Kongar-ool Ondar, a Tuvan throat singer credited with popularizing the centuries-old musical tradition of his homeland to Western audiences, has died after emergency surgery to treat a brain hemorrhage, friends said. He was 51.

Ondar died Thursday at a hospital in Kyzyl, the capital of Tuva, a Russian republic that borders Mongolia, said Sean Quirk, a longtime friend of the singer and manager of the Tuvan throat-singing ensemble Alash.