Dances Invite the God part 5

WAYANG KULIT

             On an island where cinema screens and TVs haven't yet percolated through to the smallest villages, a wayang kulit performance, or shadow puppet drama, still draws in huge crowds and keeps them entertained well into early hours of the morning. The stories and techniques are familiar to all, but the sheer panache, eloquence and wit of a good dalang ( Puppet master ) means the show is as likely to break news, spread gossip and pass on vital information as it is to entertain.

            A typical wayang kulit show takes place after sundown on the occasion of creamation, or a temple odalan, stage either in the outer courtyard of the village temple, or in the bale banjar meeting area. The dalang (nearly always a man) sets up a white cloth screen, lights faming rags dipped in paraffin for his illumination and assembles his collection of puppets (Wayang). It's not unusual for a dalang to own 150 different wayang, each of them fashioned from flat lengths of buffalo hide, carved and perforated to create a lacy effect before being painted and mounted on a stick. As in many other Balinese dramas, Wayang characters can be divided into those belonging to the refined and noble camp (royal personages, holy men and women, heroes and heroines) and those that are coarse and vulgar (clowns and servants). The refined characters speak in the ancient courtly language of kawi, while the coarse characters use Balinese. One character may be represented by a number of different puppets, each one showing him or her in a particular mood or stance.

             The Dalang mobilizes all the puppets behind the screen, speaking for each of them and moving each one in character as well. Well-educated and humorous, with a quite astonishing memory for lines, not to mention an impressive range of different voices, the Dalang also rehearses and conducts the special four-piece orchestra that accompanies his performances, the gender wayang. Not surprisingly, dalang are greatly revered by other villagers, who see them as being invested with great spiritual power.

              From the complete wayang cast, the dalang selects between thirty and sixty puppets for any one show. The torch - lit screen represents the world: The puppets are the humans that inhabit it, the torch stands in for the sun, and the dalang acts as god. Puppets which represent good characters always appear to the right of the dalang, and those who are evil appear on his left. A leaf-shaped fan - like puppet, symbolizing the tree of life, marks center stage and is used to indicate the ends of a scene as well as to represent clouds, spirits and magical forces. The most popular wayang kulit stories are taken from the Mahabarata.

BALINESE CALENDAR OF EVENTS

BALINESE CALENDAR OF EVENTS

There are two traditional calendars in Bali in addition to the Western or Gregorian calendar. The Hindu saka calendar operates on years from 354 - 356 days, is divided into twelve months and is eighty years behind the Gregorian year, so 2011 is 1932 in the saka calendar.

Also in use is Wuku, pawukon or uku calendar based on a 210 day lunar cycle ; these cycles are unnumbered. The wuku calendar is magnificently complex, as the 210 days are divided into weeks that are ten days long, nine days long, eight days long and so on down to weeks that are one day long. All of these weeks run concurrently and have specific names: for example the four-day week is called catur Wara, the five-day week Panca Wara and each day of each week has a specific name. This means that every day has a name from each of the weeks, giving ten names. To ad to the complexity, each of the thirty seven day weeks has its own name. You may come across the names of the days of the three-day week, pasah, beteng and kajen. They are often used for traditional markets which operate on a three day cycle. You can buy tika calendars to keep track of all of this, but the different systems won't affect most visitors - they are used chiefly to determine festival dates and other auspicious days.

The wuku Calender determines some Balinese Holidays such as Galungan Day. Galungan is an annual event in the wuku calender which means it takes place every 210 days. This year we celebrate on 15 July 2015. This ten -day festival celebrates the victory of good over evil and all the ancestral gods are thought to come down to earth to take part. Elaborate preparations take place: penjor - bamboo poles hung with offerings -arch over the road, offerings are prepared and animals slaughtered for the offerings. Galungan day itself is spent with family, praying and making offerings. The following day, Manis Galungan is the day for visiting friends. The final and the most important day is Kuningan, when families once again get together, pray and make offerings as the souls of the ancestors return to heaven. "Happy Galungan Day": Hope we are more peace (peace at our heart, body, and earth) Om santih, santih, santih, Om

The Greatest Balineses Epic

THE RAMAYANA

Written in Sanskrit around the fourth century BC, the 24,000 verses that comprise the Ramayana have since fired the imagination of writers, artists, dramatists, theologians and sculptors right across  Southeast Asia. Like the other great Hindu epic, The Mahabarata, The Ramayana has been translated into the classical Javanese Kawi Language and transcribed on to sacred lontar texts.

           It's essentially a morality tale, a dramatization of the eternal conflict between the forces of good (dharma) and the forces of evil (adharma). The forces of good are represented by Rama and his friends. Rama is the hero of the piece, a refined and dutiful young man, handsome, strong and courageous, who also happens to be an avatar of the god Wisnu. Rama's wife Sita epitomizes the Hindu ideals of womanhood - virtue, fidelity and love - while Rama's brother Laksamana is a symbol of fraternal loyalty and youthful courage. The other important member of the Rama camp is Hanuman, the general of the monkey army, a wily and athletic ape who is unfailingly loyal to his allies. On the opposing side, the forces of evil are mainly represented by the demon king Rawana, a lustful and devious leader whose retainers are giants and devils.

         The story begins with Rama, the eldest son of the king, being banished to the forests for thirteen years, having been cheated out of his rightful claim to the throne by a scheming stepmother. Sita and Laksamana accompany him, and together the trio have various encounters with sages, giants and seductresses.

           The most crucial event in the epic tough is the abduction of Sita by Rawana, a crime  that inspires the generally easy - going and rather unwarlike Rama to wage battle against his avowed enemy. A favourite subject for dances and carvings, the episode starts with Sita catching sight of a beautiful golden deer and imploring her husband Rama to catch it and bring it back for her. The golden deer turns out to be a decoy planted by Rawana, and the demon king duly swoops down to abduct Sita as soon as Rama and Laksamana go off to chase the animal.

           The distraught Rama determines to get Sita back and, together with Laksamana, he sets off the direction of Rawana's Kingdom. En route he meets Hanuman, the monkey General, who agrees to help him by sneaking in to Sita's room at Rawana's palace and giving her Rama's ring (another popular theme of pictures and dramas). Eventually, Rama, Laksamana, Hanuman and his monkey army all arrive at Rawana's palace and, following a big battle, Sita is rescued and Rawana done away with.

THE MAHABARATA

Like its companion piece the Ramayana, The Mahabarata is an epic moral narrative of Hindu ethic which came originally from India in the eleventh century. Written during the fourth century AD by Indian poet Vyasa, the original poem is phenomenally long, with over 100,000 verses in all. The Balinese version is translated into the ancient poetic and written on sacred lontar books kept in the Gedong Kirtya Library at Singaraja.

           At the heart of the story is conflict between two rival branches of the same family, the Pandawas and Korawas, all of them descendants of various unions between the deities and mortals. The five Pandawa brothers represent the side of virtue, morality and noble purpose, though they each have idiosyncrasies that are not entirely snowy white. The eldest is Yudhistira, a calm and thoughtful leader with a passion for justice, whose one vice - an insatiable love of gambling - nonetheless manages to land the brothers in a fair amount of trouble. Then comes Bima, a strong, courageous and hot - headed fighter, whose fiery temper and earthy manner make him especially appealing to the Balinese. The third Brother Arjuna, the real hero; not only is he a brave warrior and an expert archer, but he also handsome, high - minded, and a great lover. Arjuna's two younger brothers, the expert horseman Nakula and Sahadeva, are twins. Their rivals are their cousins the Korawas, who number one hundred in all, and are led by the eldest male Duryodhana, a symbol of jealousy, deviousness and ignoble behavior.

            An early episode in the Mahabarata tells how the pandawa boys are forced by the korawa to give up their rightful claim to the kingdom's throne, and are banished unceremoniously to mountains for minimum of thirteen years. The pandawa brothers grow up determined to regain their rightful heritage. Meanwhile, both families engage in all sorts of minor adventures, the best of which recur in carvings, wayang kulit dramas and dances. A particular favourite exploit is known as Bhima Swarga, in which the second Pandawa brother, Bhima is dispatched to hell to rescue the souls of his dead father and stepmother. While there, he witnesses all sorts of horrible tortures and funishments - many of which are graphically depicted on the ceilings of Klungkung's Kertagosa. When Bhima returns to earth with the souls of his relatives, he's immediately sent off again, this time to heaven, in search of the holy water needed to smooth his dead parent’s passage into heaven. This episode is known as Bhima Suci and features the nine directional gods, as well as a dramatic battle between Bhima and his own godly (as opposed to earthly) Father, Bayu.

        Finally, a full-scale battle is declared between the two sets of cousins. On the eve of the battle, Arjuna suddenly becomes doubtful about the morality of fighting his own family, and confides as much to his friend and charioteer Khrisna. Khrisna, who is actually an avatar of the Hindu god Wisnu, then launches into a long theological lecture, in which he explains to Arjuna that the action is the all-important factor, not the result, and that because Arjuna is of the warrior caste, his duty is to fight, to act in a manner that's appropriate to his destiny. This episode of the Mahabarata is known as the Bhagavad Gita, and encapsulates the core Hindu philosophy of caste, and the notions of karma and destiny. Duly persuaded, Arjuna joins his brothers in battle, and at the end of eighteen bloody days the Pandawa brothers are victorious.

Dances Invite the God part 4

Tari Sanghyang ( Trance Dances )

           The state of trance lies at the very heart of traditional Balinese dance. In order to maintain the health of the village, the god is periodically invited down in the temple arena to help in the exorcism of evil and sickness-inducing spirits. When the deities descend, they reveal themselves by possessing certain people and using them as their medium. Sometimes the deities communicate in verbal form, which may or may not have to be interpreted by the priests, and sometimes the whole physical being is taken over and the devotee is moved to dance or to perform astonishing physical feats. The chosen medium is put into a trance state through a combination of special priestly chants and protective mantras, intoned exhortations by the Capella choir, and great clouds of pungent incense wafted heavenwards to attract the god attention. Trance dances are traditionally only performed when the village is suffering from particularly bad about sickness or bad weather - the versions that are reproduced at tourist shows have none of the dynamism of the real thing. Though it is said that performers do sometimes slip into trance even then.

          One of the most common trance dances is the Sangyang Dedari ( angel Deity ), which is widely believed to have been the inspiration for the popular courtly dance the legong. In the Sanghyang dedari, the deities possess two young girls who perform a complicated duet with their eyes closed and, in part, while seated on the shoulders of two male villagers. Although they have never learn the actual step, the duo almost in variably performs its movements in tandem  and sometimes continues for up to fours hours. when they finally drop to the floor exhaustion, the priest wakes them gently by sprinkling holy water over them. In the Sanghyang Dedari performed at tourist shows, however, the girls have almost certainly rehearsed the dance beforehand and probably  do not enter a trance state at all. They wear the same tightly bound green and gold sarongs as the legong dancers, and dance to the haunting backing vocals of an a Capella chorus of men and women.

         In the Sanghyang Jaran ( Horse Deity ) one or more men are put into a trance state while the temple floor is lettered with burning coconut husks. as they enter the trance, the men grab hold of wooden hobbyhorse sticks and then gallop frantically back and forth across the red hot embers as if they were on real horses. The all male kecak chorus fuels the drama with excited a Cappela crescendos untill, finally, the exhausted hobbyhorse riders are awoken by the priest.

TOPENG : MASK DANCES

          In the topeng or mask dance the performer is possessed by the spirit of the mask. Balinese masks are extremely sacred object, carved and painted with great reverence to the gods and spirits. Before every entrance, the topeng actor sprinkles holy water on his mask and recites a mantra. Women never participate in topeng. Female roles are played by men, and most actors play several characters in each drama.

          The storyline of most topeng dramas are much more important than in most other Balinese Dance-Dramas. They usually center around popular folk tales or well known episodes from history, and every character wears a mask which makes him or her immediately recognizable. Refined and noble characters always wear full masks, usually painted white with almond-shaped eyes, and thick black eyebrows for the men. They communicate with elegant gestures of the hands, arms and head ( speaking is impossible because of the mask ), and move with rather grand, often swaggering bravado. A royal servant always acts as a narrator figure, speaking on behalf of the voiceless nobles, and he, like the coarser characters, the clowns and the servants, wears a half mask and baggy shapeless clothing in which to roll about the floor and engage in comic antics.

           One of the most popular mask dances is the topeng tua, a solo performance by the character of an old man, a retired first minister, who recalls his time in the king's service. The mask is always shrouded in straggly white hair and beard, and the actor hobbles about with shaky legs and wavering fingers. Another classic tourist topeng is the frog dance - performed to the gloriously evocative music of the Balinese Jew's sharp or Genggong - which tells how frog turns into a prince. The Jauk is a masked dance of a slightly different nature, in which the solo dancer portrays a terrifying demon - king. His red and white mask has huge bulging eyes, horribly goofy smile and a thick black mustache, and his hands are crowned with foot - long fingernails which flashes menacingly throughout the dance. To the clashing strains of the full-blown gamelan who take leaps mischievously about the stage as if darting from behind trees and pouncing on unsuspecting villagers.



Keyword :
Sanghyang Jaran Dance, Sanghyang Dedari Dance, Balinese trance Dance, Spectacular Balinese performance, Topeng Dance, Balinese Frog Dance, Topeng Tua, a solo mask performance, Genggong Music, Jauk Dance

Dances Invite the God part 3

           A great wave of artistic experimentation hit Bali in the 1920s, particularly in north Bali, where a group of young musicians started playing around with the traditional gamelan form. They came up with a vibrant and much brasher type of music, which they named Kebyar. The new sounds  soon struck chords with musicians in the south as well, and by 1925 had also inspired the talented young dancer, Mario, to choreograph a new piece. He performed this dance while seated on the ground and so called it Kebyar duduk ( seated kebyar ). It's a stunningly camp piece of theater, starring just one man, who alternately flirts with the gamelan, plays the kettle gongs ( Trompong ) that are placed in front of him, and flutters his fan in beguiling self-dramatization. Some year later, slightly different version of this dance was invented, the kebyar trompong,  in which the dancer sits and plays the trompong for only part of the performance, in between mincing coquettishly about the stage and making eyes at the audience.

KECAK DANCE

          Sometimes called the monkey dance after the animals represented by chorus, the kecak gets its Balinese name from the hypnotic chattering sounds made by the Capella choir. Chanting nothing more than " cak cak cak ", the chorus of fifty or more men use seven different rhythms to create the astonishing music that accompanies the drama. Bare-chested, and wearing lengths of black and white check kain poleng cloth around their waists and a single red hibiscus behind the ear, the men sit cross-legged in five or six tight concentric circles, occasionally swaying or waving arms and clapping hands in unison. The narrative itself is taken from a core episode of Ramayana, centering around the kidnap of Sita by the demon king Rawana, and is acted out in the middle of the chorus circle, with one or two narrators speaking for all the characters. 

Unlike nearly all other Balinese dances, the kecak has no ritualistic purpose and was in fact invented by a foreigner in the 1930s. When the German artist and musician Walter Spies was commissioned by a film director to put together a Balinese spectacle for the movie, The Island of Demons, he and his collaborator, Katharane Mershon, came up with the Kecak, drawing inspiration from the Sanghyang trance dances, in which the chorus chants the " Cak ....Cak...Cak " syncopation as part of the trance - including ritual.

LEGONG 

Undoubtedly the most refined of all the temple dances, the quintessentially Balinese Legong is rather an acquired taste, which can seem tiresome to the uninitiated because of its restrained movement and lack of dramatic narrative. Its beauty is all in the intricate weaving of arms, fingers, torsos and head. The legong is always performed by three pre-pubescent girls who are bound tightly in sarongs and chest cloths of opulent green or pink, with gilded crowns filled with frangifani blossoms on their heads. When village elders and former dancers are selecting aspiring legong dancers, They look not only for agility and vitality, but also for grace and poise, as the spirit of the legong is considered the acme of Balinese femininity. As a result, Legong dancers have always enjoyed a special status in their village, a reputation that endures long after they retire at the the onset of menstruation. In the past, many a legong dancer has ended up as a raja's wife or latterly, as an expatriate artist's muse and subsequent partner. 

The dance itself has evolved from a highly sacred sanghyang trance dance and take several different forms.By far the most common is the legong keraton ( dance of the court ), based on a classical twelfth-century tale from Java. It told the story of King Laksem, who is holding a princess, Rangkesari, captive against her will. Rescue is on the way in the form of Prince Daha, who plans to wage battle against King Laksem. The princess tries to dissuade the king from going to war, encouraging him to set her free instead of risking lives, but the king is adamant and setts off. As he leaves, he is attacked by a raven, an extremely bad omen, after which he duly loses the battle and is killed.

The performance begins with a solo dance by a court lady, known as the condong ( dressed in pink and gold ). She picks up two fans from the ground in anticipation of arrival of the two legong ( literally "dancer" ). Dressed identically in bright green and gold, the two legong enact the story, adopting and swapping characters with no obvious warning. The condong always returns as the raven, with pink wings attached to her costume. The final fatal battle is never shown on stage.

TAG
Taditional Gamelan, Kebyar duduk, Mario, Kebyar Trompong, Kecak DanceMongkey Dance, cak cak cak, Kain Poleng, Ramayana Dance, Balinese Dance, Sanghyang Dance,Balinese Legong,Legong Keraton

Dances Invite the God part 2

           Featuring the most spectacular costumes of all the Balinese dances, The Barong-Rangda Dramas are also among the most sacred and most important. Essentially a dramatization of the eternal conflict between the forces of good and evil, the dramas can take a variety of forms but nearly always serve as ritualized exorcisms.

The Mythical widow-witch character of Rangda represents the forces of evil, and her costume and mask present a duly frightening spectacle. The Barong Ket cuts a much more love-able figure, a shaggy - haired creature with a bug-eyed expression and mischievous grin on his masked face, something like a cross between pantomime horse and Chinese dragon. The Barong Ket ( lion ) is by far the most common persona adopted by this mythical creature, but you might also see Barong Macan ( tiger ), Barong Bangkal (Wild Boar ) and Barong Celeng ( pig ). All Rangda  and Barong masks are invested with great sacred power and need to be treated with due respect and awe. When not in use, the masks are kept wrapped in magic cloth and stored in the temple.

          Barong - Rangda dramas can be self-contained as in the Calonarang or they can apper as just one symbolic episode in the middle of a well - known story like the Mahabarata. Whatever the occasion, the format tends to be fairly similar. Rangda is always called upon by a character who determines to cause harm to a person, a family or a village ( unrequited love is a very common cause ). She generally sends a minion to wage the first battles, and is then forced to appear herself when the opposition calls in the Barong, the defender of the good. In this final confrontation, the Barong enters first, occasionally joined by a monkey who teases him and plays tricks. Suddenly Rangda appears, fingernails first, from behind the central gateway. Flashing her white magic cloth, she harasses the Barong, stalking him at every turn. When the Barong looks to be on his last legs, a group of village men rush in to his rescue, but are entranced by Rangda's Magic and stab themselves instead of her. A priest quickly enters before any real injury is inflicted. The series of confrontations continues, and  the drama ends in stalemate: the forces of good and evil remain as strong and vital as ever, ready to clash again in the next bout.

The Story of Calonarang is basically an embellished version of Barong - Rangda conflict, grafted on to an ancient legend about the daughter of a witch queen whom no one will marry because they're scared of her mother. The witch queen Calonarang is a manifestation of Rangda who, furious at the lack of suitors for her daughter, demands that her followers wreak destruction in all of the villages. This drama is acted out on a regular basis, whenever there are considered to be evil forces and impurities affecting the community, and sometimes the whole neighborhood take part, the men parading with hand-held kulkul drums and the women filing in to make offerings at the temple shrines.

          There's also an unusual human version of Barong, called Barong Landung ( Literally "tall Barong ) These are huge puppets, one male and one female, each one operated by a single performer. The male puppet looks forbidding, his masked face is black and he has a fanged mouth and grimacing features. As a representation of the legendary Jero Gede, a giant from Nusa Penida who brought disease and misfortune to Bali, this enormous figure is also meant to scare away any similar giants. Jero Gede is always accompanied by a far sweeter looking female puppet, known as Jero Luh, who wears a white mask with a smiling face and faintly Chinese eyes. Together they act out a bawdy comic opera which has exorcist purposes as well

DANCES INVITE THE GOD

Barong - Rangda Dances

           

