KODÁLY, KINAESTHETICS AND KARAWITAN : towards a paedagogy of ...

KODÁLY, KINAESTHETICS AND KARAWITAN:
towards a paedagogy of Javanese gamelan in the West
or,
GAMELAN TEACHING:
an “uncommon approach”
by Nikhil Dally
© 2005 Nikhil Dally
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or
by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission
in writing from the author.
This paper is dedicated to all my gamelan students,
past and present,
who have taught me so much;
especially to the members of
Kridha Anggara
and the Hertfordshire Gamelan Ensembles.
December 2005
Nikhil Dally
22a South Avenue, Egham, Surrey TW20 8HG, U.K.
tel. +44-1784-453347
e-mail: nikhil@dally.org.uk

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© 2005 Nikhil Dally
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Abstract
Developing an effective paedagogical strategy for teaching Javanese gamelan to Westerners
requires that we take careful and sensitive account of the vast differences between the world-views
of Java and the West. The West has since the Renaissance tended to develop an attitude to the world
which is rational, linear, man-centred, individualistic and product-oriented; Java has tended to
remain more instinctive, indirect, spiritual, communal and process-oriented. Western obsession with
product over process has had a deleterious effect upon certain aspects of its musical and educational
cultures. A more spiritual and communal world-view can help to heal this, and can guide us in
forging a paedagogy for gamelan in the West which, whilst directly imitating neither the product-
obsessiveness of much Western music education nor the informal “osmosis”-based learning styles
of Java, helps our students to engage deeply in the processes of karawitan and be themselves
transformed by the experience. By using certain European concepts of music education (such as that
of Kodály) which parallel the implicitly vocal nature of karawitan, and by emphasising the
importance of kinaesthetic, aural, and emotional aspects of music, we can teach gamelan in such a
way as to transform our students’ attitudes not only to music and learning but also to the world they
live in.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the many people who have given me advice on the writing on this paper:
Philip Dale, Angela Dally, Chris & Ranu Dally, Laura McColm, Sarah de Nordwall, Brian Noyes,
Paskasari Permana, Tushaar Power, Alan Thomas, Christine Waite.
Note
Throughout this paper, the masculine personal pronoun doubles as the epicene. This is purely for
grammatical convenience.

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© 2005 Nikhil Dally
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Contents
Preface: Four “Bapaks”
I. Introduction
II. The cultural clash
III. Music
Music in the West
Music in Java
IV. Towards a sound music paedagogy
Product-oriented teaching
Product-oriented music teaching
Learning by “osmosis”
Process-oriented music teaching
Physical intelligence
Aural intelligence
Singing
Emotional intelligence
V. Teaching gamelan
Notation
The gong
The voice, structure, lancaran and srepeg
The voice, body rhythm and damping
The voice, Kodály, hand-signs and balungan
Multi-layered consciousness, Kodály, balungan and structure
More multi-layered consciousness and more hand-signs
Kethuk, anticipation and bonangan gembyangan
Lancaran, memorisation, making mistakes etc.
Ladrang and longer structures
Bonangan pipilan, elaborating patterns in general, getting lost and finding your way in
again, and irama changes
“Lagu”, the importance of gérongan, and céngkok
“Long-play”, and creating a musical learning community
VI. Objections and conclusions
Notes

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Preface: Four “Bapaks”
If we want to become better teachers of anything, we learn most from collecting the ideas and
methods of inspiring individual paedagogues. I would like to thank four people who have been great
inspirations to me, principally because of their willingness to speak fearlessly about what is
important to them in their teaching.
Alec Roth was the undisputed bapak (lit., “father”) of British gamelan education in the early
1990’s, and his example and discourse on the subject 1 inspired many of us who taught gamelan at
that time. The late Bapak Al. Sutiknowati (Pak Tikno) is one of the few Javanese I have ever met
who dared to be openly opinionated; his understanding of the challenges involved in British
gamelan paedagogy was deeply insightful. And Jody Diamond (a metaphorical bapak)
revolutionised my whole approach to the teaching of gamelan over the course of three days in
Jakarta in 1989. Finally, it is probably safe to assume that Bapak Zoltán Kodály never realised that
his concepts of music education might be applicable to Javanese gamelan; perhaps it is a sign of
true genius in a paedagogue if his ideas are so profoundly perceptive that they can be so broadly,
even universally, relevant.

