I think Arn is doing a great job in terms of securing Cambodian culture, and I believe that hundreds of years later people in Cambodia will feel grateful for all of what he did. Just like Arn mentioned in the documentary and seminar, most of the songs are passed on through generations from father to son, and there are no written records about these songs. So once the last master who knows how to play a particular song passes away, it vanishes from the world. For every lost traditional song, they are not only a great mean of entertainment, but also the representation of human beings’ wisdom. I’m glad that Arn and Cambodia Living Art picked that up and started doing something, and already made a difference to the reality. I’m also happy to see that during their journey, they discovered a few instruments that were believed to be lost before, and I hope this could keep happening in the future as well. They also did a decent job in raising people’s awareness of Cambodian traditional music, which will be valuable to their future steps.
Therefore I believed that Watkinson and Mr. Gromack were on the right track to help Cambodian. With our help, many good things could happen in Cambodia. They already found students for the music masters, so that their talent can pass on to the young generation of Cambodia. I also glad to see that the masters are willing to share their knowledge with young people. Because there are also such problems in China, that many traditional art forms are facing extinction due to lack of successors. However, many masters have restrictions on their successors; If the successors don’t meet the masters’ criteria, they would rather their talent get lost than teaching someone else. I see this as one of the major problems that China has recently. Except for the fact that some masters are not willing to share what they know with others, young people are not interested in learning traditional art forms. The major reason is that as society is getting more and more materialistic, people are getting more and more materialistic as well. Pursuing a career that is related to traditional art forms is not bring them a great amount of money, so the young generation is not interested in doing it. I’m really glad that a similar kind of mindset is not happening in Cambodia, so the traditional Cambodian music can still develop and getting stronger.
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