Sinat Nhok grew up in Siem Reap province not far from the Temples of Angkor, in a small village that appears to have changed little in the past five hundred years. Songbirds dart amongst trees lining the rice fields that stretch out behind his house, a wooden cart meant to be pulled by a cow sits in front, and in the dry season dirt from the village’s one road fills the air, stirred by the slow march of oxen as they pass by, pulling goods to be sold in Siem Reap’s markets. To an outsider this village smells of antiquity, but to Sinat this place is home.
The music Sinat plays, plaing kaa boran or classical wedding music, is steeped in his country’s history, and together with the Angkor Temples is one of the few remaining vestiges of ancient Khmer culture. While this form of traditional music is one of Cambodia’s oldest and most-loved, today only a handful of musicians from Siem Reap and Takeo provinces know how to play it. Most other musicians learn the newer form of wedding music, which is faster and more popular with the younger generation, but which bears evidence of Thai and Chinese influence. Classical wedding music is thought to be more difficult, perhaps even arcane and esoteric, but unmistakably Khmer. The song lyrics speak of Khmer lives and ways and refer to ancient Khmer legends, and the music’s sound transports one back to the rice fields, to Angkor, and back to one’s family roots and beginnings.
As a young teenager Sinat began studying with CLA’s classical wedding music class at Wat Bo. He chose to study the kse diev, one of the oldest and most difficult of Khmer musical instruments, and under the tutelage of Master Sok Duch he soon blossomed into a fine musician. As Sok Duch says, “Sinat has a gift for understanding how a song is put together, and because of this he can learn songs much faster than most students. He is an eager student who always wants to learn more, exactly the sort of person I want to teach.”
CLA identified Sinat as one of its most promising students and chose him as a recipient of a 3-year scholarship for advanced musical study. In August 2004, as part of this scholarship, Sinat moved to Phnom Penh to live with CLA Masters Kong Nai and later Mao Pheung, enrolled at the Royal University of Fine Arts (RUFA) in Phnom Penh, and began studying with Yun Khean, one of Cambodia’s top musicians and ethnomusicologists. Sinat has also been able to resume kse diev study with Sok Duch, who had left his post at Wat Bo and returned to his home in Takeo province south of Phnom Penh. A typical week of study for Sinat includes six days of classes at RUFA, private lessons with Yun Khean, English language lessons, and on Sunday a trip to Takeo to study kse diev with Sok Duch.
When asked about his future, Sinat talks about his dream of becoming a lok kruu playing kaa boran, a master and teacher of classical wedding music. Already on his way to mastering the kse diev, Sinat next wants to learn the tro khmer, and then the chapei dong veng, the skor, and the pei aw, all instruments of the classical wedding ensemble and necessary education for an aspiring master.
He also says that after this scholarship he wants to move back home. Sinat says he is deeply grateful for this opportunity for study, but admits that the move to Phnom Penh has not been easy for him. It has taken him away from his home village, from his friends at the Wat Bo music class, and from his mother. So after completing his music education, Sinat wants to return home to his mother and to the village where he grew up, and he hopes to carry with him the traditional music that has always had a home by the fields of Angkor.
--written by Jeff Dyer
