MELODIES & RHYTHM

Laras

Laras is the kind of notation in gamelan. For the easy discription, in general music, we know an octave that has 8 tone including the higher notation. There are do,re,mi,fa,sol,la,ti,do(the higher octave). So, laras is like an octave in gamelan. About the kind, general music only has one type of notation. But in gamelan, there are two types of notation. We called them with laras Slendro and Pelog. Each laras has different characteristic, so they make the different tone.

Slendro beda karo pelog, ing slendro ora ana angka 4 (papat) karo 7 (pitu). Laras slendro nduwe 5 nada neng masing-masing oktaf, yaiku 1 2 3 5 6 utawa C- D E+ G A lan masing-masing nduwe beda interval swara sing cilik.

Slendro ( read : sléndro)

This laras has 5 tone in an octave. They are 1 , 2 , 3 , 5 , 6 . The name of each tones are same in Javanese language. 1 : panuggal, 2 : gulu, 3 : dhadha , 5 : lima , and 6 : nem. But the pronounciations are different from the name. 1 : siji, 2 : loro, 3 : telu, 5 : lima , and 6 : enem. Sometimes we say the abbreviations. 1 : ji , 2 : ro, 3 : lu, 5 : ma, 6 : nem.

In Javanese language, ‘a' is pronounced ‘o'. So, ‘ma' is pronounced ‘mo' and the ‘e' in ