Program 2011

<back

 


The University of Pittsburgh
Department of Music
 
presents
 
 
Sunda:
Gamelan and Dance of West Java
 
University of Pittsburgh Gamelan
Directed by Andrew Weintraub and Indra Ridwan
 
Guest Artists:
Undang Sumarna
Ening Rumbini
 
 
Bellefield Hall Auditorium
April 8 & 9, 2011
8pm

  

     Gamelan refers to a set of predominantly percussion instruments including tuned gongs, metal-keyed instruments, and drums (as well as bowed lute and voice). Established in 1995, the gamelan performance program at Pitt has introduced hundreds of students to new ways of thinking about, practicing, performing, and composing music. During the past eight years, guest artists from Indonesia have been invited to the university to teach, present workshops and lecture-demonstrations, and perform in large-scale gamelan concerts for the university community, as well as for the larger Pittsburgh community. The concerts not only demonstrate traditional forms of music, dance, and theater as they are performed in Indonesia, but they also provide an opportunity for musical and theatrical experimentation.
    The University of Pittsburgh owns two gamelan sets. The first set, which arrived in October, 1995, is named “Kyai Tirta Rukmi,” or “Venerable Rivers of Gold.” This gamelan is tuned to laras salendro (a five-tone tuning system made up of approximately equidistant intervals). The second set of instruments, which arrived in March, 2005, is named “Ligar Pasundan” (“Fragrance of Pasundan”). This gamelan is tuned to laras degung (a five-tone tuning system made up of large and small intervals). Other Sundanese instruments used in this performance include calung, a set of bamboo idiophones.
     In Indonesia, dance has developed in conjunction with ceremonial and religious rituals, popular entertainment, court culture, modern drama, and avant-garde artistic expression. Classical dance forms are part of elaborate dance drama productions in which dance functions to distinguish different types of characters, ranging from refined to course characterizations. Dancers use elaborate costumes and masks to portray different character types. Javanese classical dance appears rather abstract, but the movement patterns are all designed to contribute to the portrayal of characters.
     West Java did not have kraton (palaces) like its Central Javanese counterpart. In West Java, the closest equivalent to the Central Javanese kraton were the kabupaten (provincial government seats), which had neither the resources nor the influence to maintain, develop, and preserve dance traditions such as those of the Central Javanese kraton. Dance was performed in the kabupaten and patronized by the bupati (governors), but limited resources necessitated bringing artists in from the surrounding community to perform in the kabupaten. As a result, music and dance traditions were developed within artistic families rather than in the courts.
     Sundanese classical dance, while based on Javanese forms, has its own unique style and repertoire. One of the most important features of Sundanese dance is its close connection to the drumming, which is loud, dynamic and exciting. All Sundanese dance genres share certain traits including the prominent drumming, manner of stepping, and graceful arm gestures. In dance music, the drummer accompanies the movements of the dance by playing corresponding sound patterns for each movement.
     One of the most widely known and important modern dance forms in Indonesia is called jaipongan. Created in the 1970s in the urban capital of Bandung, West Java, jaipongan took the dance world by storm.  It was based on folk dance movements and music from the rural areas around Bandung, but it had a different aesthetic than the traditional forms. Characteristics of jaipongan include set choreographies, dramatic poses, bright costumes, jagged melodic lines, and elaborate musical arrangements.  Most of the dances were created for women, and they highlight the beauty of the female body, as interpreted by male choreographers.
     The emergence of jaipongan coincided with the tremendous influx of Western cultural and entertainment forms during the 1970s.  In order to compete with these forms, composers incorporated Western movements and sounds. Propelled by the cassette industry, which disseminated the music for accompanying the dances, jaipongan caused quite a stir when musical recordings for the dances began circulating widely in the early 1980s. Some thought jaipongan was too Western because some of the dance movements were akin to modern dance a la Martha Graham as well as the then-popular genre of disco. Others thought the dance was too eroticized because of the hip and chest movements, as well as the revealing costumes (by Indonesian standards). Some called for the dances to be banned from live performance and television. However, people began to appreciate the beauty of the dance, and they prevailed over more conservative voices. Its popularity continued to grow in the 1990s. Today, jaipongan is considered one of the "classical" dances of Indonesia.
 
Program
 
A. Gamelan Degung and Calung
 
1. Jipang Prawa
2. Galatik Mangut
3. Kinteul Bueuk
4. Reumbeuy Bandung
5. Kalangkang
6. Lalajo Wayang
7. Calung
  
Intermission
 
B. Gamelan Salendro and Dance
 
1. Lagu Perang
2. Badaya (classical dance)
3. Jalaprang
4. Gudril
5. Paparikan
6. Peperenian
7. Jaipongan (modern dance).
 
Featured Artists
 
Undang Sumarna comes from a lineage of famous drummers and musicians. His grandfather and main teacher, Abah Kayat, helped to develop and crystallize a style of dance drumming during the 1950s that incorporated influences from the music of Central Java, Bali, Cirebon, and various Sundanese regional styles. Undang began studying drumming as a child and quickly developed into one of the most sought-after dance drummers in Bandung, West Java. He has taught gamelan at KOKAR (High School for Indonesian Performing Arts) and ASTI (College of Indonesian Arts) as well as UC Berkeley and UCLA. Undang Sumarna currently teaches at UC Santa Cruz, a position he has held since 1974.
 
Ening Rumbini (b. 1969) comes from a family of artists trained in the traditional performing arts of music, dance, and puppetry. Her father was a popular dalang (puppeteer) of the 1940s-1970s. She began studying Sundanese classical dance at age ten. The following year, she began learning the wildly popular jaipongan dance. Her teacher was Gugum Gumbira, the founder and main choreographer of the Jugala dance company. As a member of Jugala, she participated in local (West Java) and national (Jakarta) performances during the boom years of jaipongan (1980s and 1990s). In 1987 she entered the national music conservatory in Bandung. As a member of Jugala, she has performed on concert tours to Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand. Currently, she teaches dance in Bandung.
 
The University of Pittsburgh Gamelan Musicians
The Pitt University Gamelan is made up of Pitt students. The class meets on Mondays and Wednesdays from 4 to 520pm. Enrollment is currently open for the fall semester, 2011.
Dylan Crossen
Donald Lewis Custer III
Alison Decker
Kim Frost
Dorietta W. Fuller 
Jeremy C. Garcia 
Meggie C.  Piotrowski
Meng Ren
Darve A. Robinson
 
Please visit our websites:
 http://www.pitt.edu/~musicdpt/performance/gamelan.html
http://www.ucis.pitt.edu/gamelan
 
Acknowledgments
University of Pittsburgh Department of Music, Asian Studies Center, Pitt Arts, Dorothy Shallenberger, Phil Thompson.

<back