Filed under: Thailand
Thailand has an amazingly rich, diverse musical culture. It ranges from classical xylophone based ensembles (piphat) to funky rural genres like luk thung and molam.
This recording is of ระบำดาวดึงษ์ (rabam daowadueng), from the famous lakhon “sang thong”, a dance-drama written during the reign of king Rama II (1809-1824) and derived from the Jataka tales (a collection of folktales about the births of Buddha). The lyrics to this dance describe the second level of heaven; the abode of the god indra, who lends much assistance to the play’s protagonist, phra sang, the conch-shell prince. The story has many magical elements, such as an ogres who dies of a broken heart. There’s a brief plot summary here.
The performers are a phiphat ensemble คณะดุริยะปราณีต (khana duriya pranit), along with a group of singers. originally this would have been an all-male production, at least in terms of the actors.
Piphat is the ensemble used for classical Thai music. There are several forms of piphat ensemble with different instrumental configurations, the basic form consists of the pi nai (oboe), ranat (xylophone), khong wong wai (gong circle) and various percussion instruments. The Cambodian version is called pinpeat.
Thanks to Peter Doolan for translation and general info, he’ll be pitching in here while we explore some Thai records. Be sure to check out his amazing and informative Thai cassette blog MONRAKPLENGTHAI.
Filed under: Cambodia
Here’s a beautiful record of Mohori music from Cambodia. Mohoroi is a traditional Khmer ensemble, but the name also refers to the repertoire. There are different size ensembles, with different combinations of instruments consisting of flutes, fiddles, xylophones and percussion.
On this recording we hear khloy (flute), khimm (hammered dulcimer), tror so and tror ou (Different pitched 2 string fiddles), Jakae (crocodile zither) and more
The label says “Kreung Ksai” meaning string ensemble. “Sak Som Peo” on the right is probably the name of the group or school.
The name of the song is Pleng Boran, meaning “Music from the Past”, which turns out to be more true than the musicians who recorded this in the 1940’s could have guessed, as songs like this disappeared with the many musicians who were brutally murdered by the Khmer Rouge.
Special thanks to Prof. Terry Miller (again) and Bee, a great Khmer musician. Here are his youtube performances.
Filed under: VIETNAM
I thought I was finished with Vietnamese posting and ready to move on when I got my hands on this interesting record. After discussing the record with Jason Gibbs I decided it was worth posting. Most of the information in this post comes from him.
Hát bội (or tuồng theatre) is a form of Chinese opera imported into Vietnam as early as the 13th century. It uses costumes, gestures and stock characters similar to Chinese opera. The double reed instrument is the kèn, similar to the Chinese suona.
By the 1950’s, the communist government in the North was issuing records of folk music and opera with propaganda lyrics. The song is entitled “Đấu tranh chống Mỹ” – “Fight Against America.” It is sung in the khách and nam modes of the tuồng theatre repertoire. The words are by Mịch Quang and are sung by Võ Sĩ Thừa. The music is played by the surrealistically named Dàn Nhạc Đội Tuồng LK 5 (The Ensemble of the Tuồng Troupe of Interzone 5). The 5th Interzone consists of Quảng Nam, Quảng Ngãi, Bình Định and Phú Yên provinces — the coastal region between Đà Nẵng and Túy Hòa.
The significance of interzone is showing the solidarity between those who regrouped to the North with their comrades still below the 17th parallel (the Bến Hải river). They sing in the dialect and musical style of that region. The Bến Hải River marked the demarcation of the border between North and South Vietnam at the 17th parallel. The much evoked landmark for this border was the Hiền Lương bridge that crossed this river.
The below photo shot from the North show a gate to the bridge with the words: Hồ Chủ Tịch muôn năm – Premiere Hồ Forever.
Three postcards showing Vietnamese opera troupes:
Thanks again to Jason Gibbs!
Filed under: VIETNAM
Cải lương was commonly found on 45rpm 7 inch records in the 60’s and 70’s. As discussed in the previous post, the music consists of pop introductions and traditional Vọng cổ. The cover designs are wildly inventive, with unusual typefaces and sometimes shocking color schemes. Here’s a small sample.
Filed under: VIETNAM
By the 60’s, Cai Luong had updated itself again. Now the Vọng cổ sections were surrounded by Western pop styled intros and outros, from light swing to twangy rock, called tân cổ giao duyên (new and old songs of predestined affinity). On this record you can even hear the traditional instruments overlapping with the pop arrangement near the end.
The song title is Một chiều gặp gỡ – An Afternoon Encounter. Nhật Hạ (a pseudonym for the songwriter Khánh Băng) wrote the tân nhạc (modern music). The femal evocal is by Thanh Nga, an idol of the cải lương stage and cinema in the South. The male vocal is Thành Được, a popular cải lương actor. Văn Vĩ plays the lục huyền cầm = literally 6 string instrument (guitar, in this case with scalloped out frets). Yên Sơn wrote the vọng cổ (lyrics that fit the skeletal melody).
Thanks to Stuart from Radio Diffusion Internasionaal for the hooking me up this record. He’s got a great guest post at Excavated Shellac right now that’s worth checking out.
And another big ‘thank you’ to Vietnamese music researcher Jason Gibbs for his continuing help with translation and more. Vietnamese popular music is Jason’s main focus, with any luck we’ll hear more from him on the subject.
