Abstract
The Burmese arched harp, known as Saung Gauk, is the national icon of the Southeast Asian country of Myanmar (once called Burma). It is both ancient and contemporary, and its music frequently carries stories that are threaded with long-standing philosophical principles of the Burmese. The music of the Saung Gauk consists of five primary pitches (and two ornamental extras) that provide intriguing melodies, and a bronze bell and wood clapper provide the accompanying rhythm in traditional practice, even while Burmese-style piano and tuned drums may fill out an ensemble in which Saung Gauk is featured. A learning pathway will detail ways to approach this extraordinary music and the special place of this harp in Burmese identity.
American music education is world-renown for its attention to raising competent young musicians who can perform in traditional school bands, choirs, and orchestras, even as American music teachers have recently embraced the need to offer students an array of more culturally diverse musical experiences (McCarthy, 1997). Many nations look to and learn from the extent to which concert-programming and lesson-planning in U.S.-based schools historically opened up in the 1980s and onward into an array of expressive practices from Asia, Africa and its diaspora, Latin America, Europe, and the Pacific Islands (Anderson & Campbell, 1989; Volk, 1998), and some have modeled their own growing intercultural music programs on the American model (Ho, 2016). While it’s commonly understood that American music educators are striving to diversify school repertoire, there is a gnawing sense that (a) many more musical cultures deserve a place in the curriculum and (b) students gain immeasurably in understanding music as cultural identity and social power (in addition to its sonic features).
While the history, culture, and artistic practices of Myanmar are decidedly not on the radar screens of American music teachers, our position is that there are musical and cultural reasons for ensuring that music from Myanmar is given a space in the school music experience. With a focus on the national instrument, the Burmese arched harp known as Saung Gauk, the unique sonorities of old Burma offer an earful of music that ranges from the celebratory to the sublime. To Western ears, music of Myanmar is complex, and the head spins with a desire to find the logic of this music. It is melodically colorful, with phrases cascading one to the next, meandering and seemingly exploratory (although it is not), sometimes breathless and moving onward without the sort of cadential pauses to which Western listeners are accustomed. The harp may play alone its running passages or with the sound of percussion instruments (Si, bronze bell, and Wa, wood clapper) to punctuate phrases, and can be joined by Sandaya (Burmese-style piano) and Hsaing Waing (Burmese orchestra of tuned drums and other instruments), as is the case in the music selection featured below. Saung Gauk is an ancient instrument, and yet it is also central to contemporary musical expression, and in current practice today (Williamson, 2000). It is riveting music, confusing to newcomers to the sound, and as it challenges the ear, it also provides new musical ideas for students to experience and to consider in their own creative musical work. It is music of people of a nation with a long-standing relationship with the West. Myanmar and the United States have had a checkered history, especially in recent decades, due to the Myanmar military suppression of human rights and pro-democracy efforts; still, diplomatic relations are maintained in the capitols of both nations at Yangon and Washington, DC. The U.S.-based population of Burmese Americans, and of all people with ancestry in Myanmar (such as the Karen, Chin, and Kachin), is small, and yet, their community centers are found in large and small cities such as Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Chicago, and Fresno, California.
This article is one of a series on Teaching Music Culturally. It is an acknowledgment of the convergence of music, education, and culture in K–12 and undergraduate curriculum and instruction, and of the pressing professional need to give accent to intercultural understanding through experience and study of global cultures. We offer a description of Saung Gauk and of music in Myanmar, generally. Briefly noted is Saung Gauk artist and composer Saung U Ba Than, followed by a Learning Pathway based on the five dimensions of World Music Pedagogy so that students can learn the music via listening, participatory musicking, and creative involvement, and understand the uses, functions, and meanings of the music by people of Myanmar. We will make the point of teaching music and culture, in tandem, and will suggest resources and learning pathways for supporting students in their journey of becoming musically attuned and culturally compassionate.
Preparations
The Music
There is no music in the world quite like the traditional music of Myanmar. It flows in metric cycles of four pulses, and sometimes two or three pulses, and features melodies that run rapidly through many pitches. The melodies are comprised of small segments of pitches, one phrase or pitch-set following another, each of which seems to press forward to the next, and few of which fall to a stopping point. Octaves are commonly heard, and references to a pillar-point pitch or home-tone, and sometimes the melodies sound against a second simultaneous line at a fourth or fifth above (or below). To the Western listener, untrained in the complexities of Burmese classical music, the listening experience can seem disorienting without the culturally familiar chords and cadences to which the ear is accustomed. Yet, many listening opportunities onward, there is great delight in following the plucked pitches of the harp’s melody, the pattering resonant timbres of the tuned drums, the whirling pitches of the piano that seem to circle round and round without end. It takes time and concentration to find an anchoring in this music, to pluck out melodic phrases and rhythmic forms, but this music moves the ear to a different beauty and logic that is historically a part of Myanmar’s cultural history (Douglas, 2001, 2009).
