Kiswire Malaysia employees who formed a drum troop to play Chinese drums
in the art of the 24 Festive Drums, were delighted to meet with Tan Chai Puan, one
of the founders of this unique art of drumming recently.
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| Members of the Kiswire drum troop practicing their moves |
While
this creative art of playing the 24 Festive Drums was founded by then Foon Yew
High School students, Tan and the late Tan Hooi Song in 1988, Kiswire Malaysia
was established in Johor in 1989 as a US$600 million investment. In 2009, this unique art of drumming was recognised
as a national cultural heritage by the Unity, Culture and Heritage Ministry.
Inspired
by drummers they saw in past International Drum Competitions, some employees in
Kota Kiswire, their regional headquarters and research and development centre
in Johor Baru, decided to form their own drum troop. Since last December, this group has been
training under drum coach, Koh Chung Wei, a skilled drummer and Foon Yew High
School graduate.
 |
| Drumming coach Koh Chung Wei [Left], co-founder of the 24 Festive Drums Tan Chai Puan [5th from Left], Kiswire CEO Charles Lee [4th from Right] with the drum troop |
Kiswire
SEA Headquarters, CEO, Charles Lee, said that they have a Sports and Social
Welfare Club for staff to arrange sports events as well as the company’s annual
dinner for some 1300 employees in their high-carbon steel products operations
in JB and Tanjung Langsat. In addition
to playing games like football, badminton, table-tennis and bowling, their
sports club also has a drum troop.
"Part
of our philosophy is to always appreciate our colleagues who work hard for the
company’s success,” said Lee. “We are
like a big family here,” he added.
“Muhamad
Shahrul Nizam has a good sense of rhythm and he leads the troop to play the
drums with good timing,” said Koh about the troop member who probably honed his
rhythm sense from his experience in playing the traditional kompang.
Koh coaches the troop for two hours per week in a second floor space
that the company allocated for the drumming training.
“Every
day after lunch, we practice our drumming,” said Chris Chai, one of the women
members of the drum troop. She explained
that they initially started strongly with 20 members but due to various
reasons, their membership dwindled to only nine. At the moment, their troop comprises five
Malay, three Chinese and one Korean member.
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| The Kiswire drum troop after their performance at the company's Annual Dinner held in March 2015 |
“This is
very significant for drumming,” said Tan who was delighted to discover this
drum troop in Kiswire, a Korean investment here. In his recent visit to China, Tan was
thrilled to discover a Shanghainese company, another private corporation that
also has their own 24 Festive Drums troop.
Tan, a
cultural activist and poet who is also head of the Art & Cultural Museum in
Southern College, anticipates more interest in this art of drumming as the next
International Drum Competition is being organised for the fourth time in JB.
This
unique art of drumming was exported abroad when more graduates from Foon Yew
High School went to further their studies and formed drum troops in
universities in Singapore, Taiwan, China, Thailand, Switzerland, United Kingdom
and the United States. With more than
300 drum troops worldwide, Tan is pleased that this JB-born art form has gone
international.
A version of this was published in The Malaysian Insider on 2 July 2015
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