Conclusion

This blog was a great experience for me to learn more about the musics of my culture. In all honesty, it was a lot of music to go over. Each country has had a long history and each own's outside influences. To go through it all would have been beyond manageable, so I went over the basics and learned a lot. I started this blog meaning to just compare Chinese instruments to Indonesian and Thai instruments, but the more I looked into the instruments, the more I realized that there were many more influences. I didn't think that Indonesia had that great of an impact on Thailand but apparently they did. Just look at the pi phat and gamelan ensembles. That was another thing I changed while making this blog. Instead of focusing on instrument structures, I became more interested in the ensembles they were in. It was cool to see the evolution of the ensembles over time and they way they incorporated new instruments when they were introduced. Nowadays, there seems to be a set structure for ensembles and permanent changes to that would seem radical (just imagine an accordion having a permanent spot in an orchestra).

I liked the idea of being able to (or at least try my best) to use the ideas we've learned in class and apply it to a whole new set of countries. The main ideas I focused on were idea migration and diaspora. The first day of class, we saw images of the pipa, the tang bipa, and the biwa. The instruments looked so similar and yet were still unique and turns out, from different countries. But their origin was China. This idea of an instrument form being imported to different cultures and changing is what I tried to think of while learning about the Indonesian and Thai instruments. I tied the migration of instruments with the migration of people. We learned that when Chinese people came to California, they took their music and culture with them since music was a source of comfort. I figured that this was one of the ways instrument forms spread. However, I also learned that there were other reasons as well such as trade and war. Then I realized that trade was the way a lot of instruments spread along the Silk Road. It all tied back to what we learned in class.

Anywho, thanks for reading my blog. I hope that it has been as informative for you as it has been for me.

-Tiffany