RATANAKIRI CAMBODIA

RATANAKIRI is the north-east province of Cambodia , at the boarder with Laos and Vietnam, with Mondolkiri (the province south of Ratanakiri) they used to be the territories of ethnic minorities or proto-khmer. In colonial times the french did not succeed in controlling the area, after independence the khmer tried to, then the khmer rouges rebels were hidding in the forest of those provinces in the 60s, the extension of the conflict between communist Vietnam and the USA + the khmer rouge madness and the vietnamese occupation till 1991 could have destroyed totally the way of life of the ethnic minorities of north-east Cambodia, but indigenous people restarted in the 80/90s their practice of swidden agriculture (slash and burn) and gong playing and kept their animist ceremonies and beliefs. Its only in the 21th century that rubber plantations and development for the sake of big companies of dominant ethnic groups (Khmer, Vietnamese, Chinese) took over and are a real threat to the way of life of ethnic minorities who are not taken into account.
Here you can listen to various gongs ensembles being played in animist rituals and for drinking the fermented rice alcohol called TAVEI, and instruments and vocals of the BRAO, KRUNG and TAMPOON people in Ratanakiri province. Recorded at a time where rubber plantations had not taken the territory of indigenous people, and khmer techno music had not ruined ancestral music…

1 BRAO 7 nipple gongs in Trabok village, Taveng district, february 2006
2,3 BRAO 3 nipple gongs, 7 flat gongs, 1 drum and male singers in Taveng 2005
4 BRAO tha (a pair of flat gongs) played by 2 men in Taveng 2005
5 BRAO 3 nipple gongs, 7 flat gongs in Trabok village, Taveng district, february 2006
6,7 KRUNG 7 nipple gongs with responsive singing between a man and a woman in Chouay village, Taveng district, february 2006
8 KRUNG MEM (a 1 stringed bowed instrument using the mouth as resonator) performed by Pon Dao in Dong Kamal village, O Chum district 2004
9 TAMPOON duet, Pon (man) plays a GUANGTEUNG (10 metallic stringed attached to a bamboo tube with a gourd as resonator) while his wife JOUEN sings about following the rules in order to get married. in Yak Loam lake, Banlung district 2004
10 TAMPOON a woman sings about her life in Yak Loam, Banlung district, january 2006
11 in a BRAO village by the Sesan river, a mill and the birds, in Taveng, january 2006


RECORDED BY LAURENT JEANNEAU 2004, 2006