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🇫🇷 The Land of Frang Frang in 1684
Music Composition Diary

December 1, 2020

By Tan Onwimon
(Read Original Article in Thai Here)

It is rare to write music for such a bizarre project like ”The Land of Frang Frang in 1684”. So I’d like to take this opportunity after the show, to share my thought process of creating sounds for this stageplay. 

One of the reasons I’m so enthusiastic about this project is that it almost feels like I’m performing live music for a silent film that originated in France just like this stageplay’s story. With this stageplay’s Classic French-influenced style, I decided to adopt the film score writing into many parts of the story. It is quite entertaining to imagine that I was actually playing piano next to the projector screen in a tent somewhere in Paris.

When Pump was asking me if I was interested in writing music for Eaw’s new French stageplays, I already knew that the accordion is the first and only instrument I will present to Eaw. At the time, I still had an idea of switching the accordion with a keyboard or some other percussion such as cymbal to accent comedy moments. I even thought of using some electronic dance music in Kawin’s scene for variety (and at that time I was not confident with my accordion skill). Eventually, with the limitation of the performance venue and the logistic reason, Eaw decided that we will only use the accordion. So I said yes!

Chapter I: Nature of Accordion

The accordion has an easy function. Your left hand will pump the bellow and play chords. Your right-hand plays the melody on a piano key. And your right hand can also push a special button that can change the accordion’s sound, just like an electronic keyboard. 

There are five sounds function in the accordion:

1. Clarinet - High pitch - sounds similar to a melodeon. It has a thin texture which suits to use in a comedic moment with Khalid’s character. Moreover, it is a good sound to use for Micky-Mousing Khalid’s ballet dance and also his laughs. And this sound is the best fit to use for mocking “that Royal” music effectively. For those who already saw the show, you already saw how I just used this sound playing a couple of notes, and the audiences already laughed their ass off. Moreover, you might notice that I only use the ‘Clarinet’ sound to play music during the open house. So that once everyone is seated, I will change to richer sounds to inform the audience indirectly that the performance is about to start.

2. Violin - Richer texture - it is that French-romantic and warm sound that everyone is familiar with. When we talk about the accordion, this sound is probably the first sound you think of. This is the main sound I use in the performance, including opening and ending. One advantage of the ‘Violin’ is that it possesses a high-frequency sound that contrasts with a male’s voice. Since this production has a majority-male cast, ‘Violin’ is a good choice to underscore a scene without disturbing the dialogue. For example, the play reading scene or bedtime story scene.

3. Master - similar to ‘Violin’ but thicker, deeper, and richer. This sound is heavily used in a big and important scene such as the opening scene for Kage and Khalid, the scene where everyone is guessed Fa’s gesture correctly, or when Kage gets angry. Above this, I tend to avoid not using this sound too often since it might disturb the actor’s voice (we don’t use a microphone in this show)  

4. Bandoneon - common in Tango music. I use this sound a lot in a quirky moments such as Kawin/Kage dueling scene, which they later adopted tango into the choreograph which is the perfect fit. I also use ‘Bandoneon’ in Kawin’s dancing scene.

5. Bassoon - Low and deep. I rarely use this sound except in the Storytelling scene where I use it to imitate the turtle’s sound.

From the five modes of an accordion’s sounds above, I tried to utilize every sounds to its full capacity to tell a story with variety.

**There is a higher accordion model that has ‘Piccolo’ sound which is the highest sound. You might hear it in Studio Ghibli animation, or in the Oscars movie “The Shape of Water”**

Chapter II: Opening Scene

This show divides a character clearly in terms of their personality and their social class. The music also needs to split into a different theme to underscore different characters’ entrances.

1. Farida - Fa is the heart of this story who can only speak one word at a time. Fa’s theme is also the show’s main theme that I play during the opening and curtain call. This theme has the most French style out of all the character’s themes.

2. Earth - With his nerdy reader character that is dreaming of becoming a playwright, the melody will be heavily influenced by classical music. This theme also has a lot of pause in the melody to make way for Earth’s introduction dialogue.

3. Joke - Start with a sinister and nebulous melody in a minor key to keep the audience unsure of what Joke’s character is going to be like. But once he waves the fabric, became openly sassy, I switched to major key on the same melody to surprise the audience. This melody has a swing rhythm to make it a little dancey. 

