Video " Angkor Wat " by Paul Lawler and Paul Speer

I have the great honour and pleasure to present Angkor Wat, a mesmerizing soundscape with a touch of mysticism out of the new album Wonders, composed and performed by critically acclaimed musicians Paul Lawler from the UK and Paul Speer from the USA. Wonders is a musical journey to awe inspiring places on Planet Earth.

Please see Paul Speer's channel for more information: http://www.youtube.com/user/paulspeer1 or go to: http://www.paulspeer.com


Again, my heart felt thank you and sincere appreciation to Paul Speer and to Paul Lawler for this exciting collaboration! It was again such a great joy for me to make this video and I am so grateful for this.


Angkor is a name conventionally applied to the region of Cambodia serving as the seat of the Khmer empire that flourished from approximately the ninth century to the thirteenth century A.D. The ruins of Angkor are located amid forests and farmland near modern day Siem Reap, and are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The temples of the Angkor area number over one thousand, ranging in scale from nondescript piles of brick rubble scattered through rice fields to the magnificent Angkor Wat, said to be the world's largest single religious monument.

Many of the temples at Angkor have been restored, and together they comprise the most significant site of Khmer architecture. In 2007 an international team of researchers concluded that Angkor had been the largest preindustrial city in the world with an urban sprawl of 3000 square kilometers (1,150 square miles). Angkor could have supported a population of up to one million people.

Angkor Wat (or Angkor Vat) was built for the king Suryavarman II in the early 12th century as his state temple and capital city. As the best-preserved temple at the site, it is the only one to have remained a significant religious centre since its foundation—first Hindu, dedicated to Vishnu, then Buddhist. The temple is the epitome of the high classical style of Khmer architecture. It has become a symbol of Cambodia, appearing on its national flag, and it is the country's prime attraction for visitors.

Angkor Wat combines two basic plans of Khmer temple architecture: the temple mountain and the later galleried temple, based on early South Indian Hindu architecture, with key features such as the Jagati. It is designed to represent Mount Meru, home of the devas in Hindu mythology: within a moat and an outer wall 3.6 kilometers (2.2 mi) long are three rectangular galleries, each raised above the next. At the centre of the temple stands a quincunx of towers. Unlike most Angkorian temples, Angkor Wat is oriented to the west; scholars are divided as to the significance of this. The temple is admired for the grandeur and harmony of the architecture, which has been compared to the architecture of ancient Greece or Rome, its extensive bas-reliefs and for the numerous devatas (guardian spirits) adorning its walls. The measurements themselves of the temple and its parts in relation to one another have cosmological significance.

In 1177, approximately 27 years after the death of Sulyavarman II, Angkor was sacked by the Chams, the traditional enemies of the Khmer. Thereafter the empire was restored by a new king, Jayavarman VII, who established a new capital and state temple (Angkor Thom and the Bayon respectively) a few kilometres to the north.


One of the first Western visitors to the temple was Antonio da Magdalena, a Portuguese monk who visited in 1586 and said that it "is of such extraordinary construction that it is not possible to describe it with a pen, particularly since it is like no other building in the world. It has towers and decoration and all the refinements which the human genius can conceive of".

(Source: www.wikipedia.org)


Enjoy the music and the video:)