Last year’s symposium at PGVIM aimed at exploring the complex perceptual and aesthetic boundaries between various modes of musical expression. The questions asked were: What is New ? What is Authentic ? What is Classic ? It is clear that there can be no absolute answers to any of those interrogations but that we can rather consider all forms of human expression as being inherently tied to the temporal and cultural contexts they evolve in. What was considered ‘popular’ yesterday is labelled ‘classical’ tomorrow and what is new in Singapore might already be out of fashion in St. Petersburg. 

One musician might try to achieve ‘authenticity’ within a musical context that belongs to a time and geographical location that is totally foreign to theirs while ignoring other musical styles that are rooted deeply within the soil of their native land. In the current globalised context, everyone of us can choose to explore our own local cultures as well as that of other parts of the world. We can decide to investigate the musical past as well as the music of today. We are all, indeed, migrating birds singing in the middle of a very large forest of possible futures. In spite of such an encompassing availability, an artist shall never forget his/her responsibility. We should always reconsider the context of something that we use. We should take care that those numerous possibilities of borrowings, combinations etc. never lead to an undifferentiated melting-pot. 

Diversity and mutual acceptance of difference are still crucial aspects of humanity. Combining acoustic and electronic music, visuals and rituals, notations and improvisations, this eclectic evening of sound making featured contributions by Dieter Mack and the PGVIM students, Peter Edwards & Max Riefer as the duet Zero Crossing, Kim Ngoc Tran, Anant Narkkong, Damrih Banawitayakit, Supreeti Ansvananda, Saowakhon Muangkruan, Watchara Pluemyart. Watchara Pluemyart and jean- David Caillouët. 

The Conference of the Birds Part IV: “There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self Reliance recited by Dieter Mack Improvisation – 

In the Cage

Saowakhon Muangkruan, Cello 

Watchara Pluemyart, Percussion 

Jean-David Caillouët, Soundscapes, Visuals and Live Electronics 

ธัชวงศ์ ศิริสวัสดิ์, Camera 

Prateep Nara Jattanakul, Sound Recording 

Jean-David Caillouët, Editing, Mixing and Mastering 

Recorded live at PGVIM, Bangkok. 10.9.15 

This event was curated by Jean-David Caillouet, Anothai Nitibhon and Dieter Mack.