The national instrument of Myanmar is the arched harp known as Saung Gauk. It is immediately recognizable by its long curved neck that is carved from the root of a tree, and features 13 to 16 strings of silk or nylon. Meticulously decorated with gold gilt and red and black lacquer, it is positioned in the lap of the harpist who plucks the strings with one hand and dampens the strings with the other. It is further decorated with mica crystals referred to as “Mandalay pearls,” and with red tassels at the ends of the silk or nylon strings. One of the most ancient of instruments, the Saung Gauk can be traced to the 8th century, and was played in the royal courts of Burma alone or in a chamber group of several instruments (Becker, 1967). Often, a singer performed poetry in lyrical form to the accompaniment of the harp. While the singer learns the texts of the songs through script, Burmese traditional music is not notated and so is passed on orally from teacher to student.
The Culture
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, lies in Mainland Southeast Asia, and is bordered by India, Bangladesh, China, Thailand, and Laos, with the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea to the south. Although subject to indiscriminate logging, dense forests of teakwood still cover much of the country, while coconut, rubber, and palm trees are also prevalent. Precious gems are mined in the mountains, including 90% of the world’s rubies. Burma was for a time the world’s largest producer of rice, and in the 19th and 20th centuries, Europeans became wealthy while the Burmese benefited very little. Once a British colony, Burma achieved its independence in 1948 and was once governed as a parliamentary system with a president and legislators who are partly elected and partly military appointments. On February 1, 2021, on the first day of the parliament after the election, the military launched a coup d’etat and resistance by ethnic groups and people defense forces have continued since then. There is great ethnic diversity in the country, with over two-thirds of the population identifying as Bama (Burmese), while other groups include Shan, Karen, Rakhine, Karenni, Chin, Han Chinese, Mon, and Kachin. With over 100 languages spoken in Myanmar, Burmese is most widely spoken and other mother-tongues abound. Almost 90% of the population follow the religious beliefs of Theravada Buddhism. The monastery is important to cultural life where boys are expected to spend some time when they are young to become novices and to learn monastic beliefs and practices (and arithmetic). Monasteries were historically strong and once were the only institution dedicated to educating the young. In the villages of Myanmar, Nat worship is important, involving prayerful rituals to an array of spirits.
The Master
Saung U Ba Than, the master of Saung Gauk who is featured on “Thuwana Shan,” was both a performer and composer. Due to his exceptional musical skill as a harpist, the prefix “Saung” (harp) was added to his name. With the rigorous guidance of his music enthusiast father, he moved from a village at the age of 11 years to the Burmese city of Yangon to study multiple instruments with the last of the Burmese court musicians of King Thibaw, including the godmother of Burmese court and traditional music, Daw Saw Mya Aye Kyi (1892–1962). As his musical brilliance became recognized in Burma, U Ba Than was then sent on government-sponsored cultural missions in the 1950s to perform in China, Thailand, India, the Soviet Union, Germany, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. He was appointed by the British government as head of the strings department at the Burmese Arts and Music School, and was promoted to a higher rank officer at Burma’s Ministry of Culture for the preservation and standardization of music. A featured performer of harp and Pattala, bamboo xylophone on many recordings, he composed many songs for the harp, the Hsaing Waing, and other traditional ensembles. Many musicians pay tribute to Saung U Ba Than as the inspiration of the current generation of musicians who are preserving while also provide diverse interpretations of traditional Burmese music.
A WMP Learning Pathway for Saung Gauk (and More of the Music of Myanmar)
World Music Pedagogy (or WMP) is a way forward, through listening, to developing student knowledge of culturally unfamiliar music, and to evolving their cultural and intercultural understanding (Campbell, 2018). WMP is not “just” listening, by any means. Listening is underscored as core to learning the music of oral cultures. Through repeated listening opportunities, students are drawn into the music, so that they become familiar with its elemental features, even as their curiosity grows as to why the music sounds the way it does, who the musicians are, and how the music functions within a given cultural community. Listening is the foundational base of other experiences that include musical participation, performance, and creative activities, and the integration of language, stories, and cultural meanings serve to wrap the musical experiences into a more holistic understanding of music’s cultural significance (Campbell & Lum, 2019). All the components of World Music Pedagogy come together to offer students a full slate of musical involvement, and this then comprises learning that is both musical and intercultural in process and outcome.
