Looking at all of the instruments, it was clear to see that China had a big impact on the forms of instruments of the ensembles of both Indonesia and Thailand. There were gongs and metallophones used in gamelan and pi phat as well as stringed lutes used in khruang sai. The interesting part was what countries changed about the adopted instrument form. Gongs were developed from rough-looking metal bowls to knobbed gongs in Indonesian bonang to knobbed gongs in a vertical stand in Thai khong mon. Indonesia had more of a direct Chinese influence whereas Thailand had more of an indirect Chinese influence (ideas came to Indonesia, got developed, then got passed to Thailand).
Cambodia was also a big influence in Thai instruments. Stone carvings at Angkor show instruments that were played a long time ago and give insight to what ideas the Thai might have borrowed (14).
There are multiple ways these musical ideas could have spread:
Migration: Political instability of China compounded with economic opportunity abroad caused Chinese migration to countries such as Indonesia and Thailand. This is similar to what happened with the Chinese diaspora to the United States (28) (29).
War: Ayutthaya, Siamese kingdom from 1350-1767, was a dominant power back in its day. It waged a lot of attacks, including those on the Khmer people, taking over Angkor. Fighting with the Khmer would explain the large Cambodian influence on Thailand and its music (30).
Trade: China and Thailand are relatively close geographically which made interacting with the other country a lot easier. The Chinese had trading communities set up in the Gulf of Siam. Thailand also traded with other countries like India and later even Europe. Trade can be a major factor in influencing culture, as seen with the spread of musical instruments, among other ideas, along the Silk Road (29).
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