The Fifth International Symposium on Traditional Polyphony ...

POLYPHONIC ASPECTS OF BALINESE GAMELAN MUSIC
63
MICHAEL TENZER (CANADA)
<strong>The</strong> most well-known Balinese gamelan music has a multi-part texture in which simultaneous variants of
a melodic structure are superposed. In traditional court repertoire dating from the 16 th to early 20 th centuries
– a period during which many musical practices were codified – melodies are arranged in strictly stratified
layers. Though embellishments are possible in some layers, most layers comprise melodies with isochronous
durations. Durations among the layers are related by duple density proportions such as 1:2 and 1:4. Faster
layers replicate the pitches of the next-slowest layer at their original positions while intercalating new tones
between them. Layers thus normally coincide at the unison or octave. In this study such points are labeled
convergence (C). Other simultaneous intervals are labeled divergence (D).
This procedure is systematic; the musicians memorize their parts and perform them the same way each
time. <strong>The</strong> music has some qualities of heterophony because the parts are all closely related variants of one
another, and because of the preponderance of simultaneous unisons and octaves. But in its systematicity and
in the clear rhythmic distinctions among the parts it possesses special polyphonic features. <strong>The</strong>se features have
numerous facets within the traditional repertoire; moreover, they have developed during the late 20 th century
such that polyphonic aspects of recent music are significantly different.
Each of the three parts represented in the transcriptions below has its own Balinese name, which gives
an important indication of how it is understood. <strong>The</strong> slowest is the pokok, which means trunk or basic tones.
Balinese would identify the pokok as the equivalent of what in English we call a main or structural melody.
At twice the rate of the pokok is the neliti, meaning “the one that is correct”. This is what Balinese would be
most likely to sing if asked to reproduce the “main” melody of a piece. At four times the rate of the neliti
is the payasan (elaboration) layer. <strong>The</strong>re are many kinds of payasan; the type illustrated is called Kotekan,
interlocking parts. Kotekan are divided into two separate parts played by a pair of musicians, and notated here
with stems facing opposite directions. <strong>The</strong>y dominate the texture, are difficult to perform, and demonstrate
mastery. Taken together, the three layers pokok, neliti, and Kotekan are in a 1:2:8 density relationship. One
may think of the slowest layer as a ground or support for the others, or take the slower layers as abstractions
of the faster ones. Since each layer has a different, but equally significant role to play, it is not possible to rank
them in significance. Rather, the layers work together inseparably (And indeed culturally speaking they have a
monophonic quality too, because they are thought of as an indivisible whole).
<strong>The</strong> genre of Balinese music to which I will (mainly) refer in this paper is the popular gamelan gong
kebyar. <strong>The</strong> initial examples illustrate the traditional principles as described above. Subsequent examples
illustrate techniques in a contrasting traditional repertoire, the gamelan gender wayang, and final examples
consider recent composers’ innovations in gamelan gong kebyar and a new kind of gamelan introduced in
the 1980s, the semaradana.
Balinese gamelan ise tuned in many different ways. In all but example 3a, 4 and 5a, the five-tone pélog
scale used is given as C#-D-E-G#-A in rough correspondence to one characteristic tuning, but for consistency
I have not modified this in the examples where the gamelan actually sounds higher or lower. <strong>The</strong> staff lines B
and F are not used, so moves from A to C# and E to G# are conjunct. In example 4a the anhemitonic pentatonic
slendro scale is notated F-G-Bb-C-Eb; the staff lines A and D are not used.
Example 1 shows the most conventional kind of intercalation in music for the dance Gabor. <strong>The</strong> melody