Irreverent, informed and downright eclectic books and reportage from Southeast Asia and beyond
When I first traveled around Asia in the early 1990s, I collaborated with the British Library on a long term recording project of indigenous music from the region.
Hundreds of hours of recordings from Pakistan to the Philippines resulted from these travels and they are now deposited with the British [...]
Until very recently the markets of Muang Singh, Luang Nam Tha, Phonsavan and Vang Viang were teeming with live and dead forest animals. Squirrels, civet cats, forest rats, bats, beavers, porcupine and their close relative the ‘sinhawn’ as well as an enormous variety of birds including owls and pheasants were offered from market stalls all [...]
The Moken - Sea Gypsies of the Andaman Sea is available from Topic Records (UK). The songs of the Moken, the last sea nomads of the Andaman Sea, where recorded by Tom Vater in Ko Surin National Park in 1999, located off the west coast of Thailand. Photos by Aroon Thaewchatturat. Liner notes by Tom Vater.