The Travels of Marco Yolo: Blazing Trails where Marco Polo Feared to Go

  My friend Marco Ferrarese has published his latest and very very cool travel anthology, The Travels of Marco Yolo: Blazing Trails where Marco Polo Feared to Go.   It’s a great read that jumps all over Asia and the Middle East, including some pretty obscure and remote corners, proving that good travel writing survives […]

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My catalogue of field recordings from Asia at The British Library.

Between 1995 and 2004 I recorded several hundred hours of music and sounds from Asia for The British Library’s National Sound Archive – material from Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, The Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Pakistan, India and Nepal. I recorded mostly the music of minorities and musicians in remote rural locations. I released several CD collections of […]

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British Library holds a significant collection of Lao material – including unpublished recordings of remote populations by Tom Vater

Hmong Lao Khaen player in Vientiane 2001 The British Library holds a small but significant collection of Lao material, consisting of manuscripts, rare printed books, periodicals and post cards, mainly acquired after 1973. However, the oldest items in Lao language date back to the 19th century. The earliest book about Laos is in Italian and […]

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UBUD Writers & Readers Festival Diary by Aroon Thaewchatturat

This week, I am at the UBUD Writers and Readers Festival in Bali to present my books Sacred Skin (with co-author and photographer Aroon Thaewchatturat, published by Visionary World) and The Cambodian Book of the  Dead (published by Crime Wave Press). I will also be taking part in several panel discussions. Owner of Visionary World […]

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