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I. Introduction
The growth of interest in the West in Javanese gamelan over the past three or four decades is
remarkable. Particularly in the USA, the Netherlands and Great Britain, Javanese gamelan has
become one of the most visible and well-known non-native musical traditions.
One of the most notable aspects of the British love affair with Javanese gamelan is the manner in
which gamelan has been embraced as a context for music education, both for children and adults.
Schools, music services, education authorities and cultural centres up and down the country have
latched on with enthusiasm to the educational potential – or at least to the political correctness – of
gamelan. Gamelan teaching is a thriving niche market.
Ironically, though the proliferation of gamelan teaching around Britain is almost universally lauded,
very few searching questions are asked – and still fewer answered – about how exactly to do it. It is
my hope, in this paper, at least to begin a public conversation which may redress this balance.
There does seem to be a certain reluctance amongst us British gamelan teachers to discuss openly
how we teach; discussions on the subject often lead to a retreat to the well-trod position that
“everyone is different; there is no one way to teach gamelan.” This statement may be juridically
true, but it is not of great paedagogic utility. There are indeed many ways to teach gamelan, but it is
up to us teachers to discern which methods help students to learn in the most profound and effective
manner.
Another frequently stated view is: “It doesn’t matter how we teach gamelan; the only important
thing is that we teach gamelan.” This statement, which is presumably meant to reassure,
unfortunately prompts more questions than it answers: for instance, “What is gamelan?” Is it a set
of instruments? a style of music? a repertoire? a process? a way musicians relate to each other? a
feeling? And therefore, as Jody Diamond puts it, “What does it really mean to ‘teach gamelan?’” 2
This reluctance to discuss paedagogical detail is a shame, because it militates against the exchange
of potentially valuable ideas, such as routinely happens amongst American gamelan teachers via the
Dartmouth Gamelan Listserver. It is also misleading, because, as Maria Mendonça found whilst
researching for her PhD dissertation, 3 a British gamelan teacher interviewed on his own,
unhampered by the presence of others, can be as opinionated as anyone, even an American…
*
A trawl through the archives of the Gamelan Listserver, as well as through comments collected by
Maria, suggests an awareness of two main poles of paedagogical theory: on the one hand the so-
called “traditional Javanese” way, involving an emphasis on aural skills, rote learning,
memorisation, imitation, trial and error, and the gradual assimilation of concepts through practise;
and on the other, a so-called “Western” way, using more notation, less memorisation, and a greater
emphasis on clarity of explanation and “getting it right”.
Here are some comments from the “aural/memorisation/‘traditional’” side of the argument:
“Reading really does inhibit listening.” 4
“The most enjoyable way I’ve found to learn... was by ear... It seems to be more deeply rooted than
other ways.” 5
“Having a piece internalised... is an entirely different experience, and to me a more sublime one.” 6

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“Sometimes the most efficient... method is not the preferred one.” 7
“Getting lost is an important process that I like to happen in my classes.” 8
countered by some views from the “notation/explanation/clarity” side:
“Some people can pass a lot of time in repeated contact but only remain bewildered.” 9
“Notation may be a necessary component for us in learning to play musics that are traditionally not
played with notation.” 10
Though this divide clearly has some validity, I suggest that the situation is far more complex than
these quotations on their own imply. When transposing an art from one culture to another,
appealing merely either to the “authentic practice” of the culture of origin or to the “normal
practice” of the destination culture is of limited use. We need to forge a paedagogy which combines
the best of, but also goes beyond, both “Javanese” and “Western” ways of teaching. This is not a
way of restating the paedagogical impasse that “everyone is different; there is no one way to teach
gamelan.” On the contrary, it is a way of moving beyond that, with care.
*
When Western students meet gamelan for the first time, both the learner and the thing learnt bring
with them certain deeply-rooted, often subconscious, cultural presumptions. We need therefore to
start by seeking a deeper understanding of the cultural implications of Javanese gamelan, and their
contrast with the cultural implications of our own and our students’ upbringing. This will help us to
do two things, which are necessary preliminaries to formulating a teaching strategy for gamelan in
the West:
First, examining the deep underlying cultural presumptions behind different ways of learning and
teaching will help us to discuss intelligently their advantages and disadvantages.
Second, it will help us to answer the question: “Why teach gamelan to Westerners?” This question,
if left unaddressed, sabotages all further discussion. Javanese musicians have a natural cultural
affinity with karawitan and are therefore are not normally faced with the question of why it is
gamelan, rather than any other kind of music, that they have chosen to teach. But we British
gamelan teachers all have different ideas about why we have chosen to teach this kind of music, and
unless we deal with this question, any attempt we make to discuss British gamelan paedagogy will
inevitably founder.
If we can achieve some understanding of the profundity of the cultural clash inherent in the process
of teaching a British person a Javanese art, then we will begin to see the potentially revolutionary
benefits which learning gamelan can bring to people in this country – benefits which are, at their
best, profound and life-changing. We will then no longer say that “the only important thing is that
we teach gamelan,” for we will see that gamelan itself, both for the Javanese and potentially for us,
is but part of a far greater process of personal growth, communal development and spiritual
enlightenment. We will know then that how we teach gamelan is crucial in determining the extent to
which we can help our students access those ideals.

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© 2005 Nikhil Dally
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II. The cultural clash
Marsudiya kawruh jroning gendhing,
taberiya ngrasakké irama,
pangolahé lan garapé,
ngrasakna wosing lagu
witing pathet saka ing ngendi,
ing kono golekana,
surasaning lagu
rarasen nganti kajiwa,
karya padhang narawang nora mblerengi,
tatas nembus Bawana.
Strive to understand the wisdom contained in gendhing,
be diligent in feeling its irama,
its development and treatment;
feel the essence of lagu,
know where lies the origin of pathet,
seek there
the meaning of lagu,
feel it until your soul
is made clear, bright, and your view unclouded -
a clarity that penetrates the universe.
This acrostic poem by the great twentieth-century Javanese musician R. L. Martopangrawit forms
the final section of his Catatan-Catatan Pengetahuan Karawitan (Notes on Knowledge of
Karawitan). 11 The rest of the book consists of a detailed examination of various aspects of
karawitan, in a style which partly resembles Western models of academic music analysis. It is
instructive and enlightening for us, therefore, that his final word consists, not of a page of analysis,
but a very Javanese poem imputing to karawitan a distinctly spiritual power. It is an apt reminder to
us that the way the Javanese think about music, indeed the world, may be very different from ours.
Discussing the cultural clash between “East” and “West” is a notoriously difficult issue. Almost by
definition, anything anyone can say on the matter can be construed as racist, bigoted, patronising,
triumphalist, generalised, or failing which, “politically correct”. Because of my own mixed cultural
background I am well aware of the difficulties inherent in discussing cross-cultural matters, but also
of the absolute necessity of doing so if we are to understand anything as knotty as cross-cultural
paedagogy.
Read any author who discusses cross-culturalism (for example Buruma & Margalit, 12 and Edward
Said), 13 and one comes across a plethora of adjectives used to characterise the difference between
“East” and “West”. Just as in the discussion about gamelan paedagogies above, they tend to group
themselves into two mindsets which seem to refer to a sort of cultural opposition:
traditional
vs.
modern 14
spiritual
materialist 15
communal
individualist 16
internal
external 17
profound
rootless 18
organic
mechanical 19
holistic
specialised 20
mystical
empirical 21
wise
clever 22
intuitive
rational 23

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© 2005 Nikhil Dally
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non-discursive
discursive 24
childlike
mature 25
quest-oriented
goal-oriented 26
Though this oppositional conceptual framework clearly has only limited objective validity, it exists
in the minds of many on both sides of the divide. As Buruma and Margalit point out, “this is not
about policies, but about an idea.” 27 This framework describes trends in human thought which, real
or imagined, conscious or subconscious, have had a profound effect, both in the Occident and the
Orient, upon attitudes both to music and to education.
I will discuss these specific areas in greater detail below, as they are crucial to our discussion of the
paedagogy of gamelan. But we must not underestimate the extent to which attitudes to music and
education in both “East” and “West” represent and are shaped by more general cultural contrasts. If
we spend all our time immersed in the values of British society we can sometimes forget just how
profoundly different are the attitudes embedded in and implied by Javanese gamelan. If we are to
have any hope of effectively domesticating British people to Javanese gamelan, or vice versa, we
must become aware of the far-reaching differences between the general world-views of Java and
“the West”, even if we can only describe these differences inexactly.
Therefore, before discussing the choices which face us in choosing models of music education, I
first submit my interpretation of the “Java vs. the West” cultural clash. It is of course generalised
and incomplete, and admits many exceptions. I am discussing societal trends here, not making
blanket accusations about the individuals who make up these societies. But I hope it will help to
clarify the answer to the question, “Why teach Javanese gamelan to Westerners?” Therefore it is my
first step in formulating a paedagogy of gamelan.
*
Martopangrawit concludes his analysis of karawitan by emphasising the central importance of
spirituality, of the artist’s relation to the immanent. Clifford Geertz, in his book The Religion of
Java, points out that “playing (or listening to) a gamelan is a spiritual discipline, not just a mere
amusement.” 28 For the Javanese, karawitan and God are inextricably linked. We in modern Britain
may well find this an awkward fact to deal with, but we must face up to it if we are to have any
proper understanding of gamelan. Further, if we are to gain any insight into our own interface with
gamelan, we must, whatever our feelings about religion, face up to and understand the nature of our
own spiritual outlook, and the attitudes to spirituality with which secular Western society may have
inculcated us.
It will be clear to anyone who has spent any time in Java that for the Javanese, spirituality is a sine
qua non, an absolutely fundamental pre-requisite to understanding the world we live in. The
Javanese world-view also holds that devotion to community is at least as important as
individualism. Personal ambition is best left subservient to the communal good. Individualism, and
single-minded devotion to achievement and progress, are often held in distrust.
We can learn much about life, therefore, not by taking it apart and analysing it, but by living it and
experiencing it in time-honoured ways. Subjectivity, contemplation, stillness, instinct, ritual: all
these can be our teachers. We can achieve wisdom by navigating life in measured, graceful and
curved pathways, not in goal-oriented straight lines. Wisdom comes from living the life we are
given and seeking that which is ineffable and transcendent, that which has its roots beyond the
visible world, but which manifests itself in the interior essence of a thing rather than in its outward
appearance. This attitude is expressed with great power (albeit not in a Javanese context) in Vicki
Baum’s A Tale From Bali:

