Musique du Laos, une identité plurielle : tradition, nationalisme et patrimonialisation

Abstract

“Tradition, Nationalism and Patrimonialisation” illustrate three living performance contexts. In Laos, the institutionalization of music is developing through the creation of national music and the supervision of its transmission. The phenomenon takes as emblem the khaen Lao (the popular raft shaped mouth organ) with a standardization of its musical language and uses. However, we observe that the diversity of practices persists and crosses cultural policies, with the khaen joining the lists of intangible cultural heritage of UNESCO in 2017-2018. This article proposes to analyze musical mutations at the heart of institutionalization, through the question of reinvented traditions. What musical identity will be sought in this particular context? What will be the transformations in the musical organization in terms of the musical material itself but also of the social organization of the music scene? Which choices will be arbitrated in the transmission? What power will be given to the spectacularization ? Khaen’s very recent inscription in Unesco is gradually redefining the shapes of its traditions, the role of this instrument and the very framework of practices at the heart of institutionalization. Which cultural policies will be chosen to influence this desired heritage-making process, but how will they also adapt to its constraints ?

Keywords

• tradition
• insitutionalization
• heritage
• transmission
• spectacularization
• musical identity