PERFORMING T HE ARTS OF INDONESIA

Figure 8.1: Sri Gurindam Melayu group performing at a wedding on Pulau

Penyengat. Photo: Geoffrey Benjamin, 1990.

Figure 8.5: A women's kompang group practising in the Balai Ad at (Traditional

Hall) on Pulau Penyengat. Photo: Geoffrey Benjamin, 24 March 2017.

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 PERFORMING
THE ARTS OF
INDONESIA
Malay Identity and Politics in
the Music, Dance and Theatre of
the Riau Islands

edited by
Margaret Kartomi

Copenhagen
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n·as
I P R ES S

2019
ISBN 978-87-7694-259-5 (hard cover)
 CHAPTER 12

Malay art music composers and

performers of Tanjungpinang
and Pulau Penyengat

Geoffrey Benjamin

THIS CHAPTER DERIVES FROM THE SURPRISE and pleasure I gained from
the specially-composed music that accompanied the tarian kreasi (non-
traditional choreographed dances) performed on 21 May 2011 at the
ninth Gawai Seni Tanjungpinang (Tanjungpinang Arts Festival). My ini-
tial response to this unexpectedly modern-sounding music was tentative
and impressionistic, in that I had never heard such music before and could
not contextualise it within what I already knew ofMalay music and culture
(Benjamin 2016). I refer not to the hybridity of the music- which is an
ever-present feature of most Malay music- but to its varied exploration of
new timbres, extended compositional structures and unusual harmonies;
hence the term 'art music' in the title of this chapter.
I managed to meet some of the choreographers and dancers follow-
ing the performance, but I failed on that occasion to meet any of the
composers whose music had so surprised me. That had to wait until later
fieldtrips to Tanjungpinang, when I interviewed several of them about
their music, background, livelihood and aims. I also met up with other
Malay musicians, both asli (traditional) and kreasi, kreativ (innovative,
modern) on Pulau Penyengat and in Batam Centre, 1 some of whom I
had first met and recorded decades earlier. The body of this chapter
therefore falls somewhat arbitrarily into two main subsections: ( 1) the
kreasi musicians of Tanjungpinang and (2) the more asli musicians of

1. The terms asli and kreasi are used by the musicians and organisers of public per-
formances in Tanjungpinang.

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

nearby Pulau Penyengat. I say 'arbitrarily' because some general features

are common to both and - most importantly- their personnel overlap.
The tiny island of Pulau Penyengat lies within the administrative
city (kota) boundaries ofTanjungpinang. Situated within sight of each
other and separated by a mere IS-minute boat-ride, the island and the
city have a strikingly complementary relationship. With a multiethnic
population of more than 250,000, Tanjungpinang is extensive, urban-
ised, bustling and expanding. Penyengat, on the other hand, sustains just
2000 Malays, living mostly in piled houses over the water on no more
than one-tenth of the island's territory. 2 Development on Penyengat has
been constrained by special by-laws aimed at retaining its 'traditional'
appearance, but this has not limited the modernity and sophistication
of its inhabitants, many of whom commute daily to work in the city
and are familiar with other parts of Indonesia, as well as Singapore and
Peninsular Malaysia.
More broadly within Indonesia, Pulau Penyengat is recognised for
gifting its variety of Malay, as written by the nineteenth-century aristo-
crat and national hero Raja Ali Haji ( 1808-1873), to serve as the basis
of the national language. Raja Ali was not alone in this regard, for literary
production and printing were maintained on the island until the early
years of the twentieth century by aristocratic survivors of the centuries-
old Johor-Riau-Lingga sultanate (Putten 1997). This connection
is well recognised in Tanjungpinang, which advertises itself as Kota
Gurindam ('The Gurindam City'), after the Gurindam Duabelas verses
of Raja Ali Haji. The local university, Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji
(UMRAH), also bears his name. Another Penyengat-linked national
hero memorialised in the city is Raja Haji Fisabilillah (1727-1784 ),
whose monument stands on Tanjungpinang's seafront, and whose name
is borne by the local airport, a tertiary institution ( STISIPOL, the Raja
Haji College of Social and Political Sciences) and a city park.
When the Dutch finally put an end to the sultanate in 1911, Penyengat
had been its centre of administration under the Viceroys (Yang Dipertuan
Muda) for more than a century. Despite this abrupt change in its political
status, the key role ofPenyengat in maintaining Malay artistic activity has
continued, sustained largely by the traditional aristocrats of the island -

2. For detailed historical and sociological studies ofPulau Penyengat, see Matheson
1989 and Wee 1988.

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

but with music and dance as its core1 ratherthanliterature. 3 Tanjungpinang

is part of this too: many musicians and dancers live there1 and the city
authorities actively support performances and competitions of Malay
music1 dance and poetry. Malays are now a minority in the cit)'J but the
vitality and creativeness of their activities serve to remind the population
that this is historically a Malay place. Since it is also the provincial capital1
the artistic symbiosis ofTanjungpinang and Pulau Penyengat adds extra
weight to the role of the latter - a totally Malay place - in maintaining
Malay performance arts for Kepri more widely. 4

Malay 'art' music in Tanjungpinang and Pulau Penyengat

I shall now outline some of the general features raised in this chapter.
First1 the musicians regularly described themselves as otodidak ('self-
taught') j with just a few exceptions1 they declared that they had never
been taught their craft in a formal manner - meaning that they had not
studied musical textbooks and had received no academic certification of
their skills. They had1 however1 usually learned their craft from named
musicians. Among the exceptions in this regard are a few younger musi-
cians who have recently been studying music formally) including at least
one active cellist and accordion player enrolled at Akademi Kesenian
Melayu Riau (AIZAMR1 the Academy ofRiau Malay Arts) in Pekanbaru1
mainland Riau.
Second1 almost all of the modern kreasi music and most of the
traditional-style asli music have been composed as accompaniments to
dance1 in direct association with the choreographers. The few exceptions
include those asli performers 1 mostly on Pulau Penyengat1 who remain
faithful to the classical ghazal song-genre of Johor-Riau1 and some of
the more extended kreasi works of Raja Ahmad Helmy discussed below.
Third1 it emerged that a major stimulus for musical and dance activi-
ties is the hope of winning prizes at public competitions. Tanjungpinang

3. For musical activities on Pulau Penyengat in the nineteenth centur}'J see the series
of articles by Aswandi (Aswandi 2017), which pay particular attention to the
aristocrats' interest in Western genres and instruments.
4. See Pranadipa et al. (no date) for a research-based analysis of the interdepen-
dence between Pulau Penyengat and various institutions in Tanjungpinang with
reference to their continued support for zapin dance. Among its co-authors is
Supriyadi Hasanin, the musician discussed later in this chapter under the name
Adi Supriyadi.

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

hosts many such events at school, city, district (kecamatan) and pro-
vincial levels and presents itself through recordings and other media
publications of its Department of Tourism and Creative Economy as a
serious artistic centre. The primary motivation is, I suspect, the desire
to maintain the specifically Malay historical connections of the city,
against the threat of dilution by people from other parts of Indonesia,
while still sitting safely within the multiculturalism guaranteed by
Indonesia's Bhinneka Tunggal Ika ('Unity in Diversity') ideology, which
celebrates local diversity as part of national unity (cf. Yampolsky 1995,
Long 2013b).
Fourth, musical and dance activities in Tanjungpinang are largely
organised into officially recognised community and arts foundations
known as sanggar, a Javanese word for 'workshop: These bodies some-
times receive local-government aid on a year-to-year basis, although this
is not dependent on their preparing for a competition. Some sanggar ap-
pear to be short-lived, while others have remained active for decades. To
be regarded as a sanggar, a group is normally expected to present dance
as well as music; every newly established sanggar should therefore have a
music arranger/ composer (penata musik) and a choreographer (penata
tarian). Some sanggar, even those performing choreographed 'modern'
(kreasi) dances, can also be hired privately to perform at weddings and
other celebrations, sometimes alongside more traditionalghazal groups.

Kreasi compositions at the Gawai Seni

Tanjungpinang, 2011
Margaret Kartomi and I attended the popular Gawai Seni as part of the
initial foray into the field on the part of the Music-Culture and Worldviews
of the Riau Islands Project. The kreasi session was choreographed and
composed by people who were, I assumed at the time, professionals.
The music was mostly recognisable as 'Malay' in its rhythms and melo-
dies; its sophistication lay in the rich instrumentation and complexly
programmatic structure. The live performance took place on an out-
door stage before a large audience and was relayed through very large
loudspeakers, which generated a degree of distortion and feedback.
Despite the distortion, I managed to make high-definition audio record-
ings, which were later cleaned up digitally and committed to audio CD.
Copies were distributed, where possible, to the composers themselves.

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

As described beloWj these recordings proved valuable when played back

to the musicians when I interviewed them on later occasions.
Table 12.1 lists most of the musical compositions I recorded.5 The
names and other items of information announced at the original perfor-
mance sometimes differed from the correct versions as ascertained later.
In some cases, this was because the musicians themselves preferred to
use a pseudonym; in others, the names were announced wrongly. The
corrected versions are used throughout this chapter.

Table 12.1: Music recorded by the author at the Gawai Seni 2011, Tanjung-
pinang

Composer Title Rough translation

Ronny Oktavian Senandung Puncak Indah Serenade on Puncak
IndahHill
Muhammad Thamsir Rentak Pungkis Basket-Dance Beat
Azrni Mahmud Kemarau Drought
Ronny Oktavian Tarian Sugi Sugi Island Dance
Adi Supriyadi & Ryan Puanku Bulang Cahaya Milady of the Bright
Saputra Headdress
Raja Ahmad Helmy SayangBini Love for One's Wife
Lukman Hakim Kuli Panggul Coolie Porters
Agus Rio Selat Nasi Nasi Strait

The music made extensive use of markedly rhythmic percussion, both

as background and in solo passages, presumably because it had to serve
as an accompaniment and as time-keeper to choreographed dance. The
drumming was mostly in recognisably Malay style, frequently recalling
the contrapuntal rhythmic interplay of traditional kompang groups, but
it also wandered briefly into other styles, including what sounded to
me like 1960s rock-n'-roll. In mood, genre, rhythm and tempo (known
jointly as rentak, literally 'foot-stamp'), 6 the pieces ranged from the gen-
S. For lack of space, discussion of compositions by Ronny Oktavian, Lukman Hakim,
Agus Rio and other key musicians (Haji Said Much tar Husin, 'Mario' Peri Sukma
Bin Syamsir and Diana Binti Hasan Basri) are omitted from this chapter.
6. At his lecture-recital at Monash University on January 15, 2015, composer Adi
Supriyadi said that rentak was the primary feature on which music depends. He
listed the basic rentak of traditional Riau Island music as langgam (slow), inang (a

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

tly lyrical to the deliberately coarse, to accord with the storylines acted
out in the dances.
The pieces were scored as biola (violin) solos with a variety of ac-
companiments. In some pieces, a second biola and/ or singer joined the
solo line. The accompaniments mostly consisted of a syncopated rhyth-
mic ostinato on a variety of drums, with a middle-level heterophonic
continuo of other instruments, such as rehab (spike fiddle), gambus
(lute), mandolin, guitar, accordion and tuned gongs. Some of the pieces
were framed by quieter preludes and postludes of a more traditional
character, usually played on gambus or rehab. In Lukman Hakim's Kuli
Panggul, the postlude consisted of a few measures of beautifully sung
ghazal, the 'classical' vocal form of the region.
Compositionally, the music played that evening ranged from episodic
elaborations of a single tune to a suite of tunes compiled into a unitary
composition. The piece that came closest to a unitary composition was
Puanku Bulang Cahaya by Ryan Saputra and Adi Supriyadi (Figure 12.1).
One element that was lacking, though, was the 'layering' typical of the
Java-influenced music that can usually be heard in such contemporary
Indonesian popular forms as kroncong, gambang kromong, dangdut or
jaipongan. The music was clearly of melody-and-accompaniment style,
and in that respect distinctively Malay - at least when heard against a
broader Indonesian perspective. Although some of the performances
were slightly heterophonic, they never reached the extent typically
enjoyed in mainland Southeast Asia.
Despite their mostly shared 'Malayness', the pieces were otherwise
stylistically eclectic, illustrating that Malay music intentionally takes in
elements from all over the world, especially in its instrumentation. As
shown in the rest of this chapter, Malay musicians in Kepri especially
have been keen to incorporate elements from a wide range of sources,
while merging them into a style that remains distinctively 'MalaY: 7 As
Irving (2014) and others have shown, such kacukan hybridity as a gen-

