Guidelines for Conserving and Developing Likae Paa in Nakhon Si Thammarat Province

Abstract

Likae Paa or Likae Rammana is a folk musical drama of Southern communities in the provinces of Phatthalung, Trang, Krabi and Nakhon Si Thammarat. The components of Likae Paa performance comprise male and female dancers, musicians, musical instruments, costumes, opportunities to perform, beliefs and rituals, the famous stories and performing places. Concepts and theories for conserving and developing Likae Paa performances, the author uses Clifford Geertz’s concepts of Culture and the concepts of the conservation and development of folk drama materials as a baseline for reasonable actions. The concepts of
this conservation and development are to encourage the owners of folk ensemble and the local scholars in the field to share awareness and understanding on how and why to conserve and to develop their cultural heritage. To conserve Likae Paa performance, it is necessary to conserve its traditional performing style, professional and young dancers as well as the audiences, both elderly and young generations. To develop Likae Paa performance, the performing components are needed to be modified. The modifications can be providing a brief story of the drama for pre-performance, adjusting language use in the musical dialogs to be more concise and easier to understand while the dressing style and costumes must be more stylish. Moreover, the typical musical instruments such as a tambourine, drums and cymbals should be combined with modern instruments. Finally, this type of musical drama
should be developed as a course of study so it can be passed from older generation to younger ones as a sustainable conservation scheme.