         Most Balinese dance-dramas have evolved from sacred rituals, and are still performed at religious events, with full attention given to the offertory and devotional aspects. Before the show begins, a pemangku ( village priest ) will always bless the players and the performance area with sprinklings of holy water, and many performances open with a pendet or welcome dance intended for the gods. The exorcist Barong -  Rangda dramas continue to play a vital function in the spiritual practices of every village and the baris dance reenacts the traditional offering up of weapons by village warriors to the gods to invest them with supernatural power. Some of the more secular dance-dramas tell ancient and legendary stories, many of them adapted from the epic Hindu morality tales, the Ramayana and the Mahabarata, that came from India more than a thousand years ago. Others are based on historical events, embellishing the romances and battles that characterized the royal courts of Java and Bali between the tenth and the fourteenth centuries.
           With the advent of mass tourism however, it's becoming less and less easy to see a traditional performance staged in its natural environment, at a temple festival or village event for example, rather than as a commercial performance. Nonetheless, some of the tourist shows are very good, performed by expert local troupes with traditional finesse.
           There are few professional dancers in Bali; most performers spend their days working in the fields or in shops, donning costumers and make-up only at festival times or for the regular tourist shows. Almost every Balinese boy and girl is taught to dance - small boys learn the most adept are then chosen to perform at community function, as part of the established local troupe. Dancers learn by imitation and repetition, the instructor often holding the pupil against his or her body and manipulating limbs until the exact angles and tensions are reproduced to perfection. Personal expression has no place in the Balinese theater, but the skillful execution of traditional moves is always much admired and trained dancers enjoy a high status within the village.
           Female dancers keep their feet firmly planted on the ground their legs and hips encased in restrictive sarongs that give them a distinctive forward-angled posture. They express themselves through a vocabulary of controlled angular movement of the arms, the wrists, the fingers, the neck and, most beguilingly, the eyes. Each pose and gesture derives from a movement observed in the natural rather than the human world. Thus a certain type of flutter of the hand may be a bird in flight, a vigorous rotation of the forearms the shaking of water from an animal's coat. Dressed in pantaloons or hitched-up sarongs, the male dancers are much more energetic, and whirl about a lot, emphasizing their manliness by opening shoulders and limbs outwards, keeping their knees bent and their heads high.
         Most dramas are performed in superb natural settings, either within a temple compound, or in the outer courtyard of a noble family's palace. Because the stories are so familiar to the islanders, the costumes and masks give immediate clues to the identity of each character-and to the action which is to follow. Some dramas are performed in a combination of contemporary Bahasa Bali and the ancient poetic Language known as Kawi, while others stick to modern speech - perhaps with a few humorous English phrases thrown in for the tourists.
          Although most of the dances and nearly all the dances and nearly all the dance movements have long-established histories and traditions, Balinese dance is by no means a dead or stultified art form. In the last fifty years the repertoire has expanded quite considerably, not least because of the efforts of the island's most famous performer, the late I Ketut Mario, this superb dancer was also highly imaginative choreographer, adapting old forms to suit the modern mood, and most famously to fit the modern gamelan style, known as kebyar, in the 1920s. Thirty years later, he was commissioned by a British entrepreneur to create a new " boy-meets-girl" dance - The resukting piece was the oleg tambulilingan or bumblebee dance.

 Oleg Tambulilingan Dance

BARIS DANCE

Baris Tombak Dance

             The baris or warrior dance can be performed either as a solo or in a group of five or more, and either by a young woman, or more commonly a young man. Strutting on stage with knees and feet turned out, his centre of gravity kept low, the baris cuts an impressive figure in  a gilded brocade cloak of ribboned pennants which which fly out dramatically at every turn. In his performance, he enacts a young warrior's preparation for battle, goading himself into courageous mood, trying out his martial skills, showing pride at his calling and then expressing a whole series of emotions - ferocity, passion, tenderness, rage - much of it through the arresting movements of his eyes.

            Traditionally, the solo baris has always improvised a lot, leading the gamelan rather than following it. In its original sacred form, known as the baris gede, this was a devotional dance in which soldiers dedicated themselves and their weapons to the gods. ( To be continued.... ) 

(See all Museums & Collections Books)