music here in Thailand

There are two main groups of musicians at Dipangkorn--Western style as seen above, and classical Thai as seen below. Both are respected, and both seem quite different from what I'm used to in Massachusetts.

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The man in khaki is Ajahn Burim (Ajahn translates to Honored Teacher, maybe Master Teacher), the leader of the Western-style music until he left last month for a position at a prestigious private school. His young assistant was very much in the background, has now taken over and is doing very well.

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The student band plays for the all-school assembly most days, for the three standard songs: the Thai national anthem and March Dipangkorn (music composed by Burim, words by my Thai teacher Ajahn Siribuhn), both of which I'm learning, and the third Siam Noot Sawam, a more difficult melody (hugely wide voice range; the students mostly fake it...)

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The western music is taught in two different systems: our standard, and a notation with letters, dashes and upright measure-marks, though their upright line denotes the middle of the measure (I'll bring an example). The Thai notation is from the Thai alphabet, single consonants for the musical syllables do, re, mi, fa, son, la, ti. To indicate a note up an octave, write a dot above the letter; a dot below means drop an octave. For songs in a minor key they usually shift the scale to use la through la instead of do through do.

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I've added images of Ajahn Burim teaching the two methods, using Thai letters, translating to English (he has C as do here). The band kids also read "standard" music, though I've found most kids not in the band have no idea what I'm talking about when I say "read music".

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This shows the more traditional Thai music. It's the orchestra that plays for all the Thai dance performances, as well as for religious or traditional Thai ceremonies (the first time I heard them play was for the Teacher Honoring ceremony).

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The same instruments were used for the khon performance. In both settings (school performances and fancy auditorium), the performers sit on the floor, generally cross-legged.

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The teacher for the classical Thai music is Ajahn Siranat, who is also now my saw teacher. He is more flexible than Burim was about how to tune the instrument (precise tuning, but Siranat says you can choose whether to tune do for one string and son for the second, or la and re which Burim requires; Siranat points out that some songs work better with the wider tuning and I think he's right). Siranat also changed my saw strings to thicker, fabric strings; Burim had put on metal strings. I think the metal strings give better tone and the fabric strings hold the tuning better. I'll let Kelley help me decide how best to string it. I know it can sound beautiful with metal strings, as Burim played my saw and I was entranced. So far with my fabric strings it sounds absolutely terrible.

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Burim had quite usable English; Siranat has almost none. We both speak musical syllables, and our singing voices plus smiles can convey a lot. After our last lesson Siranat wrote a single word in Thai on a piece of paper; I couldn't find it in my dictionary so I asked Boom. She found it in her more complete dictionary, and laughed--the word was "resin".

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Even though they mostly don't read music, I find the students are entranced by singing. This week when I finished the lesson on Norasing* early, we had a few extra minutes and I asked what they'd like to do. Several simultaneous voices requested a song; I pondered what to sing and they started the Thai national anthem. I chimed in with the few words I know and la-la for the tune where I don't yet know the words. They clapped as we finished. Then I sang the Star Spangled Banner and America the Beautiful and had complete, attentive silence from a class full of high school sophomores; then they clapped again.

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* the story of Norasing, as presented in my English class:

Norasing was a servant of the king. (in 1704; Thai year 2247)

Norasing drove the boat of the king.

The king was in the boat as Norasing steered.

The boat crashed into a tree at the side of the river.

The king was not hurt. He laughed, and he forgave Norasing.

But Norasing was very ashamed.

Norasing knew he must die.

The king ordered Norasing's execution.

After Norasing was dead, the king built a temple in Norasing's honor.

(True story.)