4. Kage & Khalid - Since these two are the elite in higher social status, I use the loudest and thickest sound possible to emphasize their power. You might catch that this theme is actually a remix of “that” song… hehe

5. Kawin - represents the new generation with much hope to change the world. So his opening scene will be the first time I use jazz chords (such as 9th, 11th, and polychord) to make him stand out. And most of his underscore scene will be an improvisation.

6. Pump - unfortunately, this character doesn’t have any theme (hah). But there are many moments where he sang by himself already so he probably doesn’t need any theme.

Chapter III: Vere-Bo-Bo / The Royal Whip

This is the most fun part I had of the show. And it probably will break my accordion quicker too hahaha. Basically in a scene like Vere-Bo-Bo or The Royal Whipping scene that requires lots of action, all I have is to pump air real hard to make a ‘Bang!’ sound at the same time with the whip. Sometimes I switch the ‘Bang’ sound to a higher pitch to match with every movement of the character like when Joke placed hands on his hip, or when Earth give the book to Kage. We call this technique “Micky-mousing” which is a film-scoring term we use to describe the music that is used to underscore every movement of the character like in cartoons, Tom & Jerry for example). Using this technique is so fun because I have to aim for the right moment the best I can. It might be a hit or miss but I had a great time. In fact, I wouldn’t mind playing like this the whole time Haha.

Chapter IV: Word Guessing / Blue / Visit

When Fa, the muted character, burst out yelling “BLUE!” for the first time, from that moment onwards, music has to respond to everything Fa said until the end of the show. This is a common technique in the opera’s “Recitative’ to underline the dialogue. In Fa’s case, I mostly use the dominant 7th chord which is a strong chord that has a mixture of feelings that will lead to another chord. However, I don’t intend to play anything after this chord, so it will make the audience feel ‘unresolve’ or ‘neverending’ which is the perfect sound for Fa’s Word Guessing Scene. Moreover, in this scene, I play a standard major chord when the character guessed the word correctly. This is a small gimmick to make it sound like a game show.

In addition, Eaw, the director, has the idea to pair me and Fa together to be the only two “lowest-class characters”. With this idea, Fa will be the only character who can see me and interact with me. So I usually have music that responds to her all the time. I will sometimes play the cue to underscore what Fa is trying to say. Basically, the music speaks on behalf of her. 

Chapter V: The Turtle Priest Walking on Brackish Sea Water

Eaw, the director, has a clear vision for this scene. Which is music will only play to support the new generation and be silent on the old generation (Khalid / Kage). So in this scene, I chose to only underscore Kawin’s narration. Most of the music in this scene was improvisation. The improvisation in this scene is not symbolic to modern characters or anything like that. But the anatomy of this scene is long with a flexible and unpredictable acting rhythm which is difficult to perform a fixed melody or tempo. I decided to have a basic chord to lay down the foundation to work on. And at the moment when Kawin said “The turtle starts to question things, research, and take action”, that is when I play a chord progression that supports the turtle’s “curiosity in society”. I borrow some mood and tone from the soundtrack of The Lord of the Rings to add the dramatic effects.

Chapter VI: Ending, Light Fades

For those who are wondering if I composed all original music for this stageplay, the answer is no. In fact, I already wrote music specifically for the ending scene. But I felt that it was not the best direction I could go for. So I kept searching for that sound. Then I remember the 2nd Movement of String Quartets, Op. 76 by Joseph Haydn which, after WW II, it became the national anthem of ‘Germany’ until the present. 🇩🇪

PS. During the open house when the audience was walking in, I played random songs. Basically, anything that came up in my head at a time. Most of those musics are from movie scores such as Julia & Julia, Up, The Shape of Water, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Pan’s Labyrinth. I had to switch these songs with improvisation sometimes to make it match with the moment when the house light started to dim. Please accept my apology if I made some mistake this and there.

Lastly, I’d like to thank everyone who came to see us in “The Land of Frang Franf in 1684” This production is the experience that literally opened a new world to me in terms of music. I may only used the only one accordion but hey…. Less is more right?

Thank you to everyone in this team to give me this safe space to improve my accordion skill. I hereby name my accordion “Frang Frang” from now on.

Tan Onwimon

December 1, 2020

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