SPOTTED:Anak Kayan

Who would've thought a regular family 'gendang' silat practice suddenly turns the whole family into an ethnic band performing series of pahang ethnic folklore songs? Meet "Anak Kayan", Pahang talented band consisting of Man Kayan and his family tree from wife, sons, daughter, nephews and nieces.

Established in 2010 in Kampung Permatang Badak,Kuantan.Man Kayan past time activity (other than handling their food stall) are jamming music with his wife and kids practising gendang silat alongside other equipments such as gendang, keketuks, rebana, tamborine and bebuluh singing along to ethnic songs of pahang, jamming to the songs of Datuk Ariffin Said a reknown local ethnic singer in Pahang.

From a close personal jamming sessions in front of friends and family,man kayan relatives later invite them to perform at family weddings, then more invitations pour in which later named themselves as "anak kayan" started to perform on bigger stage,from getting invitations to perform representing the state of pahang in cultural fest,dinners and events to an invitation to representing Malaysia for culture fest in Riau in January 2011! They also once invited to perform 'live' on TV during TV9's Nasi Lemak Kopio programme.

Of course the art blood runs naturally among man kayan family when he later started to wrote and compose their songs, which circles around the story of nature, love and malay culture. from the story of kancil, to words of advice from elders to the young kids to take care of the land, the trees,river and be good to people and respectful to nature. His talent were formidably full of potential since one of his song titled"semalam di kuala pahang" won Pahang ethnic song contest in 2010.

The name "Anak Kayan" comes from the musical instrument used by them were mainly made from "kayu kayan" aka wood, the kayans family as what i like to called them consist of man kayan(lead vocal/guitar), mak kayan(gong), akilah(2nd vocal),farah(keketuk),Alif(rebana/gendang),nado(gendang/rebana),kanda(gendang),apit(buluh kuntum/tamborine),idan(guitaris)along(guitaris) and afina(gamelan). Most of the kids are still in lower and secondary school except for along who just started working. Music currently is their part time get together activity and money from shows were used for school and also to provides what they need for the bands esp on clothes(which some of them were made by themselves) and instruments.

Its an honored to have "anak kayan" on TM presents Everyone Connects @ Berjaya Megamall Kuantan stage,since its not often to see such a inspiring local talents from Pahang to perform in such nature of event,whereby during the two days event, they performed and entertained the crowd with Pahang folksongs bridging both traditional and digital culture together.

The future is shining bright for man kayan and his family as his genuine effort to promote local pahang culture via music certainly gaining attention from local people, government and corporate company such as TM. Their music will soon be heard in some school in Pahang as part of the school curricular activity which "anak kayan" will be performing in front of the school kids as part of the effort to expose the kids with positive local malay culture and of course invitations to perform for shows will continously keep pouring in for the band especially when their good rapport seems to spread from mouth to mouth, the down to earth persona seems to become another charming amulet to the band since man kayan is not only a person with a calm,loving personality but a down to earth person aswell.

At the the time this posting were published, 20 "anak kayan" songs has finished the process of recording just awaiting funds to print them into CDs, hence any donors or sponsors is certainly welcome by the band to help their music distributed in a proper manner.

Eventough the time has move forward and tradition and culture is something that has becoming something that is not really important to be taken care off in era of starbucks and high speed internet?maybe we shouldnt forget where are roots from and bring them along in our modern lifestyle to keep us grounded and to make us remember that maybe, tradition is something that we all need to makes us a sane human.

For bookings and inquiry do contact man kayan @ 017-9569365 or 014-2160908