Chang - live music for a 1927 silent film by Bruce Gaston and Fongnaam

Abstract

In 1983, the silent movie Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness, filmed in Thailand (Siam) in 1925 by Ernest B. Schordsack (1893-1979) and Merian Coldwell Cooper (1893-1973), was presented with a new soundtrack written by Bruce Gaston and the Fongnaam ensemble. Gaston’s music transcended the common format and nature of the movie soundtrack. His work probes the relationship between the past, the present and the future through the fusion of a wide variety of musical styles, including various genres of traditional Thai music, modern Western music, Thai theatrical music and voice, folk music from the jungle, computer generated sound effects and soundscapes, and sounds from newly invented musical instruments crafted by the artist himself.