbox top, neck etc, today charangos are commonly made of wood, with a bowled back imitating the shape of the armadillo shell. |
| Chau Gong |  | China | By far the most familiar to most Westerners is the chau gong or bullseye gong. Large chau gongs, called tam-tams (not to be confused with tom-tom drums), have become part of the symphony orchestra. Sometimes a chau gong is referred to as a Chinese gong, but in fact it is only one of many types of suspended gongs that are associated with China. The chau gong is made of copper-based alloy, bronze or brass. It is almost flat except for the rim, which is turned up to make a shallow cylinder. |
| Chenda |  | India | The Chenda is a cylindrical percussion instrument used widely in the state of Kerala, India. It is also used in some parts of Karnataka where it is called the Chende. The chenda is mainly played as an accompaniment in the Hindu religious art forms of Kerala. |
| Chimta |  | India | Chimta is a percussion instrument from India. The chimta consists of a long, flat folded piece of metal steel strip, often with 7 pairs of small metal jingles. The rings are plucked in a downward motion to produce tinkling sounds. Chimtas with large discs are used at rural festivals while ones with smaller discs are often used as an accompaniment to Bhangra (a lively form of music and dance) dancers and singers of traditional Indian hymns. |
| Ching |  | Thailand | The ching or chhing are small bowl-shaped finger cymbals of thick and heavy bronze, with a broad rim commonly used in Cambodia and Thailand. They are made of an alloy (mixture of iron, copper, and gold) mixed with bronze. They measure about 2 inches (5 cm) in diameter and are joined together with a cord, which passes through a small hole at the apex of each one of them. Each cymbal of the pair is held in one hand and the two are struck together. The ching are the timekeeper of the ensemble. While cymbals, in general, are used for various occasions (ritual, martial, theater, and at war), the Khmer people use them purely in theater, dance, and music contexts. |
| Chitarra Batente |  | Italy | The chitarre battente (Italian: lit. "beating guitar") is a musical instrument, a chordophone of the lute family. At a casual glance, it is similar to the everyday classical guitar, but larger and typically strung with four steel strings. Nowadays it is typical of folk music mainly in Calabria, Puglia and Basilicata, as well as in other areas of southern Italy; in previous centuries was common in most of central and southern Italy. There are versions of the historical 17th instrument in museums, but the commonly played folk instrument comes in three sizes: small, medium, large. The medium and large instruments are the most popular; the small instrument is a toy and has traditionally been used to train children to play. |
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