Old empress abandoning zither's beginning another instrument (7)
I believe the answer is:
ocarina
'instrument' is the definition.
(I know that ocarina is a type of wind)
'old empress' is the wordplay.
'old' becomes 'o' (common abbreviation eg in OE for Old English).
'empress' becomes 'carina' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'o'+'carina'='OCARINA'
'abandoning zither's beginning another' is the link.
This may not be right. Some or all of it may belong to another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for ocarina that I've seen before include "Egg-shaped wind instrument with finger holes" , "Wind instrument with a mouthpiece and finger holes" , "Small egg-shaped wind instrument with holes for the fingers" , "Bird-shaped flute" , "Simple wind instrument" .)