Thai Classical Music for Monastic Rituals (T.20)

A very cool cassette of instrumental piphat music. Well recorded, spacious, and trance inducing. Enjoy!

Thai Classical Music for Monastic Rituals (T.20)

Thai Classical Music (TS-2027)

Fantastic tape of classical Thai music. Dig the cool court dancer profile, font mix, and glowing sunset artwork. Lovely.

Thai Classical Music (TS-2027)

Thai Classical Music (URT 2004)

More cool classical Thai music, and a good follow up to this post.  Really beautiful unraveling instrumental compositions with tumbling harmonic orbits and cosmic form cycles. 

Thai Classical Music (URT 2004)

Thai Classical Music (Golden TS-2038)

Beautiful cassette of classical Thai music. There's Hanuman on the cover, the magical monkey! The B side of this tape is very cool - hypnotic and time distorting cyclic forms. Great stuff.    

 

Thai Classical Music (Golden TS-2038)

Thai Classical Music - Funeral Music (Golden TS-2026)

This intense Thai cassette is a dear favorite, and still leaves me with the same somber feeling that I had when I first heard it - but like my other Thai tapes, I'm pretty much in the dark when it comes to a substantial explanation for the music. It's obviously mastered from vinyl, like many of the Thai classical music tapes out there. Also I was told that it's funeral music, which makes perfect sense. The saturated lament that opens side A sets the vibe with a weeping man's cries of sorrow over the loss of his friend, all accompanied by the piphat emsemble. What follows is a heavy spiral of blown out instrumental music and haunting pi solos - powerful stuff.  Cool open shutter photo for the cover art as well.  I would love to know more about this cassette - if anyone reading this can provide some insight into the story here, please leave a comment - I would be much obliged. 

  

Thai Classical Music - Funeral Music (Golden TS-2026)

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Update....

Peter, the man behind the incredibly cool 

monrakplengthai blog, posted this info in the comments:

"i think i can help you out with some context for this tape. you're right about it being funeral music; the style is "piphat mon", derived from the mon people, though now part of the thai repertoire, played (by thais) at funerals.. i'm not sure about historically how it acquired this position, other than through the clearly plaintive nature of the tunes.. this would be interesting to look into! there are no artists listed, only the description of the ensemble as a ปี่พาทย์มอญเครื่องใหญ่ (piphat mon khrueang yai), which indicates the size and instrumentation of the orchestra. this is a really excellent recording, i've never heard vocals like this! thanks so much for sharing."

here is the tracklist:
01. มอญร้องไห้ (mon ronghai)
02. มอญยกศพ (mon yok sop)
03. เชิญศพ (choen sop)
04. มอญประจำบ้าน (mon pracham ban)
05. มอญประจำวัด (mon pracham wat)
06. ธรณีกรรแสง (thorani kansaeng)
07. ธรณีกรรแสง (thorani kansaeng)
08. ดาวทอง (dao thong)
09. ย่าเล (ya le)
10. มอญโพกผ้า (mon phok pha)
11. เพลงแน (phleng nae)
12. พญาแบแล (phaya bae lae)
13. ดาวทอง (dao thong)
14. ย่าเล (ya le)

Thank You Peter!!!