At the centre of Asia
Tuva sits at the geographic heart of the Asian continent, a bowl of steppe and taiga ringed by the Sayan and Tannu-Ola mountains where the two source rivers of the Yenisei meet at Kyzyl. For three thousand years it has been a crossroads of the nomadic world — Scythians left gold in its kurgan burial mounds, Turkic and Uyghur khaganates rose and fell here, and the people who remain are herders who follow horse, sheep, yak and, in the northern forest, the reindeer across a calendar of seasons.
Two notes from one throat
Khöömei — Tuvan throat-singing — is the art of producing two or more pitches at once: a low, steady drone and, riding above it, a whistling overtone melody shaped by the lips, tongue and throat. Its styles imitate the living soundscape of the steppe — sygyt the high wind and birdsong, kargyraa the rumble of camel and river, borbangnadyr the rolling of water. It is not performance bolted onto life but a way of speaking with the land itself, carried on the horsehair igil and doshpuluur.
A century of upheaval — and a living present
In 1921 Tuva became Tannu-Tuva, a nominally independent republic, before being absorbed by the Soviet Union in 1944 — a change that brought a new alphabet, collectivised the herds and pressed hard on both shamanism and Buddhism. Both have since returned in the open: shamans practise again in Kyzyl, monasteries are rebuilt, and khöömei, once a regional curiosity, has carried Tuvan singers like the group Huun-Huur-Tu and the late Kongar-ool Ondar onto stages across the world.
What is kept alive
A long thread
Hear it for yourself
Threads across the graph
Mongolian
Steppe neighbours and kin whose long-song and khöömii overtone singing share Tuva's bond of voice to horizon.
Sámi
Reindeer-herders of another north whose joik, like khöömei, sings the land itself rather than about it.
Inuit
Throat-singing kin across the circumpolar world, voicing breath and place between two singers.
Common questions
Who are the Tuvans?
The Tuvans (Tyva) are a Turkic people of south Siberia, at the geographic centre of Asia, where the two source rivers of the Yenisei meet. Numbering around 280,000, they are herders of horse, sheep, yak and reindeer, and are best known worldwide for khöömei — overtone throat-singing.
What is khöömei throat-singing?
Khöömei is the Tuvan art of producing two or more pitches from one voice at the same time — a low fundamental drone with a whistling overtone melody shaped above it. Its named styles, including sygyt (a high whistle) and kargyraa (a deep growl), imitate the wind, water, birds and animals of the steppe.
Where do the Tuvans live?
Most live in the Republic of Tuva (Tyva) in the Russian Federation, a region of steppe and taiga ringed by the Sayan and Tannu-Ola mountains on the Mongolian border, with the capital at Kyzyl. Smaller communities live across the frontier in Mongolia and China.
What do Tuvans believe?
Tuvan spiritual life blends Tengrism and shamanism — the veneration of the eternal sky and the master-spirits of springs, passes and mountains, honoured at ovaa cairns — with Tibetan Buddhism, whose monasteries and lamas were revived after the Soviet period.
How can I help preserve Tuvan heritage?
Support Tuvan musicians and khöömei masters directly, learn a few words of the Tuvan language, and back community-led recording. On FirstCiv every recording is logged with the singer's consent and minted as a Heritage Tablet owned by the Tuvan community, so royalties flow back to the keepers of the tradition.
Every recording here is held with community consent. The Tuvan are named as origin and primary beneficiary; royalties flow to the community fund. Photographs & media: Wikimedia Commons (CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA).