Any other instruments will not work because they are kept in boxes. A survey I carried out recently revealed that parents tend to be willing to purchase a piano because they want their children to be good not only in school but also other things like sports, arts and so on. The second reason is that people need a piano to practice. .
This brings us to the third phenomenon which is rather difficult to appreciate. I can't elaborate how the Chinese moved to the South Seas from China in the 19th century, but they did it in great numbers. Now their musical cultures have become almost extinct. Chinese traditional instruments like the er-hu and gu-zheng are even rarer than the pianos. The most probable reason is that, in the colonial days, the younger generations began to take on western culture. Also, as they lived with local people, they probably wanted to demonstrate their adaptability skills by replacing their culture with a western culture. The consequence of that is that nowadays there is very little traditional Chinese music in the musical life. .
The following table shows that while the number of music examination entries increased in Sabah, in the same period of time, the entries for Britain decreased: .
Piano Examination Statistics (A.B.R.S.M. Reports): Number of entries YEAR SABAH BRITAIN .
1982 400 333025 (all practical subjects) .
1985 650 270094 (all practical subjects) .
1986 730 144566 (piano examined) c. 260000 (all practical examined) .
Sources: Annual Report (1982, 1986, 1987), Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, UK .
How do the Chinese people appreciate Western music? Western tonal music is taken as the standard music, there is no other good music except tonal music. Music before Bach and after Tchaikovsky are considered "strange" music.
The "Westernised Oriental" may be described as having hardly any sense of judgement[3]. People have discarded their cultural identities and have also taken on board a foreign type of music, but unable to express themselves through it.
