Mongolian music is a reaction to their surroundings and life. Caring for a baby provokes melody. Seeing a calf being rejected, its mother is convinced to return by singing. Seeing white gers spread across the green pasture inspires a proud melody. Traveling a long way on horseback, riding sets a pace, the pace delivers rhyme, and here again the song is involuntary. Hurrying to one's beloved, the heartbeat composes another melody. The sources of song are endless. Birthdays, weddings, national holidays, winning a horse race or wrestling competition, celebration of the elderly, mare's milk brewing, wool cutting, cashmere combing, and harvest comprise an endless chain of reasons for singing and dancing.Through the ages, music has spread around Mongolia through home teaching and festivities. Any family or clan event was a good chance for musicians and singers to gather together. Coming from different areas, most often representing different tribes, people had the opportunity to perform, to learn from others and to take home a new melody or song. In this way, the ancient patterns of various corners of Mongolia have been preserved by local masters for the whole nation.Some specific types of Mongolian song are:

Long-songs
This genre is not called Long-song because the songs are long, but because each syllable of text is extended for a long duration. A four-minute song may only consist of ten words. Long-songs are generally sad, and are sometimes perceived as being morose. Lyrical themes vary depending on context; they can be philosophical, religious, romance, or celebratory, and often use horses as a symbol or theme repeated throughout the song. Eastern Mongols typically use a moriin khuur (horse-head fiddle) as accompaniment, sometimes with a type of indigenous flute. Western Mongols typically sing long-songs unaccompanied. 

Long songs relate traditional stories about the beauty of the native land and daily life, to which Mongolians offer blessings. These feelings are formed into majestic, profound songs, such as "The Pleasure Sharing Sun of Universe", "The Old Man and the Bird", "The One and Only Real Love", "Sunjidmaa, the Beloved".

Epics and legends. This ancient genre, enriched by generations, combines poetry, songs, music and the individuality of each performer. Singers may sing with or without a musical instrument. These sung stories are told from memory and may have thousands of quatrains. Such long stories are usually performed on a long winter night.

By combining stories, music and drama, herders organize a kind of home school. The children, while playing various collective games with bone and wooden toys, listen to the songs and learn about history, life and folklore.

"Geser", "Jangar", "Khan Kharakhui", and "Bum Erdene" are classic legend and story songs. Each is a library of folk wisdom and national heritage.

 

Horse-head fiddle

The horse-head fiddle, or moriin khuur, is a distinctively Mongolian instrument, traditionally played by the uligershin (bards) of that culture, and is seen as a symbol of the country. The instrument is two-stringed and is bowed like a cello. There is some controversy regarding the traditional carving of a horse on the upper end of the pegbox. Some scholars believe that this is proof that the instrument was originally a shamanistic instrument, as the staffs of shamans have a horse similarly carved on top; the horse is a much-revered animal in Mongolia. The UNESCO proclaimed the traditional music of the moriin khuur a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity on November 7, 2003.

 

Throat singing
Perhaps the best-known musical form of the Mongols is the throat-singing tradition, extant among all or most Mongols though best well-known internationally from Tuva. Sung differently than traditional vocals from Mongolia or almost anywhere in the world (with the exception of a few specific areas, such as Switzerland or Canadian Inuit). In Mongolia, the most-famous throat-singers include Khalkhas like Gereltsogt and Sundui, while the Tuvan group Huun-Huur-Tu has an international following. This unique type of singing involves the performer generating two notes at once, one much higher than the other.Interestingly it can only be sung by men, the long-song is a particularily powerful song in the steppes where it is given room to develop. Mongolian Resorts employs a long song singer during the summer months, he is placed high above the camp on a hill and all the guests wonder what it is, an animal, a human or even a god....

Pop music

 Largely unknown outside of Mongolia, there is a thriving pop mop scene centered in the city of Ulaanbaatar. Actually, this is a mixture of various kinds of popular music. Other Western genres include heavy metal bands like Hurd, boy bands like Camerton, girl groups like Lipstick, hard rock bands like Haranga and hip hop groups like Lumino. There is also a long established and distinctive "Mongolian pop" genre that occupies the same place on the musical spectrum as Japanese Enka music or Western soft-pop-oriented folk music or country music. Classic performers from the late 20th century include Batsukh and Tumurhuyag. Some of the repeatedly heard lyrical themes are very distinctive for Mongolia: heartfelt tributes to the songwriter's mother, for example, or paeans to great horses. This type of music is not considered world music in the west and was long generally unavailable outside Mongolia, but can now be downloaded from various Mongolian websites. It may be filed under the designation Зохиoлын Дyy (literary music).

 

Labor song.

These are melodies sung while working.

The hunter's call attracts the animal by imitating its call in order to select a specific type of animal and to hunt with certainty, without wounding.

Various herder's calls manage the flock by signaling to go to pasture, return home, generate more milking, encourage insemination, bring a mother back to her calf, and so on.

An example of such a call in the Central Khalkha region:

The Oirat Mongols call a bit differently:

Buuvey song.

A buuvey song is a lullaby, or any sweet melody expressing a mother's boundless love for her baby. "Buuvey… buuvey… buuvey…" is repeated while caressing a child to make him or her sleep. The melody may come from the heart of mother and be improvised. There are also lullaby songs with legends already composed, learned by the family and distributed to other families and generations.

"Uukhay" or "guiyngoon" song. These are encouraging and provoking calls, connected with seasonal events. As warm days arrive, mare's milk flows and the horse race training reaches its peak, the "guiyngoon" songs of little riders is heard in every direction. It is followed by songs of victorious winners, be it a rider, a wrestler or archery master. Fans chant the "uukhay!" encouraging song, which roughly means "go ahead".

Mongol Hoomii. Mongol hoomii involves producing two simultaneous tones with the human voice. It is a difficult skill requiring special ways of breathing. One tone comes out as a whistle-like sound, the result of locked breath in the chest being forced out through the throat in a specific way, while a lower tone sounds as a base. Hoomii is considered musical art - not exactly singing, but using one's throat as an instrument.

Depending on the way air is exhaled from the lungs, there are various ways of classifying hoomii, including Bagalzuuryn (laryngeal) hoomii, Tagnainy (palatine) hoomii, Hooloin (guttural) hoomii, Hamryn (nasal) hoomii, and Harhiraa hoomi: under strong pressure in the throat, air is exhaled while a lower tone is kept as the main sound.

Professional hoomi performers are found in only a few areas with certain traditions. The Chainman district of Hovd aimag (province) is one home of hoomii. Tuva, a part of Russia to the north of Mongolia, is also a center of Hoomii.

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