CREATING AN ARTISTIC INTENTION

25th Feb. 2019: Getting started

Brainstorming ideas for my product: ​For task two, one of my idea is that I want to express my
personal and cultural stories using music, more specifically composing a music piece that will
represent the story that I want to tell and including my knowledge about different elements such
as dynamics, rhythm and the key signature of a music piece to create my artistic intention.

I can also write a song with the lyrics about the story that I want to tell, which might also be a
good idea because by writing the lyrics, I can surely deliver my thoughts and the story I have in
mind to the listener, and by using different pitches and the word choice in the lyrics can really
create my artistic intention of the story.

Another way of completing this task can be also through visuals and adding some sort of
supporting music or background musics. This might be somehow related to the first idea I have
which was composing a music piece, for adding visuals, it can be images showing like
slideshows, animations or videos with the music piece that I composed to tell the story. If the
audiences are just ​listening​ to the composition, I think it will be less effective as ​listening​ and
seeing​ with the visuals, therefore by adding visual can really create a better artistic intention to
the work.

My story I want to tell:​ Since this is about telling our own personal stories, I look back in the
past, I feel like my parents are the ones who put me in the position I am today, they made me
who I am, they’ve worked hard and they paid for what it takes to help me achieve my goals and
support me with everything in life, therefore I think telling a story of how hard my parent worked
to get me here is the best way of telling my personal story.

Me and my sisters grew up with our mother more than with our father because of his businesses,
he’s always away from home; however I still know that he’s been working hard overseas to raise
the family, but because we spent more time with our mother, we were able to see and hear more
stories of things that they have been through from our mother, especially for the struggles that
she has been through. Ofcourse she misses her families, and even though sometimes she says she
wanted to go home to her mother, but she still stay strong and managed to raise this family. This
might seems not as big of a deal for anyone today, but it is a lot to work for for a women like my
mother who grew up in a small village on the very north of Kachin land (our hometown), decent
education and just enough income for her parents to feed 10 children every day. She worked all
her way through the toughest times on her own when she did not receive full support from her
husband even after their marriage like others normally would. Therefore I want to express the
struggles and the journey of my mother through the beauty of music for this task.
My inspiration:​ To make this happen, I will be referring to an existing piece of poem that my
older sister wrote for my mom on her 45th birthday. And it brings me to my final idea for the
product, which is almost similar to adding visual; however, I will still compose the music piece,
but for this idea, the visuals are not drawings or other illustrations of the poem, but the poem
itself. Since the poem was written in Kachin language (mother tongue language), I could
translate the poem into English version in my best ability without changing the intention of my
sister when she wrote it, I would present this task by reading the poem and the composition
playing at the back while I read as to support my artistic intention to the story.

26th Feb. 2019: Expending my idea

To accomplish this task, based on my previous experience with composing songs for the second
unit in music class, I think it will take me probably all the available time that were given to make
it the best outcome as possible. For my previous composition, it was based on an existing piano
piece; however, this time I will have to come up with an original melody and the chords since
there isn’t any existing compositions to the poem, therefore it would take me longer. The
estimated amount of time we have to complete this product is 4 - 5 weeks, which I think I will be
spending most of the time composing the music piece itself. But before composing the music
piece, I started translating the poem, I think translating the poem and making it fluence will take
me about at least one week working little by little everyday, the tool I need to translate this poem
is some sort of device that I can access to google translator, which I uses my chromebook and
my mobile device. I will write down the translation on my notebook, making changes to the
word choice when translating to better emphasize the intention of the poem, then after finish
translating the poem, I will have to develop my composition. The idea that I have right now is to
also include some sort of our traditional music instruments such as our bamboo flute, to show the
tradition aspect of the poem and the part in the poem about where my mother came from, which
reads, “from the mountain, travels to the village, from the village, travels to countries abroad”
this sentence at the start of the poem is indicating where my mother came from, which is an area
called ​Putao ​on the northern part of Kachin state, therefore this piece can start off with our
traditional instruments which emphasizes the artistic intention. And then the piece will continued
with more well known instruments such as piano and violin to indicate the part in the poem
about traveling to the countries abroad and living life outside of our hometown. For some part of
the poem, which reads, “under the rain, she faught, not knowing the place or the language, she
struggled” I can decided on the instrument or the element of music to create the tension of the
struggle that she have been through, if I decided to use instrument to create this tension, I can use
loud drum sounds at the background or as the main melody in that part to give this unpleasant
feeling to the listeners, if I decided to use instrument to create this tension, I could use notes or
chords such as tritone or high pitches or the pitches that sounds bad with each other to give
unpleasant feeling to my audiences while listening to the piece. I am thinking to make the ending
does not sound like an ending, for example using pitches or notes that doesn’t feel like an
ending, because the ending of the poem which my sister wrote, “I will be always praying for you,
mother” this prayer continued, therefore I want to emphasize that part of the poem also.

Here is the poem that I’ve translated so far:

Nam kata kaw na mare du yu,
From the mountain, travels to the village
Mare kaw na maigan de pru.
From the village, travels to countries abroad
Shara n-chye, ga n-chye, ma ni a matu marang hta kabye.
In an unfamiliar environment, under the rain, she faught
Shara n-chye, ga n-chye,
Not knowing the place or the language, she struggled
Ma ni ning tawn, Nu myi man mani tsawm.
Only to see the accomplishments of the children
Bungli galaw shaja, n-ta ningnan hta,
She worked hard, now in a new house
Gumrawng gumtawng n n-myit,
Not showing any arrogant to the guests
Manam tau she kyin.
Busy welcoming to let them rest, instead
Yawng hpe ga ngwi ga pyaw shaga.
Matsa mawa galoi n-nga.
Manang ni hte lu sha rau galaw,
Jahta let grai she pyaw.
Ja kachyi kumhpa jaw n-ra,
Prefer the flower then the gold
Nampan hte sha pyi Nu myit pyaw la.
Yawng Nu hpe tsaw ra hkungga,
Nu a kasha tai lu ai Ngai,
Born to be your children
Karai Kasang hpe na-chying chyeju dum n-ngai.
I am very thankful to the God
Tsawra ai Nu,
Mom
Ngwi pyaw hkam kaja nga u ga ngu,
“May our mother always be healthy”
Galoi mung kyu hpyi ya nga nngai.
 I will always continue my prayer
Changes: ​After I finish translating some part of the poem, I feel like the meaning of the original
words in the poem somehow slightly changed, I tried to keep it as similar as possible, but
because of different structures in different languages based on their background, and some words
are not translatable in some other languages; therefore I think by translating the poem to English
sentences losses the original intention, which makes me to a conclusion that I will translate the
poem into English to tell the meaning; however when I am presenting, I might just read it in my
language (Kachin) to restore the original artistic intention.

1st Mar. 2019: Connecting to the Global Context and Statement of Inquiry

Global Context: ​Personal and cultural expression

Statement of inquiry:​ Personal and cultural identities can be expressed through storytelling.

My artistic intention was developed throughout the process to connect to our global context.
Since I am telling a personal story of our mother based on both our cultural setting and foreign
countries. For example, in the poem reads, “From the mountain, travels to the village” this part
of the poem is indicating the place where my mother grew up, my mother who grew up in a
small village on the very north of Kachin land (our hometown), by composing a music piece for
the poem I am also representing our cultural background and our (Kachin) people. I am also
thinking to present the poem in my own language to represent my culture. To better connect to
our statement of inquiry, when I am thinking about the composition for the music piece, I am
thinking to use our traditional instruments as to show our cultural, which is expressing our
cultural identities through music.