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© 2005 Nikhil Dally
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Pak knelt and put his clasped hands to his forehead... He did not give thanks for anything and he did
not pray for anything; he only felt that there was meaning in everything and that things happened as
the gods ordained... His children were dead and his father had been killed; but his heart was filled
with a contentment the white man does not know. 29
*
How different this attitude is from the one taught us by modern Western society. But perhaps it was
not always like this. As Christopher Small points out,
Europe in the centuries before the Renaissance was an oral, mainly non-literate communal culture,
not so very different in style from the rest of the world. It was around the middle of the fifteenth
century that our culture began to reveal those new attitudes and concepts, ways of feeling, seeing and
hearing, that were to cut Europe off from the rest of mankind and make her culture, including her
music, unique. 30
In the past five hundred years or so, Europe and her cultural offspring have changed massively in
comparison with the rest of the world. Just as a major part of the Javanese world-view is intimately
connected with its spirituality, so too have Western attitudes to life been shaped by a growing
secularism. If we are to investigate the ways in which British people can learn Javanese music, we
need to look deeply at the roots, as well as the implications, of Western secular cultural
presumptions. I base much of the following upon Small’s analysis.
From around the Renaissance onwards, two new ideas began to establish themselves in the West,
eventually becoming the new orthodoxy: first, that man’s importance challenges that of God; and
second, that the importance of the individual challenges that of the community. These ideas so
contradict the ancient view of the world that it is inevitable that they will revolutionise any society
which takes them to heart. 31
If man aspires to displace God, then it follows that his moral framework needs re-examination.
Superstition can be displaced, and replaced with result-oriented mores. The notion that certain
actions or states of being can be intrinsically good ceases to be self-evident. Tradition is there to be
overturned, ritual a pointless routine. Passivity is no longer a virtue. 32
If the individual is as important as the community, then it is right for him to set goals, to improve
himself, and to advance, rather than to accept the realities bequeathed to him. Man can therefore
become more result-oriented, seeking the most efficient, linear way to reach his goal. Product
becomes more important than process. The route to that end, and the processes engaged in on the
way, become less important. Taking diversions, pausing for contemplation or the fulfilment of
ritual, become less relevant.
If self-betterment is an end in itself, then so must be the pursuit and acquisition of productive,
useful knowledge. The authority of divine revelation needs to be questioned. Reason, logic and
science, rather than insight, intuition or experience, are exalted as the supreme tools in the search
for knowledge. 33 Areas of human activity which appear to be based on the subjective assessment of
individual personal experience attract less respect. 34 Areas of thought which are hidden, interior, or
intangible, are suspect.
If there is such a thing as objective human knowledge, then those who have followed the logical
designated path to acquire that knowledge can be deemed experts in their field. We expand our own
knowledge by imbibing information recognised and collated by experts. Since logical paths are by
definition direct paths, breadth of knowledge is accorded less and less value: to be an expert in
anything, one needs to specialise.

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From this small clutch of cultural presumptions flow many of the greatest achievements of Western
civilisation: science, technology, medicine, education, exploration – the list is endless. Without
these changes in world-view, the West might have remained, as much of the rest of the world did,
“in the Dark Ages”.
However, “neither intellect nor power of logical thought is any guarantee of insight.” 35 The danger
of being too fixated upon approaching things in a linear, goal-oriented, product-based manner, is
threefold. First, we can end up baffled and impotent when faced with the unintended, illogical or
deleterious consequences of our individual or collective actions. Second, we run the risk of
rendering ourselves incapable of understanding or relating to areas of human thought which are not
themselves exclusively based on reason. Third, we can blind ourselves to the deep-level unifying
connections between different areas of knowledge which can help our understanding of the world
around us, and of ourselves:
As the secular life is content to remain godless, and so deprives itself of any… unifying aim, it is but
natural that success in each of its many branches should come to be regarded as an end in itself…
The man of science should deify positive knowledge,… the statesman should regard political power
as intrinsically desirable,… the merchant and the manufacturer should live to make money… Even
the ardent reformer… pursues the ideal to which he devotes himself, as an end in itself, and makes
no attempt to define or interpret it in terms of its relation to that supreme and central ideal which he
ought to regard as the final end of human endeavour. 36
This is perhaps an over-generalisation, but it is certainly true that the man-centred, product-oriented,
linear way in which our society has learned to function over the past few centuries has had a
profound effect on both the musical and the educational cultures we have created in the West.
Whatever our background, the chances are that the assumptions we subconsciously make about
music, and about learning, will be deeply challenged when we come face to face with so
intrinsically spiritual and interior an art as gamelan.

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