little faster), zapin (fast), joget or inang cepat (very fast) and jogt!t dangkung (the
fastest). These also differ, he said, in the speed and elaboration of their grenek
gracings, which are especially fast in the music that accompanies silat martial art
(for which, see Kartomi 2013 ).
7. For broader surveys of the musical forms favoured in Riau and neighbouring parts
of the Malay World, see Kartomi ( 1998: 605-607, 614-619; 2012) and Matusky
& Chopyak (1998) .

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

eral feature of Malay culture has been noted by European commentators

for at least two centuries.
My initial exposure to the kreasi baru ('new creations', non-tradi-
tional) compositions in 2011 left me with several general and specific
questions relating to the performances I had recorded. I was not sure
how the musicians navigated the compositional relation between the
choreography and their music. Was the music fully composed first, to
suit the story behind the dance, or was there more extempore give-and-
take between the two before the final outcome was produced? The latter
would have been facilitated by the fact that the musicians do not rely
on written musical notation, which would have 'locked in' just one par-
ticular version of the music. On the other hand, given the complexity of
some of the pieces with regard to both the composing and transmitting
of the 'score' to the performers, the music would have had to be closely
coordinated with the choreography. Even though the same musicians
certainly can, and do, incorporate extemporisation into their playing
on other occasions, they mostly refrain from doing so when a more set-
piece approach is required. 8 I was able to investigate the question of this
musical give-and-take on several later visits, as outlined below.

Some composers ofTanjungpinang

The following observations are based on interviews (in 2013- 2017)
with some of the musicians while playing the recordings back to them.
Through free-ranging conversation, my aim was to uncover the sources
of their musicianship, their training, the transmission of their art, how
they talk about music, the manner of their cooperation in performance,
their receipt of outside support, their concern with 'Malayness: and
their openness to influences from outside that tradition. As I did not
employ a formal questionnaire, the different interviews did not all cover
the same topics. Nevertheless, as shown below, they expressed similar
concerns.

8. Repeat performances of the same items by the same musicians posted on the
Internet confirm that, once the performance has been agreed on, the musicians do
not introduce much further variation. Similarly, Raja Khadijah sang along in total
unison with a recording I had made of her more than two decades earlier, despite
the complexity of her grenek-grenek gracings.

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

Muhammad Thamsir
Muhammad Thamsir Saputra bin Ali Hassan1 known as Rahmat1 is a
Malay from Tanjungpinang and a graphic designer by profession. While
studying information technology in Jogjakarta1 Thamsir 'helped' some
of the people there to play Malay music while furthering his own kom-
pang drumming technique at the Institut Seni.
Although a percussion specialist1 he nevertheless holds views on the
place ofother instruments in Malay music. Truly'Malay' music should1 he
said1 employ instruments made ofbrass (gongs1 presumably) or leather
(drums) 1 but the violin and harmonium are admissible too because they
arrived before European colonialism. 9 However1 in the recording I made
of his piece Rentak Pungkis in 2011 the instrumentation was more
extensive than that: the introductory passage was played on mandolin
by Ryan Saputra1 followed by a gambus solo played by Emping1 Azmi
Mahmud's younger brother (Ryan and Azmi are discussed below.)
The central percussion section1 played by Thamsir himself1 was in a
variety of dance-linked syncopated rhythms (sinkop tarian) of his own
creation1 aimed especially at following the dancers' hand-movements.
The pungkis in his the title of his music is the wedge-shaped basket used
by builders and others to carry their materials. The rhythms were suc-
cessively rentak empat belas (' 14-beat') 1 a samba ( campuran Latin1 'Latin
mixture') 1 and a medley employing what he referred to as the Malay
patam-patam and joget beats 1 all interspersed with quieter sections of
musik biar saja ('just music'). He demonstrated these rhythms on a
plastic container for us to record on video. 10
Their preparation for the 2011 performance took just one week with
five rehearsals. They collaborated with Feby, a female choreographer
who had given him the synopsis beforehand but who lacked musicians.
The musicians he gathered together did not constitute a complete sang-

9. Presumably, Thamsir meant that these instruments were not introduced by the
Dutch, the direct colonisers ofRiau, but centuries earlier by the Portuguese (as in-
dicated by the local name for the violin, biola) or more recently from India, where
the hand-pumped harmonium has had a varied history since the late nineteenth
century (see Meddegoda 2013 for discussion of the harmonium in the Malay
World.)
10. Associated video file: Thamsir Demonstrates Malay Drumbeats.mp4, https: l I
doi.orgl 10.26180I Sc85e9396472 7.

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

gar, as they were just freelancers (sambilan). To do the job properly, he

said, would have taken a year of rehearsals until they were all satisfied.
Thamsir can be seen and heard on a YouTube video 11 performing as
a member of the Balai Gendang ('Drum Hall') ensemble. It consists of
Tanjungpinang Malays who, like Thamsir himself, have returned from
studying in Yogyakarta, augmented by some older musicians such as Pak
Ajis, a 'legendary' accordion player who can also be seen on the video.
The 15-minute continuous suite, entitled A ku, Kau dan Melayu ('I, You
and Malay[ness] '), is built of contrasting Malay musical genres - ghazal,
syair, kompang, joget and mak yang, among others. Thamsir himself de-
scribed the highly innovative music-making in English as 'in-your-face'
-a description borne out by the deliberate dissonance and coarse-toned
approach that marks much of the videoed performance. Significantly,
this took place at the third of a series of festivals entitled Revitalisasi
Budaya Melayu (Revitalisation of Malay Culture), aimed at not allowing
traditional Malay musical instruments to be forgotten.

Adi Supriyadi bin Hasanin

The violinist and gambus-player Adi Supriyadi, who hails from
Daik-Lingga (see Chapter 7), was invited to perform with the various
groups on Pulau Penyengat by Azmi Mahmud. Like several other musi-
cians in Tanjungpinang, Adi is known by a variety of names in a vari-
ety of spellings. As a student of Government at STISIPOL College in
Tanjungpinang, he enrolled as Supriyadi Hasanin; but as a performer he
employs the stage name Adi Lingkepin (Dediarman 201 7), derived from
Lingga Kepulauan Riau. I recorded Puanku Bulang Cahaya ('Milady of
the Bright Headdress') - Adi's joint composition with Ryan Saputra - in
2011, but did not meet him until late 2014 (in Batam Centre) and again
(in Melbourne) in early 2015, at which the photograph in Figure 12.1
was taken.12
To my mind, Puanku Bulang Cahaya was the most 'advanced' of the
pieces I recorded at the Tarian Kreasi session.13 I found out later that
the dance-drama accompanied by this music was taken from the history
11. ww>v.youtube.coml watch ?v=tvwxN OeGnFw (accessed 11 November 2018).
12. For an interview with Adi at the Monash conference, see Gaby 2015.
13. Associated audio file: Adi Supriyadi & Ryan Saputra, Puanku Bulang Cahaya.
mp3, https: I I doi.orgl 10.26 J 80I 5c8Seb846b8a2.

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

Figure 12.1: Adi Supriyadi performing one ofhis own

compositions at Monash University. Photo: Geoffrey
Benjamin, 15 January 2015.

of the Riau Islands, somewhat mythologised. Since the story recounted

the relationship between a tribal woman and a more 'civilised' aristocrat,
the music overtly incorporates elements from both traditions. The an-
nouncer appropriately described the music as 'dynamic' and 'rhythmic:
To my Western classical ears, the composition came across as a kind of
concerto grosso, with a solo violin playing against a tremolo harmonic
ritornello on the other instruments, and holding together with an excel-
lent flow between the contrasting sections. The music was less arbitrar-
ily assembled than some of the other pieces performed that night, nor
was it particularly 'Malay' in melody and idiom, except for the drum
interludes and the gracings in the violin part. Most of my information on
this particular composition comes from its co-composer Ryan Saputra,
whose comments on it are presented in the next section.
Since his Gawai Seni performance in 2011, I have heard Adi
Supriyadi play his own compositions on other occasions, at all of which
he displayed his mastery of very different styles of music. In January
2013, in association with the conference held by the Music-Culture and

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Worldviews of the Riau Islands Project in Tanjungpinang, he played

violin in an extempore traditional Malay style to provide a heterophonic
obligato accompaniment to Dwi Saptarini's contralto singing of verses
from Raja Ali Haji's Gurindam Duabelas. In December 2014, as part of
his large Samudra (Ocean) ensemble, he provided much of the music
for the dances and vocal items performed at the semi-official Kenduri
Seni Melayu (Malay Arts Party) at Batam Centre. This was recognis-
ably 'Malay' music in its rhythms, melodic style and gracings, but also
more forceful and modern in approach, as befitted its highly staged
and amplified outdoor performance. At Monash University in January
201 S he repeated his duo performance with Dwi Saptarini of Gurindam
Duabelas in an especially moving manner by providing highly decorated
heterophonic counter-melodies to the vocal solo. 14
At the same session, Adi presented a brief lecture-recital describing
the many sources that go into both his traditional and his modern music,
paying particular attention to the central importance of tempo - or more
strictlYi rentak (genre-cum-tempo) - as the primary feature on which
music depends. He also remarked that he and his fellow contemporary
Riau musicians now fuse pop, rock, countrYi blues, jazz etc. with the
various Malay genres that they still employ. 15

Ryan Saputra bin Mohd Syahrir

As with several other Malay musicians in Tanjungpinang, Ryan's true
identity initially proved difficult to verify. The music of Puanku Bulang
Cahaya was wrongly announced at the 2011 performance as being the
joint work oCAdi Aisalah and Rian Susupah: Later, though, I ascertained
that 'Adi Aisalah' and 'Rian Susupah' were actually Adi Supriyadi and
Ryan Saputra respectively. I finally met Ryan in June 2016, when he
provided more information about the music I had recorded.
Ryan is from Pulau Penyengat - a fact that led his middle school to
insist that he play in the sanggar at the school, presumably because this

14. Associated audio file : Dwi Saptarini & Adi Supriyadi, Gurindam Duabelas
(Monash) .mp3, https: I I doi.orgl 10.26180I 5c85ece30c0 1a.
15. Perhaps Western classical should be added to this list. At an informal gathering
following the completion of the Monash conference, Adi played Mozart's Turkish
March by ear and without preparation, to Margaret Kartomi's piano accompani-
ment.

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 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

would ensure that he had a musical background. Eventually, however, he

began to enjoy performing, and no longer needed forcing. He told me
that the dance-drama Puanku Bulang Cahaya, the music of which I had
recorded in 2011, was based on a novel of the same name. This turned out
to be Rida K. Liamsi's Cahaya Bulang (Liamsi 2007). In the performance
I recorded, Ryan played mandolin and Adi Supriyadi played violin. Ryan
described the music as incorporating several different genres ( rentak):
pop Melayu (including the chords), silat Melayu, zapin and langgam.
When I asked whether the music had been influenced by Western 'clas-
sical' music, he said that it was actually influenced by the Irish folk-rock
band The Corrs. His somewhat radical approach started out as a protest
against what he regarded as the narrowness of the traditional Malay style,
but he said that even the older people now accept this new music.
While I was playing my recording ofPuanku Bulang Cahaya back to
him, Ryan provided a running commentary on different sections of the
music. 16 The piece opens in pop Melayu style, proceeding to a middle
section in zapin style, with percussion provided on tarbuka, bebana and
tambur drums. Keyboard-like effects were added from the mandolin
played in langgam style. This was followed by what Ryan himself said
was a shift from minor to major in the same key, G. Only later did the
music modulate to a different tone centre (berubah nada dasar\ to D.
The next section was 'kreativ', following what Ryan (in English) called
'dream theatre', syncopated but in no particular rentak, and succeeded by
a return to the pop Melayu style of the opening.
A tremolo section commencing around four minutes into the music
was in rentak jogi, which Ryan described as being Indian-derived and
in a fast 4 I 4 beat, in contrast to the 3 I 4 beat of conventional joget This
incorporated some wordless vocalising, sung here by 'Zazi' (presumably
a pseudonym), a woman from Pulau Penyengat. There then followed
a fast jogi section, with double-stops on the violin with mandolin ac-
companiment. The piece ended with a coda sung by Zazi in traditional
syair baku style, with words taken from the novel on which the dance
was based, and freely accompanied by violin and mandolin.

16. The music of a later performance held at Taman Mini in Jakarta, where it is listed
under the name of the choreographer Apriansyah Firdaus, can be heard on a video
recording (""""'~.youtube.com/watch?v=JnhsEwUSL -4, accessed 11 November
2018).

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 MALAYART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Figure 12.2: Raja Ahmad Helmy and his wife, Syarifah

Muslihati Kampung Tambak. (See page 275 for a fuller,
colour version of this image.)

This complicated piece, and especially the close unison between voice
and violin in the jogi section, required twice-weekly practices over two
months, which took place in an open field without amplification -which
was employed for the first time at the final Gawai Seni performance.

Raja (Radja) Ahmad Helmy

Raja Ahmad Helmy (see Figure 12.2) 1 who composes explicitly pro-
grammatic extended pieces in private1 is the most adventurous of the
composers I interviewed1 as described below. He also works as an event
organiser and as a recording and sound engineer.
At the Gawai Seni performance in 2011 1 I heard the title of his music
announced as Sayang Diri (literally 'selflove') 1 which at the time I as-
sumed meant something like 'self respect: However1 when I finally met
him in 2014 Helmy himself corrected it to Sayang Bini ('Love for One's
Wife'). This fundamental shift in meaning caused some amusement
among those listening to the discussion. At the 2013 conference I com-
mented on the music of Sayang Bini as followsY
The dance showed how some hardworking housewives wanted to dance
the joget to ease their pain. Although the music was repetitious, it worked

17. Associated audio file (the original recorded performance): Raja Ahmad Helmy,
Sayang Bini (Gawai Seni) .mp3, https :/ / doi.org/ l0.26180/ Sc8Sefe3ed57l.

29 1
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

well because the momentum was maintained throughout. There were

adventurous passages, with the solo violin wandering into chromatics
and harmonics, with what sounded like electronically altered singing.
Much of the music was a furious joget played by two violins with tabla
accompaniment. Gongs, presumably telempung, were also involved.

When I met Raja Helmy at his house in Kampung Tambak1a suburb

ofTanjungpinang1he explained that the bini of the title was his own wife1
Syarifah Muslihati binti Said Mur Abdillah1 known as Eti. Eti's father is
a schoolteacher, and she is the first cousin of Said Parman1who was an
active organiser of dance and music events during our 2011 and 2013
visits to Tanjungpinang. The Sayang Bini music-and-dance performance
won first prize on the Bandung station of Radio Republik Indonesia and
second prize in Bali- but on home ground in Tanjungpinang it won only
third prize! The Bandung and Bali performances were danced to record-
ings1 a 'clean' version of which Helmy played from his computer for us to
listen to1 and from which I extracted the lyrics presented below. 18
Helmy said that the music and dance of Sayang Bini were composed
serentak ('jointly in step'\ bit-by-bit1 in inang cepat ('fast inang') genre1
with a 'constant speed' concept for the tempo1 and mixed with 'tribal'
percussion 'from Africa'. His approach was influenced by P. Ramlee's
films, such as Ali Bah a and Bujang Lapok. The instrumentation included
a darbuka (pot drum), jim be (vertical pot drum with plastic membrane) 1
violin1 mandolin, gambus and a bamboo transverse flute. He character-
ised this particular piece as not so 'serious' or rapi (well-ordered1strictly
composed), especially in comparison with his other pieces; it was meant
simply for 'enjoyment'. At the original Gawai Seni performance1 the
deliberately lucu (comedic) vocal was sung by Helmy himself - partly
in falsetto1because the women performers had to go home as it was late,
and he had to 'become pondan (transvestite):
Interestingly, Helmy is one of the few Riau composers who regularly
sets words to music1usually his own and often amusing.19 The lyrics of
Sayang Bini are transcribed from Helmy's own recording of the music as
performed on a later occasion:
18. Associated audio file (the composer's own cleaned-up version) : Raja Ahmad
Helmy, 'Sayang Bini'.mp3, https:/ I doi.org/ 10.26180/ Sc8Sf280353dl.
19. Other local song-writers include Azmi Mahmud (see below) and Haji Said
Muchtar Husin. Some of the latter's songs can heard on Gemulay 2014, one of the
few available video CDs oflocal Malay music.

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 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Wife
Bersih-lah bersih, badan dah letih.
Nyalakan lagi, lilin meleleh.
Pinggang sakit, pergi meleret.
Walau pun buncit, kata nak
berjoget.
Husband
Hoya hoye!
Wife
Sila bersih, badan dah letih,
Harapkan laki, air liur meleleh.
Ay!
Pinggang sakit, kaki meleret.
Walau pun buncit, gatal nak
berjoget.
Husband (unaccompanied coda)
Amboi Dik, jangan merapik!
Badan Abang penat, kaki pun
meleret.
Amboi Dik, jangan merapik!
Badan Abang penat, kaki pun
meleret
Cleaning, cleaning, my body is weary.
Light it again, the candle has melted.
My waist hurts, I drag myself along.
Although I'm tubby, I'd rather be
dancing.
Hoya hoye!
Please do some cleaning, my body is
weary,
I'm counting on Hubby with drooling
spittle.
Ay!
My waist hurts, my legs are dragging.
Although I'm tubby, I'm itching to
dance.
Well I never, Wife, don't talk nonsense!
Hubby's body is tired, his legs too are
dragging.
Well I never, Wife, don't talk nonsense!
Hubby's body is tired, his legs too are
dragging.

Helmy employs a variety of techniques when composing. He uses his

mobile phone to record bits of tune as they come to mind, employing
tonic solfa to notate the melodies and staff notation for the percussion
parts. He puts the completed composition together on an electronic
keyboard, from which the live musicians then learn their parts bit-by-bit.
Unusually among the Tanjungpinang composers, not all ofhis composi-
tions are for dance- although he did write the music for Peppy Chandra's
Semah Kajang dance, and Peppy also choreographed his Sayang Bini.
His more private aim is to compose (using the English words) 'colossal,
epic' pieces lasting half-an-hour. He has not yet produced a recorded
'album', because that would require shorter pieces.
The four compositions that Helmy passed to me as digital audio files
are each less than half-an-hour in length, but they still reveal an intent

293
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

to produce free-standing programmatic music. His RajukAlamJ Global

Warming ('The World's Complaint at Global Warming')} which incor-
porates electronically sampled vocal and environmental sounds} depicts
a bleak post-'warming' world in which nothing happens any more. Three
other compositions make reference to Malay culture. Dangeng Pasir
('The Legend of Sand') is based on sajak verses by Husnizar Hood that
bemoan the mining of sand on Riau for export to Singapore. Balairang
Sri ('The Audience Hall of the Sultan') is a highly syncopated Arabising
piece} suggestive of a court maidens' dance scene in a P. Ramlee film. And
Makyang Nusantara ('Indonesian Makyong') is an intensified pastiche
of that Malay theatrical tradition. 20 Nevertheless} Helmy described these
pieces as 'universal' and tak terlalu Melayu ('not overly Malay') in style.
He designed them to be playable also as music-minus-one tracks against
a solo violin or a singer. He remarked that some of the more recent mak
yang performances were 'not serious~ as their rehearsals were truncated
and the performances lacked rah ('human spirit'). I suspect that this
slightly jaundiced view motivated the deconstructivist approach he took
in his Makyang Nusantara.
More recentl}'J in a move reminiscent of the Early Music movement in
the West} Helmy has organised 'authentic' mak yang performances shorn
of any obvious modern elements} in which he plays the gong and allows
the other performers to take the more elaborate parts. At two abbrevi-
ated performances of this kind during the 2015 conference at Monash
Universi~ several of the performers (including the young actress-singer
Tengku Sa'adiah Binti Tengku Mohamad Satar) came from the same
Penyengat-linked aristocratic background as several of the other musi-
cians discussed in this chapter.
Helmy's immediate ancestry encapsulates something of the cultural
shifts that have taken place in Riau. His father} Raja As'adJ is an imam;
but his grandfather} Raja Mansur} was a tiger shaman in Sungai EnokJ
IndragiriJ mainland Sumatra. When I asked if this somewhat 'mixed'
background might have shaped his music} he suggested instead that
Sufic chanting from Penyengat was a more likely influence.

20. Associated audio file (the composer's own): Raja Ahmad Helmy, 'Makyong Nusan-
tadmp3, https:/ /doi.org/ 10.26180/Sc8Sf5 2c8ced8.

294
 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Music on Pulau Penyengat

Pulau Penyengat is home to an unnamed centuries-old 'dynasty' of inter-
marrying musicians involved in both traditional and modern music.
These include many musicians whose personal names start with Raja
or Tengku, indicating descent from the aristocratic strata of the former
Riau-Lingga Sultanate. Among them are the ghazal singer Raja Khadijah
Binti Raja Umar and the multi-instrumentalist Tengku Fadillah Bin
Tengku Mohamed Yusof, whose personal musical histories and relation-
ships were related to us in interviews on Penyengat between 2014 and
2017 (sadly, Tengku Fadillah passed away in December 2016.)
Over the roughly two centuries since the earliest reports of court-
linked music in Riau-Lingga, there has been an increasing acceptance
ofWestern and other Asian elements alongside and into the continuing
Malay musical tradition (Aswandi 2017). 21 By the 1880s, for example,
musicians from Penyengat were being taught by Dutch and other
European bandmasters, sometimes in Melaka, to read Western musical
notation so that they could play in the substantial royal military band
on the island. Contemporary photographs show that the band had a
complement of at least 25 players of European brass, woodwind and
percussion instruments.
However, the ability to read musical notation and to play wind instru-
ments seem not to have long survived the dissolution of the Sultanate
in 1911. With rare exceptions, the present-day musicians ofPenyengat
do not read written music notes, and hardly ever employ wind instru-
ments. On the other hand, although they mostly claim to be otodidak
('self-taught~ in the sense that they lack formal training), a significant
amount of teaching still goes on, as attested by several examples in this
chapter. Azmi Mahmud (Figure 12.3, far right) and his mother Rajah
Khadijah (Figure 12.5) have been especially active in this regard. For
example, Ryan Saputra has named Azmi as his musical guru ( Gaby
2015) i and the singer Diana Binti Hasan Basri, whom we interviewed in

21. Aswandi (2017) states that the importing of Western music, known as cara
Hollandia, 'the Dutch way; started with the accession ofRajaJafaar Bin Raja Haji
Fisabilillah as Yang Dipertuan Muda (Viceroy) in 1805. Eventually, by the end of
the 19'h century, such music became an integral part of the official ceremonies,
military parades and entertainments at the Riau court. However, this did not dis-
place the more locally-developed musical activities such as no bat, gam elan Melayu,
joget, mak yong and ghazal.

