The sitar is around 127 cm long with a Pumpkin-shaped gourd at one end for the echo chamber, 19-20 frets spaced along the neck, 7 main strings and 11 sympathetic strings.
The most famous players of this instrument are Ravi Shankar and George Harrison.
In the beginning this way of playing can be very painful for the two index fingers. Experienced sitar players can be recognized by the black grooves in their index fingers.
Some people don't particularly enjoy this experience and tend to play the sitar more like a guitar.
wikipedia.org dumped 2003-03-17 with terodump