||: drummer | composer | facilitator :||

Projects

arcai

Under the name arcai I explore my Lao heritage through creating my own archives of Lao culture and composing with field-recordings, traditional folk instruments, and sensory percussion.

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Kai Chareunsy’s debut EP Naak Dam Naak Dom is about the journey of his family. Featuring interviews with his grandparents, they detail their dangerous trip made across the Mekong River from Laos to Thailand before eventually arriving in the UK in the late 1970s. The first project of it’s kind in the UK, these interviews alongside music made from field recordings collected in Laos make for an engaging, thought-provoking listen, and an opportunity to learn and understand more about the Lao refugee experience.

100% of EP sales will be donated to 'Restoration Laos' a charity that clears unexploded bombs from the ground in Laos left from the Vietnam War. Clearing these bombs saves lives and allows communities to once again farm on their land.

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After over 5 years of making music together in various contexts, and almost a year of musical solitude due to the Covid-19 pandemic, drummer Kai Chareunsy and pianist Tom Harris got together in January 2021 at UCan Studios to record a set of free improvisations.

They recorded around 4 hours worth of music, and condensed it into a 21 minute EP. They then sent this music to four of their favourite artists in different fields - Marco Woolf (poet/storyteller), Imogen Richards (visual artist), Stephanie Burrell (dancer/movement director), and Luca Shaw (visual artist).
The result was their first project - ‘canyon, exhibits i-vi.’ - a six track EP with six illustrated poetic accompaniments, and two music videos.

Chareunsy and Harris are currently in the process of organising more projects with improvising artists who inspire them from across the UK, including poets, dancers, film-makers, actors, animators, and theatre-makers.