What follows are suggestions for the application of World Music Pedagogy in teaching and learning music of Myanmar, especially the sonic features and functions of Saung Gauk. The composition, “Thuwana Shan,” is named after a character from the one of the birth stories of Bodhisatta (a person on the path to becoming Buddha, the enlightened one); the stories are called Sama Jataka. “Thuwana Shan aka Suvanasama” is a well-known Jataka tale in Myanmar, and carries the dual message to children and youth in Burmese society on how dutiful sons and daughters appropriately behave and how metta, or loving kindness, is a powerful way in the world. “Thuwana Shan” was composed by Saung U Ba Than (1908–1987), and has been widely performed in the Hsaing Waing ensemble, and is still prominent at novitiation ceremonies that celebrate the ordination of boys to monkhood. Some of the songful phrases are adapted from Mahagita, which is the repertoire of Burmese classical songs (Inoue, 2014). This piece is fixed with standard melodic content and formal principles, and yet also invites opportunities for the harpist and other instruments to improvise upon the standard piece (Douglas, 2009; Garfias, 1975). Note that the music is challenging, not only to perform it but also for newcomers to understand “what is going on?” within this complex and culturally unfamiliar music. Take the time, over days and weeks, alone and together with students, to give attention to the musical events.
1. Attentive Listening. Listen repeatedly to two brief excerpts of the Saung Gauk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Leb0YtH62aI (“Thuwanna Shan” by Saung U Ba Than, Sagaing Hla Shwe & Sein Satin) (0′01″–0′12″, and 1′03″–1′55″). Before each listening occasion, ask only one question in order to focus the listening attention of the students. Some exemplary questions follow. Begin with the first excerpt, with questions such as those posed here, and then return to follow the same sequence of questions for the second excerpt. Note: It will take many more than seven questions, for seven listenings, for students to begin to make a connection to the music, so be ready to generate further questions for focusing student attention (and allowing students, too, to generate questions for Attentive Listening):
Q: How does this music make you feel? (A: Various answers) Q: What instruments do you hear? (A: Harp [Saung Gauk], time-keeper instruments [si—and wa], piano [Sandaya], tuned drums [Hsaing Waing]). Q: From what materials are these instruments made? (A: Harp [Saung Gauk]—Wood and strings; Time-keeper [Si and Wa]—bronze bell and wood clapper; Tuned drums [Hsaing Waing]—Wood and animal skin) Q: Can you pretend to play one instrument as you listen? (Note: This can be done “in the air,” silently, while listening). Q: Does the music sound the same? Or does it change? How? (A: The music changes constantly. It is “progressive” and does not return to earlier music. There is one exception, however: The si and wa are constant throughout the music.) Q: Can you hear the si (bronze) and wa (bamboo)? (show that you are following it (pretending to play or to match your tap to the time of the bamboo and bronze sounds) Q: Have you ever heard music like this before? Describe. (A: Various answers)
2. Attentive Listening. Follow the timed listening guide for the first excerpt (0′01″–0′12″). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Leb0YtH62aI Details are provided in an advanced guide for music students, while just below is found a modified version for beginning listeners. Note: it will take many repetitions of this guided listening experience for students to begin to understand the music’s form. Encourage students to pick out each of the four sonic events described below, gesturing a new event with fingers to signify #.
3. Attentive Listening. Follow the timed listening guide for the second excerpt (1′03″–1′55″). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Leb0YtH62aI See the Advanced Guide and the Modified Guide, and offer students multiple opportunities for this guided listening experience. Encourage students to pick out the sonic events, gesturing a new event with fingers to signify #.
4. Engaged Listening. Follow the Si (bronze cymbals) and Wa (wood clapper) by clapping and tapping the 4-beat cycle throughout the listening, and giving pause and feeling but not sounding on the silent “rest” pulse. The “tapping” can be produced in various ways: by patting hands to lap, by touching two fingers of one hand to two fingers of the other hand, or by touching hands to shoulders. Students may find it challenging to keep the clapping and tapping steady, because the harp, piano, and tuned drums are sounding their quick running passages, starting up, stopping, and starting again. Still, that’s the goal: Holding steady through the musical activity:
/ / / /
Si Si rest Wa
Tap Tap rest Clap
5. Engaged Listening. While listening, sing silently the melody of the harp in the first excerpt (0′01″–0′12″). Offer many repeated opportunities to listen and sing silently.
6. Engaged Listening. As the first excerpt sounds, try (a) singing the harp’s melody aloud and (b) clapping and tapping the Si and Wa rhythm while singing.
7. Engaged Listening. Repeat Steps 4, 5, and 6 while listening to the second excerpt (1′03″–1′50″). Since this is a much longer excerpt, choose one segment to listen to, sing, and clap-tap the Si and Wa rhythm. For example, choose the tuned drums segment (1′14″–1′24″) or the closing melody statement of the harp (1′50″–1′55″).
