Revival of the B'rôh

For the Ede people, the B'rôh instrument has become increasingly attached to the daily life of the community. However, due to its limited sound characteristics, "each person plays for himself", the B'rôh instrument is not popular and commonly used in large and colorful performance spaces with other musical instruments, from traditional to modern.

This limitation has also caused the B'rôh to gradually disappear from villages as well as from contemporary cultural and artistic activities.

Artist Nguyen Truong's stylized Broh attracts many music lovers to come and learn and experience.

Teacher and artist Nguyen Truong (former music lecturer at Dak Lak College of Culture and Arts) felt sorry for that unique traditional musical instrument, so he researched and stylized the B'rôh instrument to give it a wider "stage" in today's life.

He shared: From the traditional B'rôh instrument, including its components (neck, strings, handle, keys and sound box), I have stylized a few details so that the player can juggle his emotions as desired. First of all, I found a way to overcome the sound limitation by adding electronic devices to the sound box to make the instrument resonate more; accordingly, I increased the number of keys from 5 to 7 (or more) to expand the rich range of tones; at the same time, I added a strap to make it easier to move flexibly while performing.

With these stylizations, artist Nguyen Truong believes that the B'roh is no longer as constrained as before (being a narration alone, or accompanying the melody of the ding puot flute in the nights of singing and reciting epic stories); this instrument now has a stronger influence, capable of harmonizing with many other instruments in every performance space. More importantly, the sound of the B'roh through his creative hands still retains the rustic nuances of bamboo created through the resonance box from a rustic dried gourd.

Artist Nguyen Truong is passionate about creating his stylized B'roh instrument.

Through many performances of the stylized B'rôh instrument by artist Nguyen Truong at a number of cultural venues inside and outside the province, music lovers acknowledged this as a success in terms of inheriting and promoting the value and traditional identity of the Central Highlands folk music treasure - the B'rôh instrument has pushed the range of perception and enjoyment of both players and listeners further and become more popular in contemporary life.

In other words, this unique traditional musical instrument has revived in the acceptance of everyone thanks to its new element - both rustic, different... and more modern and popular, contributing to bringing the flow of folk music of the ethnic groups here into the flow of Vietnamese culture.

Source: https://baodaklak.vn/van-hoa-du-lich-van-hoc-nghe-thuat/202504/hoi-sinhdan-broh-e9f1bc1/