Friday, August 15, 2025

sai sai mao: ka-kha-nga pin phon



artist: ၸၢႆးသၢႆမၢဝ်း (sai sai mao)
album: ၵ-ၶ-င ပိၼ်ႈၽူၼ် (ka-kha-nga pin phon)
tracklist
01. ၵ-ၶ-င ပိၼ်ႈၽူၼ် (ka-kha-nga pin phon)
02. ၶမ်ႈဢွမ်ႇၾႆး (kham om phai)
03. ပေႃးႁၵ်ႉမႃးလေႈ (po hak ma le)
04.  ၵေႃးၸၢၺ်းတေဢဝ်ပုၼ်ႈၽွၼ်း (ko sai te ao phun phon)
05. ၶၢဝ်းမၵ်း (kho mak)
06. ထိုင်မိူဝ်ႈပီႈတင်းၼွင်ႉၶွႆၵၼ် (thueng moe pi tang nong khoi kan)
07. လုၵ်ႈယိင်းဢွၼ်ႇလွႆသၢမ်သိပ်း (luk ying on loi sam sip)
08. ၽၵ်းတူ (phak tu)
09. ဢမ်ႇသင်ၵေႃးပွၵ်ႈၼိုင်ႈတေတွၼ်ႈလႆႈႁၵ်ႉ (am sang ko pok nueng te ton lai hak)
10. ဢမ်ႇလူဝ်ႇလၢတ်ႈၵႂၢမ်းသင်ထႅင်ႈ (am lo lat om kwam sang taeng)
11. ဢမ်ႇပဵၼ်ပၢင်ယဝ်ႉယူဝ်း (am pen pang yao yo)
12. မွၵ်ႇပၼ်လၢႆ (mok pan lai)
13. ၶမ်ၸႂ်ၼႃႇတေႉ (kham tsaue na te)
14. ပီႈၸၢၺ်းဢူၺ်းပိူၼ်းပိတ်းၵွႃႇယဝ်ႉ (pi sai oi poen pit kwa yao)
15. ၼူၵ်ႉႁၢင်ႈလီ (nok hang li)

1, 5, 10, 14 featuring မူၺ်ၼုမ်ႇၽွင် (moi num phong)

this week, early recordings from the late, great sai sai mao! on today's cassette he was backed by the aces at ywet wa studio in lashio circa 1978. this would have followed his return from thailand, where he had cut his first few albums with new brother records in chiang mai while serving in the rebel shan state army. it was around the time of these lashio sessions that he met his second wife, moi num phong, who joins him on a few numbers here and carries a couple solo pieces on her own. the lyrics are penned by songwriter sai kham leik (who had given sai mao his revolutionary hit "lik hom mai panglong") and are still in the tai/shan language, from before he won more widespread fame singing in burmese. enjoy!

many thanks to my dear friend samara and her father for help untangling the mix of shan (handwritten and including some older spellings!), burmese, chinese, thai and english writing systems employed on the packaging (though any errors in transcription are mine alone).