Musician/composer Anant Narkkong is returning to perform at the Silent Film Festival that will kick off this evening at Scala Theatre in Siam Square. He will perform live with German pianist Gunter A. Buchwald for the famous film Nosferatu.
Anant Narkkong.
How do you prepare for the Nosferatu gig?
Not at all. Indeed, I haven't decided which instrument I am going to use. I was invited to perform ad-lib for Nosferatu. When you perform ad lib, you do not prepare because that will defeat the purpose of improvisation.
So how are you going to play with Buchwald when you do not prepare, nor rehearse with him?
Improvisation requires you to pay respect to other musicians you are playing with. I love to compare improvisation gigs with discussing or having dialogue with other persons. You must respect, listen to the person you are having a conversation with. I never met Buchwald in person, but I know he is highly experienced and credited for his performance for silent films. We have had a brief communication via email about the tone and mood of sound for Nosferatu.
So, what will the sound of Nosferatu be like?
Definitely Eastern Europe. Nosferatu is a loose adaptation from Bram Stoker's Dracula where the setting is Transylvania. So, we will create sound that hopefully will transport audiences there.
What is the challenge of this project?
Cultural barricades. Westerners have different interpretations to the sound. For example, the sound of howling gives us goosebumps, or makes us think of ghosts, Westerners will not react the same way and that may explain why you will not hear the sound of a dog howling in foreign horror films. So, I have to cross out many of my ideas. Originally, I came up with an idea to play Phi Pard Morn (Funeral Ensemble) for Nosferatu but I abandon the idea because only Thais and Buddhist Thais in particular can feel the ambience in the funeral ensemble, not Westerners. And in ad-lib, when other musicians do not understand, the improvisation cannot take place.
What does this performance means to you as composer and musician?
Nosferatu itself is not an entertaining film but it is the grandfather of the genre of horror, and for film composers, creating and performing scores for horror is the most challenging thing compared to romantic comedy. There are few sensibilities that images cannot inspire and our challenge is to create sounds and ambience that help images or creating the sensibility that images cannot achieve... sounds that give you goosebumps and feel the chill down your spine... a few repetitive notes that make you fear.
You are also a lecturer at Silpakorn University on music for movies. How do you teach students to score films?
I am unorthodox and always love experimenting with sound. One of my favourite experiments is that I watch movies like Star Wars or even porn films and I play my ranad (Thai classical xylophone) along with it. In my class, one of the exercises is that I will run movies with famous film scores such as Star Wars. But I will kill off all the sound and ask students to create their own sound and scores.
I try to make them forget the influences of John Williams and other composers. It is imperative for students to believe there can be other sound choices for films like Star Wars.
The 3rd Silent Film Festival will run from today until June 22 at Scala and Lido. Visit www.facebook.com/silentfilmthailand, www.fapot.org or call 02-482-2013/14 ext 111.
