Ranat Thum’s practicing process according to the style of Khru Uthai Kaewla-iad

Abstract

                This article aims to study Ranat Thum’s practicing process according to the style of Khru Uthai Kaewla-iad, the 2009 national artist in performing art Thai music, to create    a concrete model of Ranat Thum’s practice for beginners. The author has collected the information from researches, textbooks, related papers, and the interview of Khru Uthai Kaewla-iad.

                The study has found that the Ranat Thum’s practice in the style of Khru Uthai Kaewla-aid composes of the “good hands’’ and the “good head’’, the appropriated qualifications which Ranat Thum learners should possess. These qualifications are on the grounds of the Ranat Thum’s basic practicing process. The “good hands” is a result from knowing how to control the sticks and practice playing to achieve a good quality and    a beauty of sounds, the skill of using the hands’ movement, as well as the practice of variating Ranat Thum tunes into various idiomatic melodies. This latter skill is considered as a significant knack representing the learner’s intelligence and wisdom. The method of Khru Uthai’s melody variation practice is that the learner must “learn” and “expand” from the teacher, collecting the knowledge within himself. After that, the learner will variate the melodies, from 10 melodies to 20 melodies, by dividing them in half before blending them together, resulting in a new idiomatic melody. Besides, the harmony between the conformity of the idiomatic melody and the pattern of using the hands’ movement should also be considered.