Hurdy-gurdy twenty-three different forms, and there is still no standardized design today. The six-stringed French "vielle à roue" is the best known and most common sort. A number of regional forms developed, but outside France the instrument was considered a folk instrument and there were no schools of construction that could have determined a standard form. There are two primary body styles for contemporary instruments: guitar-bodied and lute-backed. Both forms are found in French-speaking areas, while guitar-bodied instruments are the general form elsewhere. The box form of the "simphonia" is also commonly found among players of early music and historical re-enactors.
Hurdy Gurdy (film) term 'Hurdy Gurdy' is a "barrel organ". The film is recorded on Western Electric apparatus, which was an early sound-on-film recording system. This same system was also used on another Oswald short film entitled "Permanent Wave", which was released in the same year. Copyrighted on 3 January 1930, but released the year prior, the film was released by Universal Pictures. Thus, the film is part of the Universal series of Oswald The Lucky Rabbit films. The film opens with a bear (who is the street performer) using a barrel organ, and a monkey dancing to the music made by it.