8. Enactive Listening. Can this music be performed, at least in part? Using what’s available—guitars and other stringed instruments, winds and pitched percussion of any sort, explore the complexities of phrases and small segments of the music. Challenge students to “figure it out” by ear, giving them only the starting pitch, while they continue to listen to the first and/or second excerpts. Then, provide basic notation for these segments (Figures 1–3).
Thuwanna Shan 0′06″–0′12″
Thuwanna Shan 1′14″–1′24″
Thuwanna Shan 1′50″–1′55″
9. Enactive Listening. Ask students to play (and/or sing) these phrases, sound them at just the time they appear on the recording. Then, play the phrases without the recording, possibly to play them more slowly and to check the pitches and rhythms, and then return to playing them with the recording again.
10. Creating in the Style of Burmese Music. “Thuwanna Shan” is a standard composition, such that it is intended to sound different with every performance, by every performer. Thuwanna Shan” is not a fixed music, as the Saung Gauk, Sandaya, and Hsaing Waing parts are keep changing from one performance to the next even though the Si and Wa rhythm is constant and repeating. This is a composition that is highly for its rich sounds, carefully laid-out structures and creating opportunities for performers to improvise. So, students may grow musically from playing with featured phrases from the composition. Using one or more phrases from “Thuwanna Shan,” challenge students to create something new but which is nonetheless related to the original work. Set parameters, such as these: (a) Form a small group of three to five musicians, (b) Play or sing through a selected phrase together, (c) Construct a new expression that features the selected phrase at least 4 times, beginning and ending with that phrase. (d) Create a new phrase that fits in between the selected phrase, so that the music takes a form of rotating original (A) and new (B) phrases: A-BA-B-A-B-A. (e) Perform the new composition for peers. ‘Thuwanna Shan’ invites interpretation, so that the musicians can play “let swan pya”, a cadenza-like passage that showcases the virtuosity of performers in ways that reach beyond the original melody of the piece.
11. Cultural Integration. Clarify the place of Saung Gauk within Burmese tradition, and within the national identity of Myanmar today, by offering opportunities for students to delve into the cultural history of the nation and region. These video-links will transport students to the “Burmese-ness” of Saung Gauk, giving attention to the ancient cultural roots of the vibrant music, Moreover, their viewing of the people and culture of Myanmar today will set in context the music of the Saung Gauk and its artistic practice:
* The story of Myanmar’s Last King, when the royal family of Burma was exiled to India by the invading British army in 1885. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWFOr47_dao&t=0s
* The Saung Gauk provides the music for a dramatic play by the Myanmar Ramayana Culture Troupe: “Bow Lifting Contest and the Golden Deer.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9Ip6XF0Lpg
* A 2-minute sample of the performance of the Saung Gauk by Saung Let Swan Pya. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YXA-QfZrAU
* A performance by a troupe of musicians and dancers of the Burmese Nat Pwe ceremony. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XSpyTwC0V4&ab_channel=ZamanProduction[youtube.com]
* Performance of a new composition by Ne Myo Aung, “Cavorting,” featuring Saung Gauk along with several other Burmese traditional and Western art instruments Ne Myo Aung’s composition [youtube.com].
* An academic lecture by Professor Judith Becker on the Burmese Nat Pwe Spirit Festival. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euweekhy8no
Learning Cultural Knowledge Through Saung Gauk
There are multiple musical and cultural benefits to featuring experience and study of the Saung Gauk, particularly when teachers foster a progression of events meant to deepen student experience in the music’s sonic structures and sociocultural meaning. As they listen repeatedly to a musical selection, learners grow musically, intellectually, and emotionally, particularly when they progress from listening (and viewing) into the performative practice of playing, chanting, moving, and inventing new possibilities based within the cultural aesthetic of the music. When cultural considerations are given attention as, music becomes a holistic experience as well, with students discovering answers to questions like “Where does the music come from?,” “What is the purpose of the music?,” “How old (or new) is it?,” “When/Where is it performed?,” and “Who are the performers, the composers, and the master musicians?.” Ultimately, music becomes more meaningful to learners when its sonic experiences are wrapped into knowing how it reflects people’s beliefs, behaviors, and values.
With the focus of this WMP Learning Pathway on Saung Gauk can come also an understanding of the wider scope of music (and musical instruments), and the arts and culture of Myanmar and the Burmese people. This musical form references the high regard the people of Myanmar place on the intricate technicalities of pitch and rhythm, the melodic elaborations, the precisely articulated rhythms, and the interplay of several instruments in a small ensemble. At times, in contemporary renditions of Saung Gauk, when tuned drums, Burmese-style piano, and continuing sound of the bronze bell and wood clapper join the sound of the arched harp, are joined by other instruments, Myanmar’s identity as both ancient and contemporary is celebrated. In school music classes, experiences with Saung Gauk guarantee both the musical and intercultural understanding of students who progress through the five dimensions of World Music Pedagogy.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