295
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

Figure 12.3: Musicians in the Sanggar Budaya Warisan Pulau Penyengat re-
hearsing the 'Bilik 44' ( 44 Rooms) dance on Pulau Penyengat. Photo: Geoffrey
Benjamin, 10January2013.

Tanjungpinang, studied ghazal and lagu asli with Raja Khadijah. I have
no information, however, on how this teaching is carried out - a topic
that surely deserves ethnographic study.

A dance rehearsal on Penyengat

In January 2013, I videoed a music-and-dance rehearsal on the open-
air stage opposite the mosque in Penyengat. 22 This stage, fronted by a
substantial forecourt and known formally as the Balai Desa Kelurahan
Penyengat (Penyengat Subdistrict Village Pavilion), is regularly used
for musical and other cultural performances. Its central position at the
head of the road leading from the main jetty of the island, opposite the
mosque and next to a stand for motorised trishaw taxis (see Figure 12.4,
background), ensures that any activity taking place there does so in full
public view and hearing. It therefore serves as the focal point for cultural
activities on the island.

22. Associated video files : Music: Sanggar Warisan, Music Rehearsal.mp41 https:l I
doi.orgl l0.26180I Sc85f74cld48a; Dance: Sanggar Warisan, Dance Rehearsal.
mp4, https:l l doi.orgl l 0.26180I Sc85f881049bc; Choreographer: Sanggar
Warisan, Choreographer.mp4, https: l I doi.orgl 10.26180I 5c85f942666bb.

296
 MALAYART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Figure 12.4: Dancers rehearsing the 'Bilik 44' dance.

(See page 2 7S for a fuller, colour version of this image.)

The rehearsal shown in Figures 12.3 and 12.4 was in preparation for
the 2013 Gawai Seni Tanjungpinang, at which the performance eventu-
ally won first prize. It went on to win second prize at the Parade Tari
Nasional (National Dance Parade) in Jakarta. The dance was entitled
Bilik Empat Puluh Empat ('Forty-four Rooms'), a reference to the
planned 44-room royal palace in Daik-Lingga. This lies in ruins, having
been left unfinished when Sultan Mahmud Muzaffar Syah was deposed
by the Dutch in 1857. Azmi Mahmud was attracted to the story, and
decided to provide music to accompany the dance, which incorporated
open wooden cubes (Figure 12.4, at left) to represent the rooms. The
resultant composition was mostly in langgam genre, with some episodes
in a faster joget style along with rhapsodic extemporisations on the
violin. 23
Later, I got to know several musicians at this rehearsal (Figure 12.3),
including Azmi Mahmud (violin), Adi Supriyadi (gam bus) and Ryan
Saputra (mandolin). Ofthe nine musicians on stage, at least six were from
Penyengat. The dancers included a Muslim woman of Chinese descent
from Tanjungpinang and a Muslim Batak woman from Kijang (on the
south-east ofBintan island), indicating Penyengat as an acknowledged
centre of performance art. The choreographer, Heru Ikhsan (the jim be
player in Figure 12.3) was the grandson ofPak Rachmat, a well-known
ghazal singer who had moved from West Java to Penyengat. Some people

23. The same performers can be viewed presenting 'Bilik 44' on vvw,.v.youtube.
com/ watch?v=5ywF58tocY8 (accessed 11 November 2018), at the Parade Tari
Provinsi Kepri Tahun 2014. The video quality is poor, but the audio is acceptable.

297
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

from other parts of Indonesia become skilled performers of specifically

Malay art forms after settling in Tanjungpinang - see Chapter 14.

Azmi Mahmud
Azmi Mahmud is a talented performer, leader and composer, carrying
on the traditions of his musical ancestry while also employing the kind
of innovations that will keep those traditions viable. As an organiser and
performer on both violin and gam bus he plays a key role in the musical
life of Pulau Penyengat. Azmi's guitarist father, Mahmud Hassan, was
the leader of the ghazal group on the island, Sanggar Sri Gurindam
Melayu. Azmi's mother is Raja Khadijah (Figure 12.5), the renowned
ghazal performer, whose singing I recorded at a wedding on Penyengat
in 1990. In addition to looking after the long-established ghazal group,
Azmi guides the younger musicians who play together as the Sanggar
Budaya Warisan Pulau Penyengat.
My 2013 note onAzmi's piece Kemarau ('Drought')/4 as recorded at
the 2011 Gawai Seni, reads as follows:
The dance celebrated the importance of wells and rivers in supplying
water. Some singing was incorporated into the complete piece. The
piece opened with a 'radical'-sounding violin solo in ghazal style, full of
swooping glissandi, tremoli and harmonics, over a pedal-note gambus
and tambourine accompaniment. Touches of harmony were produced
by the pedal note. The final presto section involved violin tremolos and
a second violin playing a contrapuntal ostinato (reminding me some-
how of Bach's D minor concerto).
When I played my recording back to Azmi in 2016, h e told me that
he had based it on the drought that affected Pulau Penyengat in 2011,
when the wells ran dry shortly before the Gawai Seni festival at which
it was first performed. The piece, like many of the others I recorded,
progressed through several different tempos. It also incorporated Azmi's
own lyrics:
Timba-lah air dalam perigi, Dipping water from the well,
Airnya keruh tidak terkira. The water is exceedingly turbid.
Datang-lah musim kemarau lagi, The season of drought has come again,

24. Associated audio file: Azmi Mahmud, Kemarau (Gawai Seni).mp3, https:/ / doi.
org/ l0.26180/ 5c85fbbd34383.

298
 MALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Beldi-lah kosong, air tak ada.
Kemarau panjang kini melanda,
Air kerontang dalam perigi.
Timba kuusang apa-lah daya.
Air kutunggu diambil orang.
The bucket is empty, water there is none.
The long drought is beating down,
The water has dried up in the well.
I dip but come up dry, uselessly.
I wait for someone to bring water.

