Shostakovich Jazz Suite no.1 Plucked instrument

[Doronk]

Hi, can someone please tell me what's the plucked string instrument that has a solo in the foxtrot of shostakovich's Jazz suite no.1. Thanks

[Melodia]

I assume you mean the banjo.

[Doronk]

I don't think that it's the banjo, because it doesn't really sound like a banjo. And also I went onto Youtube to see if i could find a video of the Jazz suite. the only decent one i could find was exactly the same as the original score but there was both a banjo and an Electric guitar and the electric jazz guitar played the solo( I doubt an electric guitar was in the original score)

[sdtom]

I don't think that it's the banjo, because it doesn't really sound like a banjo. And also I went onto Youtube to see if i could find a video of the Jazz suite. the only decent one i could find was exactly the same as the original score but there was both a banjo and an Electric guitar and the electric jazz guitar played the solo( I doubt an electric guitar was in the original score)

It is a Hawaiian guitar.
Tom

[madcapellan]

Ah, threadromancy. It's actually both ironically, but the "hawaiian guitar" (known in English as the ukelele) is the featured solo instrument in that one part.

[jossuk]

This from the Boosey and Hawkes blurb for the Jazz Suite #1:

In the 1930s jazz was highly popular in the Soviet Union. Shostakovich was particularly interested in this kind of music, especially as it was practised within the USSR by his colleagues and friends. So he was delighted when he was asked to write a piece for a small Leningrad dance-band. The result was this charming and tuneful Suite in a style combining echoes of Kurt Weill, klezmer and cabaret with more American influences, especially in the darkly hilarious final movement. There are three movements in all: a soupy and engaging Waltz, a lively Polka with a tricky xylophone solo, and a paradoxically entitled Foxtrot (Blues), which features a notable episode for that pioneering electric instrument, the Hawaiian guitar.

While the ukulele (note spelling) may be electrified, I think it unlikely that such an instrument is what Shostakovich had in mind by "Hawaiian guitar". Also, the original score apparently included banjo.