Bia ma hta – Karen ‘Singing’ Shawl 1

The Pwo Karen ‘singing shawl,’ bia ma hta, makes a surprise appearance in courtship music in the Golden Triangle, for here is a garment that, while not properly a musical instrument, has musical properties due to its lilting jingles and jangles.       

Adolescent girls weave their long decorative courting shawls, which measure up to 240 centimeters, from homespun cotton they have dyed brick-red from mengkudu plant pigment (Morinda citrifolia), called khoh in the Karen language. White vertical pinstripes and horizontal bands of contrasting colored threads are woven into the bia ma hta for added color.

Singing shawls are further embellished with a variety of materials meant to attract the eye and ear of a potential mate. One end of the long panel is decorated with small, glossy white buttons of glass or plastic and sequins, which are sewn on with multicolored threads and grouped in clusters of three or five in geometric patterns. From both ends hang impressively long tassels of bright yarn and many-colored glass beads, to which tiny bells and shimmering iridescent wings of the jewel beetle (buprestidae) may be attached.

Note: This elegant Karen singing shawl features horizontal yellow, green, and multicolored bands that have been woven alternately along its length; white, yellow, blue, green, and colorful prismatic-like buttons are set in cross forms; a row of white buttons lines the bottom edge, leading to a bounty of tassels in green, red, and pink yarn and varicolored beads on which lustrous beetle wings hang. This Karen shawl is a feast for eyes and ears.

Pwo Karen girls of marriageable age attend funeral rites, dancing and singing around the bier of the deceased, dressed in their finest attire. Their long white tunics with red trim and tassels are festooned with colorful glass-bead necklaces and a white-beaded bandolier, ivory plugs or silver earrings with bright pompoms, and brass torqued bangles that cover their arms. They complete the ensemble with an elaborate headdress with multiple large metal hair pins that radiate from an ample bun at the crown of the head.

It is notable that Karen funerals also offer an opportunity for courtship. Indeed, young people attend funerals enthusiastically with an eye to finding a mate. Mourning and wooing are juxtaposed. Thus, at the moment when a couple pairs off to play courting music, the girl dons her singing shawl, woven for the occasion.  As a girl’s bia ma hta gently sways when she moves, its seductive jingling accompanies the antiphonal refrains she shares with her suitor during their musical exchanges.

Ethnic Group: Pwo Karen

Local Name: Bia ma hta

Type: ‘Singing Shawl’

Class: Idiophone (Indirectly shaken)

Tuning:

Age: Circa 1950

Materials: Cotton, wings of the jewel beetle (buprestidae), glass, plastic

Dimensions: 125 x 71 cm / 48.4” x 28”

Location: Northern Thailand

Owner / Instrument Maker:

Catalog Number: 6501