History of our Program
From January of 1999 the students were taught Balinese Gamelan and dance by Nyoman Sumandhi and his wife, Putu Sutiati, two of Bali’s most renowned performing artists who are also uniquely suited to teaching children, Nyoman Sumandhi having been principal of Bali’s performing arts high school and Putu Sutiati being a teacher in Bali’s International School.
Accompanying them were two artists who were not raised in the Balinese culture but who came to know the Balinese performing arts intimately as adults: Kaori Okado, a native of Japan, is a skilled Balinese dancer and musician, and Alexander Khalil, a composer, ethnomusicologist and Balinese gamelan player. These four artists taught the Museum School children two hours a day, four days a week for eight weeks. The children learned Balinese music on an antique set of bronze metallophones known as "Angklung", provided by the Center for World Music, and they were also taught male and female dance pieces. It was of particular importance that the students learned how to accompany dance with live music, which involves the lead musician taking cues from the dancers and then passing them on musically, through drum signals, to the other musicians. The students also learned Kecak, or "Monkey Chorus", a Balinese dramatic form which integrates dance, drama, and a large vocal chorus to tell stories from the Ramayana epic.
As part of their woodshop class some students learned instrument-building and actually built 8 xylophones modeled after Balinese instruments, which they tuned and played themselves.
The students were also given a daily 15 minute class by Dr. Robert E. Brown on Balinese culture and art. These classes included textiles, cuisine, painting and videos on Bali and its culture.
Dr. Robert E. Brown
The first 8 week program culminated in an "Odalan" festival in which the students performed gamelan, dance, and Kecak, processed around the school as part of a traditional ceremony, and cooked Balinese food. During the following week, the Museum School student Gamelan performed as guests at USD and as part of Asian Story Theater’s "3 Dragons" production, giving 11 performances to large audiences of San Diego county school children at the Lyceum Theater in San Diego.
The Museum School children perform at USD
And at the Lyceum Theater
The Museum School Children Put on a Shadow Play
Bpk Sumandhi Puts on a Shadwo play
The Second course, this time 10 weeks long, saw a continuation of the study of Balinese gamelan, the addition of Javanese gamelan (the instruments were loaned to the school by the Center for World Music), and an intensive study of Japanese music. The students were taught shakuhachi in-depth by Kaori Okado and Alexander Khalil, both Taiko drummers and Shakuhachi players. Each of the 50 students started out with a PVC Shakuhachi which had, as yet, no finger holes. After the students learned to blow and overblow this instrument they were given a first hole. The Shakuhachi has its own style of notation, which is in itself a type of calligraphy. The students were introduced to each note and its character as its hole was drilled. In this way the students were able to eventually learn to read and write Japanese musical notation. They composed their own pieces using traditional notation, and were taught step by step, in the traditional Japanese manner which includes graded series of degrees of competence much like the karate system of differently colored belts. The two students whose work was most outstanding were given bamboo flutes donated to the project by Monty Levenson, a well-known shakuhachi maker from Northern CA. Sixteen children reached the highest level in the course by playing the "challenge piece." At the Museum School graduation ceremony, these children were given bamboo flutes and were also given CDs which included themselves playing the challenge piece, "Hotaru" their teachers playing their compositions, a special computer program which helps one learn to play in tune, and a computerized picture gallery of the past 16 weeks. Following that presentation, the students concluded the ceremony by playing both Javanese and Balinese gamelan.
