The 'Lessons From The Heart' chamber concert takes place at the Taiping Public Library on Sept 13. Photo: Shireen Zainudin
True to Taiping, Perak legend, it is bucketing rain when I meet Liew Suet Fun on the verandah of the New Club, overlooking the Esplanade.
Author of more than 20 non-fiction titles, including After Long Rainy Afternoons: Of Taiping And Her People and Musings From The Nest – written during her years as the last full-time resident of Maxwell Hill – Liew now lives in the lowlands of town.
The landslides may be gone, but tremors rumble beneath heritage sites as she takes on her new role as president of the Taiping Heritage Society.
Visitors come to Taiping for colonial echoes, its 150-year-old rain trees, or a plate of chee cheong fun from a fifth-generation vendor at Circus Ground.
What Liew hopes is that they might also “linger a little longer”.
Enter Legasi, a pocket-sized music festival (Sept 12-14) organised by the Taiping Heritage Society. Liew sees it as a celebration of heritage, performance, and people.
Three distinctive sites – Maxwell Basecamp, Taiping Public Library and Perak Museum – will host concerts across the weekend.
Legasi festival opens with ‘A Path Through the Forest’ nature walk and music event at Maxwell Basecamp on Sept 12. Photo: Shireen Zainudin
Backed by Sustainable Tourism Malaysia and funded by the Finance Ministry through the Habitat Foundation, Legasi promises layered storytelling woven into music.
Youthful and playful elements are woven into the festival as well. “When we began thinking of Legasi as an idea to create an immersive heritage performance for audiences, we also wanted to build within the idea, an imparting of values and experiences for younger performers,” says Liew.
“Simply because the youth are our future and legacies after all are about perpetuity and ensuring the wealth of cultural expressions live on, and on,” she adds.
Coinciding with Malaysia Day, the festival runs alongside the second Raintown Film Festival (Sept 12-14), offering visitors music, indie film, and a documentary on Taiping’s oral history.
Taiping has long spotlighted its heritage-listed spaces. Legasi may reveal her true treasure: the people animating these grounds and the passionate talent creating new cultural journeys.
The magic of Maxwell
The weekend opens on Sept 12 with “A Path Through the Forest” at Maxwell Basecamp. Snugly perched in the foothills of Maxwell Hill (modern day Bukit Larut), it is an entry point to the 6,800ha forest reserve of protected flora and fauna.
Liew will guide guests on a short jungle walk (from 5.30pm), sharing insider tales before giving her first public reading of a poem composed for the occasion.
As dusk falls, music rooted in nature takes over.
With the Legasi festival, Liew (centre) hopes visitors will ‘linger a little longer’ in Taiping. Photo: The Star/Filepic
Tawfan Inmala plays the bamboo seruling, joined by Sarawak’s Anderson Kalang on the sape and Marianne Dayang Peter performing a Kelabit hornbill dance.
Seruling and sape will merge in an extraordinary duet.
Anderson began as a dancer before taking up the sape, once the accompaniment for warrior dances – rituals tied to headhunting.
Over time, its melodies evolved into healing chants and dance forms such as lasan (male solo), leto (female solo) and datun julut (line dance). Today he plays a hybrid sape with guitar elements, championing cross-cultural collaborations that have taken him to international stages. With Legasi, he hopes to showcase “the stories found in every instrument”.
A chamber delight
The hour-long event “Lessons From the Heart” takes place at the Taiping Public Library on Sept 13 at 8pm. Built in 1882 and rebuilt in 1912, the library retains its checkerboard floors, sofas, and loyal patrons.
Eighty seats will fill for a chamber concert led by clarinetist Ng Eng Seong, a King Edward VII alumnus who began in the school band at 12. Mostly self-taught, he honed his craft with Universiti Malaya Symphony Orchestra, the KL Symphony Orchestra, and the Malaysian Philharmonic’s outreach ensembles.
Ng feels responsible to give back by raising his hometown’s musical profile. Photo: Shireen Zainudin
During the Covid pandemic, Ng returned to Taiping, reconnecting with musician friends. A small Christmas ensemble in 2023 rekindled their community spirit. For Legasi, his nine-member group – including clarinets, flutes, trumpets, saxophone, and piano – will perform Malay classics, (Studio) Ghibli whimsy, tango, and jazz.
Inspired by the scholarly setting, they will also share insights into their instruments. For Ng, the goal is “a soaring and melding of community spirit”.
Exhibitions halls come alive
The finale, “Memories and Music”, will be staged at the Perak Museum, located along Jalan Taming Sari in Taiping on Sept 14 (8pm). Established in 1883, it is Malaysia’s oldest museum.
In what may be its first site-specific concert, 100 guests will journey through exhibition halls guided by music as storyteller.
Museum director Nasrul Aziaman calls the experiment unprecedented – engaging the community with heritage in new ways. For him, museums unite communities, and this blending of music and legacy is “humanist, harmonist, and uplifting.”
Curated by award-winning soprano Dr Ang Mei Foong, the programme traces voyages from Europe to Malaya with “journeying songs” of the 1800s before moving into Malay and indigenous traditions. Her ensemble, Dendang Suara Serantau, features Dim Sy, Koh Sin Kit, Haziq Muhyidin, and pianist Jojo Yap.
The Perak Museum is set for another first with a site-specific moving musical performance on Sept 14. Photo: Shireen Zainudin
Earlier that day, children can join a playful “piano hop-on hop-off” led by three teachers on two pianos, including a “denim-clad” instrument crafted by Taiping-born piano maker Henry Chan of The Crafting Music.
Known for customised designs – including a baby grand painted by Taiping-born artist Hock Aun Teh, whose works are in the collections of Queen Elizabeth II and Sean Connery – Chan hopes the denim piano will capture youthful imagination.
A town revitalised
Taiping, long dubbed a “pensioners’ paradise”, was revitalised during the pandemic years when younger generations returned, blending tradition with new ideas.
Legasi reflects this interweaving of old and new, celebrating a community whose cultural landscape continues to evolve.
Beyond music, the Taiping Heritage Society is trail-mapping three walking routes. The “Jana Trail” will link lush botany with remnants of tin-mining communities.
The “Tin Trail” will chart how an elephant’s discovery shaped the town’s destiny. The “Charcoal Trail” will highlight Kuala Sepetang’s industry, perfected by the British in 1904.
