A balalaika is a triangle-shaped string instrument with a fretted neck, hollow body and three strings. Two of them are tuned to the same note and the third is tuned a perfect fourth higher ...

As you can see in the video above, the balalaika can come in handy in producing some Middle Eastern-sounding string arrangements, with the earlier part of the song that Scallon constructed ...

Nick Baker tells the story of the humble, three-stringed balalaika and maverick Russian virtuoso, Alexey Arhipovskiy, who has brought to it new attitude, ambition and a surprising new sound.