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BALINESE_MUSIC

                                         June 18, 2006

 Quotes from:  A_HOUSE_IN_BALI

   
Balinese music is based on                
five tones.  In the sacred                                                  
writings of the priests these                Raven once asked Sika how 
tones have cosmological                      many tones there were in 
significance, for they are                   Balinese music.  He      
linked with the gods of the                  thought for a moment and 
five directions, north, east,                counted on his fingers           
south, west and centre, where                before saying "five".    
in the middle of the lotous                                              
sits Batara Siva, Creator,                           WAYAN_SIKA        
Destroyer, Lord God of All.   
His mystic colour is white;   
his sacred syllable _hing_;   
and the tone for this syllable
is _ding_.                    
                                        Another quote:    
The gods of the other directions        
have their own colours -- red,          He came a week later
yellow, blue, black; their              saying, Here is the book.
syllables and tones-- _dong_,
_de'ng_, _doong_, _dang_...             It was a bundle of dried palm
                                        leaves, trimmed and neatly
But he didn't think, said Nyoman        tied together.  It was old and
when I asked him, that the boys         brittle, and crumbled as I
and men of the clubs thought of         opened it.  Inside, three or
this as they played.                    four lines of Balinese script
                                        strecthed across each strip of
Music is for pleasure, he said.         leaf.
It pleases both gods and men.
                                        That is the _pokok_, the
       -- p. 43                         stalk, the trunk of the
                                        music, he said.

                                        It was nothing more than the
                                        meagre tones of the chant in
                                        the bass, the barest of
                                        outlines.  Nothing to
                                        indicate the rhythm, nothing
                                        to indicate the melody or the
                                        elaborate interweaving of
                                        sounds.  A scratch here and
                                        there marked the accent of a
                                        gong and that was all.

                                        It was only a reminder, said
                                        Nyoman.  The rest, he explained,
                                        existed in the mind of the
                                        teacher.

                                        --- p. 43



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