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2004 NEA National Heritage Fellowships
CHUM NGEK
Cambodian musician and teacher, Gaithersburg, MD
Chum Ngek is both an artist and a teacher known for his performing ability on
the roneat, a 21-keyed xylophone. Born in Battambang Province, Master Chum came
to this country in the early 1980s with a wave of Cambodian refugees and has
served as a musical and educational leader of his community ever since. At the
age of ten he began learning the repertoire of the major Khmer musical genres,
spanning classical and folk traditions. In addition, he learned the music of
the kong (gongs), khimm (hammered dulcimer), sampho (two-faced drum),
and tror
(bowed fiddle). Soon his repertoire was so vast that many people were asking him
to teach and at age eighteen he was recognized as a Krou (master teacher).
National Heritage Fellow Sam Ang Sam points out that because he is acknowledged
as the source for Cambodian music, Master Chum is frequently called on to
conduct music workshops across the continent. Still, he continues to serve his
more immediate community, as he single-handedly provides musical instruction in
the Washington, DC, area, teaching for the Cambodian Buddhist Society and the
Cambodian American Heritage organization.
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