Azmi said that the music changed shape as the performers rehearsed.
He would give out the tune and lyrics, which the other musicians and
dancers then followed. But he did not tell them what to do, as he did not
want to seem arrogant (sombong) and make it appear to be all his own
work.
Azmi learned violin on Pulau Penyengat with Tengku Fahmi Bin
Tengku Mohamad Yusof, an architect and engineer, who in turn had
learned from the late Raja Mohamad Ya'cob Bin Raja Mohamad Bai.
Among other musicians mentioned by Azmi was his relative Khairullah
Bin Raja Mohamad Hasyim, who studied flute and saxophone in Jakarta
and now works in the provincial cultural affairs office in Tanjungpinang.
However, wind instruments are not regularly sold in Tanjungpinang,
so few people there can play them, even though Azmi himself owns a
Selmer flute. He does not read Western musical notation, which (like his
colleagues) he referred to as notasi balok ('notation on b eams [staves] '),

Figure 12.5: Raja Khadijah and the guitar of her late husband in its permanent
armchair seat. Photo: Geoffrey Benjamin.

299
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

but he can write down alphabetical note-names. 25 He listens to Western

classical music when he can, which may possibly explain the Bach-like
passages I noted in his Kemarau music.
Azmi said that the acoustic guitar of his late father, which is perma-
nently seated on an armchair in his mother's house (Figure 12.5), is
rumoured to sound by itself because it reportedly contains the semangat
('spirit, soul') of a buluh perindu ('yearning bamboo') that they found
in a drawer. 26 Azmi regards music as a mystical matter ( ilmu mistik)
and musical skill as the result of spiritual gifts - an idea similar to his
mother's mention of an inherited jiwa seni 'spirit of art'. He said that this
mystical approach is no longer cultivated on Pulau Penyengat but it still
occurs on some of the other islands, where it might even include acts of
sorcery aimed at stopping other musicians' instruments from sounding.
As for himself, Azmi requires several weeks to prepare properly before
performing in public.
My most recent encounters with Azmi's music were on two public
occasions on successive nights in December 2016, when I witnessed
very different aspects of his activities. On the first night, he led a
performance by the Sanggar Budaya Warisan Pulau Penyengat in the
courtyard of the new Gonggong building in Tanjungpinang (Figure
12.6), so named because it is shaped like the edible gonggong sea-snail
that Tanjungpinang City treats as its emblem. The performance, which
attracted a large crowd, was in association with the Pertemuan Penulis
Serantau (Regional Writers' Meeting) festival. The music was a further
example of the modern kreasi style discussed earlier, but even more
'modern' in approach. The mixed instrumentation included bamboo
flute, accordion, two cellos playing in counterpoint to each other,
several guitars and violins, a (Sundanese?) zither, and a range of drums

25. Although other ways of writing down music are known elsewhere in Indonesia,
note-names and staff notation were the only two means mentioned by the musi-
cians I talked to, with the exception of Raja Helmy's private use of tonic solfa to
notate his own melodies.
26. I am not sure how to interpret this statement. Perhaps the buluh perindu appeared
in the form of magical 'bamboo pearl' crystals of the kind currently offered for
sale at high prices over the Internet. Wilkinson (1959 (I): 163) describes buluh
perindu as ' (i) Aeolian harp; (ii) semi-legendary bamboo (regarded as a precious
love-charm and identified sometimes with Bambusa magica) that is said to give
out a sweet and plaintive note when swayed by the wind.' Azmi said that the buluh
perindu bamboo does not grow on Pulau Penyengat.

300
----------------------~------------ ----

l'v1ALAY ART MUSIC COMPOSERS AND PERFORMERS

Figure 12.6: Azmi Mahmud (in tanjak headdress) prepares the Sanggar Budaya
Warisan Pulau Penyengat for a public performance of modern music, Tan-
jungpinang. Photo: Geoffrey Benjamin, 17 December 20 16.

and other percussion instruments. As usual, the music mostly served as

accompaniment - in this instance to dances and highly expressionistic
poetic declamations.
The second encounter took place on Pulau Penyengat, on the public
stage facing the mosque. This was an altogether more traditional occa-
sion, being a competition for the primary-school children of the island,
in such skills as dancingjogit and zapin and singingghazal. Azmi directed
the event, which involved an augmented Sanggar Budaya Warisan Pulau
Penyengat ensemble of accordion, three guitars, four violins, bamboo
flute, electronic keyboard and four percussionists (includingAzmi's son
Lutfi on drum-kit)i Azmi himself did not play. The music was consist-
ently in the standard Malay rentak genres, with which the musicians,
dancers and large audience clearly felt at home.
In conclusion, this well-attended event, for which the performers
and much of the audience dressed in their finest clothes, can be taken as
evidence- along with the urban performance of the previous night- that
the Malay performing arts in this part of Kepri Province are alive and
being passed on with enthusiasm. Given that these activities receive little
recognition on television or in the commercial record shops, this is all the

301
 PERFORMING THE ARTS OF INDONESIA

more surprising. It is the performers themselves and their enthusiastic

local followers who are keeping Malay dance and music alive and innova-
tive, often with the active encouragement of the local government.

Author's note
I am grateful to Raja Malik Hafrizal Bin Raja Hamzah ofPulau Penyengat
for helping to locate and contact musicians discussed in this chapter; the
Department of Tourism and Creative Economy, City ofTanjungpinang,
several of whose officials are accomplished performers and artists; and
Vivienne Wee and Margaret Kartomi for comments on earlier drafts.
However, I am solely responsible for any remaining faults in the text. I
took the photos in this chapter.

302
 iviENDUT H EATRE PERFORMANCE IN THE NATUNA ISLANDS

Figure 12.2: Raja Ahmad Helmy and his bini (wife), Syarifah Muslihati, Kam-
pung Tambak, Tanjungpinang. Photo Geoffrey Benjamin, 28 November 2014.

Figure 12.4: Dancers rehearsing the 'Bilik 44' ( 44 Rooms) dance in front of
the famous Masjid Raya (Great Mosque) on Pulau Penyengat. Photo: Geoffrey
Benjamin, 10 January 2013.

275
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