Wednesday, October 1, 2008

some Thai music [catalog number CTR219]


[unknown artist] - [album in Thai language] CTR219

This is an LP of Thai music. Unfortunately for me, all of the language written on the front and back covers are in Thai with the exception of the catalog number [CTR219] and a phrase on the back cover saying "a must souvenir for all tourists." I assume that this LP was primarily meant for tourists for them to take something authentically Thai back home with them. I don't think it can get any more authentic than this.
Since I am not fluent in Thai, I am unable to figure out the names of the artist(s), album title, label and liner notes. I even googled the catalog number, which was my only point of reference, and nothing about this album came up.

If there's someone out there who can help out with any translations that would be great. Otherwise, just enjoy the music.

UPDATE: Peter has translated the text on the front and back covers. The title of this release is chui chai phram. According to Peter, the title "is a famous thai dance ('chui chai' actually mean elegant and is the name of the dance style.. 'phram' is still brahmin, heh)". The name of the ensemble that plays on most of these tracks is piphat khana phathoykoson. The track names are translated and I put the track names below in the tracklisting.


Tracklisting:

side 1

1. track 1 ram mae bot (chom talat) {10:14}

2. track 2 fon man (fon lep) {9:37}

3. track 3 lao duang duean {4:50}

side 2

1. track 4 chui chai phram {11:16}

2. track 5 ram si nuan {6:31}

3. track 6 chui chai ben kai {6:29}

(1) or (1)

10 comments:

  1. Ach, what a coincidence!

    In the 80s, a friend of mine had an obscure 10 inch record with absolutely no Western text on the cover except for the label abbreviation and release number, which were "CTR 126". Since the 12 minutes of music on this record were so outlandishly beautiful, calm and serene like I've seldom heard before at that time, I recorded it on my Revox tape machine and much later made a digital transfer.

    This will make a perfect addition to this post by Grey. It'll be up on this blog in a few days.

    Thanks for this record, Grey. Can't wait to hear it.

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  2. hey there! from what i can make out, the title of this record is "ฉุย ฉาย พราหมณ์" (chui chai prahm) which means something like "skillful shining Brahmin" and lists the performers as "รำแม่บท รำศรีนวล" (rammaeboht ramsrinuan), a dance group (can't make out what it says parenthetically, something about ตลาด (dalat), the market) there is no info online about this album. i can definitely translate the rest for you, but i need a higher quality picture! thanks alot for sharing this, i hope i can help out some more!

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  3. H.C., so you have another one from the same label (with the CTR catalog number). I'm looking forward to that 10".
    I'm sure you'll like the record I posted although it's not really calm and serene.
    What label is this? How many records did it release? What is the story behind the label? These are questions that I must find out the answers to.

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  4. Peter, thanks for your help. I'll go find the copy and then scan the back cover so they can be better seen. I don't know why I didn't think of scanning it in the first place.
    I'll upload the scans somewhere and post the links to them here in the coments section.
    It may be a few days before I can get all of this done.

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  5. Beautiful music. Truly.

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  6. hi grey! i have the text for you!
    it turns out i was wrong before, and that everything on the cover is in fact a song title, the one seemingly chosen for the compilation's title is "chui chai phram", which it turns out is a famous thai dance ("chui chai" actually mean elegant and is the name of the dance style.. "phram" is still brahmin, heh) the name of the ensemble playing is "piphat khana phathoykoson".. although they are the listed performers on tracks 1, 4, 5 & 6 i think they are also on 1 & 2, because the descriptions are only "music for practicing Chiang Mai-style dance" and "large string ensemble", respectively. the full tracklist is as follows:

    01. รำแม่บท (ชมตลาด)
    ram mae bot (chom talat)
    02. ฟ้อนม่าน (ฟ้อนเล็บ)
    fon man (fon lep)
    03. ลาวดวงเดือน
    lao duang duean
    04. ฉุยฉายพราหมณ์
    chui chai phram
    05. รำศรีนวล
    ram si nuan
    06. ฉุยฉายเบญกาย
    chui chai ben kai

    also, i thought you might be interested to hear my theory: C.T.R. might stand for "Cathay Thai Records", as on the back, it reads "Cathay Records" in Thai!

    thanks again for making this record available, it's really fantastic!!

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  7. Peter, thank you very much for your help. I'll edit the post sometime later today to include your translations.
    I'll also look up "Cathay Records" to see if I can find out more.
    I'm glad that you're enjoying the record. Cheers.

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  8. Merci pour cet vinyle, merci pour les commentaires...
    Un vrai régale.

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  9. Merci pour cet vinyle, merci pour les commentaires...
    Un vrai régale

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  10. hey quys ... dont they have thai restaurants in your country ..? here in belgium weve got some in every major city ...
    superb blog by the way .... many many thanx

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