My story with malay music

My story with malay music

Jul 3, '07 6:03 PM for everyone

Category:	Music
Genre:	Other
Artist:	-

This is the first page of a 2 page text and is reply closed . after reading this page please visit the second part and then reply , thank you

The following text is a modified and enhanced version of my older webpage on geocities with some explanations of the radio tech terminology .The original text has been written in 2000 and here are many updates and text refines . As the history is very big I have split it in three parts :
At first do not forget that as a Greek man I am living in Thessaloniki N Greece, and these two kinds , Malay and dangdut are the only music kinds I listen …
PART 1 -
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89-90 After being in a trip in HK , Bangkok Phuket and Spore on 15-30 Aug 1989, I recorded 7 tapes from the local stations in FM with mostly tai [from the local tai stations], hindi/tamil , Malay and Chinese music. Although Chinese was ( and still is in regards to the totally :westernized standards ) the nicest of them, with Malay to follow and then Thai (with still very nice songs) I was ‘adhered’[hooked?] to the Malay that seemed to me very emotional and kept me with a very strong passion with it. The cassette recorder has been bought in Hong Kong and was an Aiwa model

The Malay station was Warna ,[the only that time ] while in Spore I had also recoded from City Sounds [chinese] and Oli [Hindi /Tamil]. I had no interest in listening to the local English stations or BBC
Among the songs I heard/kept that time from Warna were .kasih ku from Rahim Maarof , Ramlah ram’s cinta ku hanyut di lautan sepi , Gersang’s itu suratan takdir Alleycat’s suara kekasih ,another’s oh Fatima , ku petik bintang2[KRM] rantau abang [R Buang], one still unidentified from Illusi, and possibly Jamal [engkaulah yang kusayang ].
Several other very important songs but still unidentified , I heard that magnetized me are found here http://zlgr.multiply.com/music/item/105
The most important Chinese songs I heard was the,yiduo xiaohua /zaihui shou, and chankei nide ke [singing your song ] the latest two originated from Taiwan
•

Following this, starting on 1990, I tried in listening (and recording tapes) from the Suara Malaysia (SM) on shortwaves (15295kHz ) with the use of Sony’s radio ICF 7600 (a digital world band shortwave radio ) connected by cable into SILVER (an analog world radio with cassette player) with for further recording .

Suara Malaysia transmits on 1530 UTC or 1730 Greek time. Several times I could catch it on 1515+ . It starts with bamar program on 1515-1530UTC then with Arabic till 1700UTC and ends with Malay program till 1855UTC . In contrast to other stations and its more recent policy, its programming consisted mostly with music so that more than 2,5 hours per day in their 4 hour transmission could be played. Half of the music in the Arab program was/ is Malay.
There are also other several times as in the morning local time but it cannot be heard..
I used a 10 + 5 meter wire to connect to the Sony radio (5 meters are over the walls ) , on the top floor on a 7 floor building.
As the signal that time was relatively good , there were several important factors that destroyed reception: :

strong interference from RFI – Radio France International , a ‘powerhouse’ signal transmitting on 15300 kHz (+5 kHz ) nearly all day

strong interference from VoR –Voice of Russia , another ‘powerhouse’ signal transmitting on 15290 kHz (-5kHz )the same times. Both of these are at least 1000 times stronger than VoMalaysia’s signal

VoP(Voice of Friendship from Russia too) transmitting after 1730UTC on 15295 kHz (same frequency nearly same power as others

sometimes Suara Malaysia suffered from very low audio /

and he most important due to shortwave band transmission it suffered from propagation / fading ,
For those who do not know what this means , the signal can be once strong and the next two minutes poor. A good example is to look into your radio on (MW) medium waves and listen at night to remote stations (ie 2000 km far from your site), You may watch on how these stations interfere each other. Also tuning off your radio from a very strong MW station, and trying to listen to the next poor signal , you will listen on how the strong station can ruin the signal of the poor signal.
A third case is that today the signal can be good , the next day it cannot be head due to ‘no circuit’!!

As in result the signal relatively fair, under two very strong signals in between. This caused ‘hratch’ sounds from the nearby stations. The total audio was fair at best , nearly telephonic inappropriate for ‘pleasure’ listening
Several songs I heard that time, and I liked much include: kabut serankgai mawar [Zaiton Sameon], a still unrecognized song from Ella [kembali padanya yang kenyata?], some from Hetty Koes Endang , rindu kasih [Ram] , kerna dia [rohana jalil] , bila rindu ku sebut namamu [Siti fairuz] , Isabella [the famous song ] and sekian lama ku merindui (a folk song ). I am not totally sure if all of them heard on 90 or later.
•

This reason also made me being again very active on the Shortwaves after several years of inactivity !
•

Next year on 91 I was in Nigeria working on some sat systems works and used some local radios to listen and taping music from VoM for a total of 150 songs in a period of 2 months

Conditions there were quite better in terms of interference .Both nearby stations as V of Friendship were there quite poor that made a minimum interference to the station. Just some whistles under a fair signal Audio still nearly telephonic.
The station seems pre-taping some music program and playing it several times. For example the B sides from kau kunci and duri dalam cinta from Ramlah has been played at least two times . Same was with two other singes one of them is found here:
‘21 syng d msia’ [sayangi dalam Malaysia ] in the http://zlgr.multiply.com/music/item/113
There were more than 6 songs from this singer in series , and heard at least 3 times
Several of the songs I liked and some recently recognized were cinta nusantara [sheqal], keresahan [S.Aini], , rayuan ku [R Jalil and many other from her too ] angan angan [a sogn that I think did not recorded but ] , norsila’s ku suidah jatuh hati /ka ducapan mu [norshila amin ] several from P ramlee, the song susah teneng kita bersama [N Wahab/Ram], , terasing [Sudirman}, dimata cinta [Ayati Tasrip ] sendiri [May ,also Jamal ]and many others that be noticed below
The station could be heard nearly in all its broadcasting time 1530 to 1900 UTC .


92-93 were also a good period in Thessaloniki for listening though signal started to lower a bit down The Russian stations of Voice of Friendship has terminated programming on shortwaves and left the frequency clear . But a neon lamp somewhere in the building started making a recurring noise .

As an example listen to the ‘93#12A2 bersama kita’ at the end of the above page http://zlgr.multiply.com/music/item/113 .There is a ‘hratch’ sound every 1-1.5 second . And it was one of the best receptions of that time as that day the frequency neighbors had no circuit to our point .

Three music kinds that impressed me for that period 90-93:
1. What you call today jiwang. Very nice style of slow rock music or ballads that impressed too much not only me but to others too. . Several songs that I later recognized from these recordings were : CINTA [ XPDC] , several songs from May , untukmu selamanya [Visa] antara gadis [Dinamik] , Kau Yang Tak Mengerti [Teja] suci dalam debu, penatian [blackrose], Sentuhan Kecundang [ekamatra], Jawalan kasih [utopia ] all of the 91 collection
2. What you call it pop 80an , as of Jamal’s sendiri .Kazar’s Tiap Waktu Terluang , keresahan [Aini ], rayuanku [R Jalil] and several of nearly same style from Ramlah [hanyala padamu cinta ] as main style of those times. Exotic for the Greek standards. But not meaning the standard ‘pop’ [Aisha, Misha , ram etc ]
I think I have found several songs that connect dangdut , sunda and old Malay 80s together
3.Hari Raya :I was more careful on 1993 . Many songs have been aired via Suara Malaysia that period (Jan to March ) and recorded. I was more impressed with Dari-Jauh_Ku_Pohon_Maaf by another singer than Sudirman and ‘mak limah sayang’. Other I liked were selamat hari raya [ahamd jais ] Cahaya Aidilfitri [Black Dog Bone ]

•

MY next step was to communicate by standard mail with record companies from Spore and Malaysia by sending tapes with sample songs with Chinese and Malay music asking them to identify and provide me with the related albums . from the referred songs . After a strong hunting , I succeeded buying from Suwah Records ( Spore) a series of albums form Ramlah albums cintaku hanyut, duri dalam cinta , kau kunci , lagu hit A. Nawab and the chinese : zai hui shou , cahnkei nide ke aand one with oldies (Teresa teng? )

and that was only the 4 of the 15 songs noticed

•

ON 1994 I have bought a LOWE HF150 shortwave comms receiver , for enhancing reception.. But VoM signal gradually lowered due to solar conditions, so that I stopped listening to it. It was very nice that for 3-4 months RRI Jakarta , using one 500 kW of power , transmitter , so that the signal in my house was so great , that I connected it to a walkman speaker set with nice audio. The time I cold listen was on early afternoons as far as I can remember. I tried to record a bit, but suddenly they reverted to their previous transmitter of 50 kW making reception a little difficult . te most interesting songs
• I still remember songs kasih ,(a easy listening song later ‘dangdutized’ by IIs Dahlia) , two songs from Aishah and mengapa by Niki Astria

The frequency that time was 9680 kHz and as far as I think, was the third program Their music program except westernized pop included also kroncong and serious music .

A little later the SILVER was totally useless