burmese in NY

Some of the best indigenous microtonal music on the globe
and i don't mean Shakespeare

New York Times

December 11, 2003

Like Father, Like Son: Burmese Sounds in New York

By BEN SISARIO

Kyaw Kyaw Naing stood in front of his orchestra yesterday morning, its
musicians just in from Myanmar, and prepared to begin a rehearsal. The
players fell silent, and Mr. Naing raised his hands as if to speak but
instead burst into tears.

"My heart is overwhelmed, I'm so happy," he said through an interpreter.

"I've been trying so hard to bring this music to the world stage, and
these
are all my father's friends, and my teachers. I wish my father was here
to
see it."

Mr. Naing, who has lived in the United States for about four years, is
one
of the world's leading practitioners of Burmese music, a style so little

known in the West that few recordings exist of it here. Experts say a
performance by a full ensemble from Myanmar, the Southeast Asian country

formerly known as Burma, has not taken place in New York in almost 30
years.

But tomorrow and Saturday at the Asia Society in Manhattan, Mr. Naing
will
lead a 19-piece music and dance group, including nine performers who
arrived from Myanmar on Tuesday. The last time a Burmese orchestra
played
in New York was in 1975 at the Asia Society, the organization says, and
it
was led by Mr. Naing's father, U Sein Chit Tee. Two of the players this
weekend performed with Mr. Naing's father at that concert.

Rachel Cooper, who directs the performing arts program at the Asia
Society,
said she had worked for more than two years to set up the concert,
dealing
with the bureaucracies of Yangon and Washington and carefully
establishing
trust with the musicians. She traveled to Myanmar twice and nearly
brought
the group here in April, but passport problems got in the way.

"When governments cannot talk to each other," she said to the musicians
at
yesterday's rehearsal, "music and dance speak to humanity."

Cut off from the West by a military dictatorship and trade restrictions,

Myanmar has remained relatively unexplored by scholars and world-music
aficionados.

"Everybody is listening to everything from everywhere now," said Evan
Ziporyn, a music professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
who
plays with Bang on a Can and has performed with Mr. Naing, "but Burmese
music is one of the last frontiers of world music."

Mr. Naing, 39, who now lives in Sunnyside, Queens, is a master of the
pat
waing, a traditional Burmese drum-circle instrument, where the player
sits
in the middle of a horseshoe-shaped shell made of elaborately carved
wood
decorated with gold leaf. He will lead the ensemble which is to include
12
musicians and 7 dancers in a sampling of Burmese music, including
excerpts
from a zat pwe, an all-night variety show that includes music, dance,
comedy and drama. Many of the instruments and sets, which have been
shipped
in from Myanmar, belong to Mr. Naing's family and were used at the 1975
concert by Mr. Naing's father.

Mr. Naing has slowly been building a career as a Burmese musician in
America. Mr. Ziporyn said he first encountered him at a concert at a
church
in Brookline, Mass., several years ago, and invited him to a workshop at

M.I.T., where he arrived with his pat waing on the back of a pickup
truck.
Since then Mr. Naing has performed with Bang on a Can and toured with a
group from U.C.L.A.

But Burmese music has remained a mystery to most listeners. The Nonesuch

Explorer series, an exhaustive set of world-music albums issued from the

1960's to the 80's, bypassed the country altogether. But things have
begun
to change. In the last six years Shanachie, Auvidis/Unesco and
Smithsonian
Folkways have all released albums of Burmese music, which have been
received enthusiastically by critics and a small but devoted group of
fans.

Percussive, melodic and dizzyingly fast, Burmese music has been likened
to
both the music for Balinese gamelans and jazz. The Burmese have also
adapted certain Western instruments for performance in traditional
ensembles. In addition to the pat waing and saing waing a large
percussion
ensemble led by the pat waing player the concerts this weekend will
feature
the Burmese piano and slide guitar.

The piano first entered the country's music after it was given to a
Burmese
court in the mid-19th century as a gift from the Italian ambassador,
according to an essay commissioned by the Asia Society, which is
presenting
the performance with Lotus Music and Dance.

Mr. Naing said that like jazz musicians, Burmese players "look at one
another and listen to the tune and play accordingly."

"And even though they might play the same piece of music, the next time
they play it differently," he said.

But does it sound anything like jazz?

"No," Mr. Naing said with a laugh, "it's totally different."
-- -Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
http://www.anaphoria.com
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU 88.9 FM WED 8-9PM PST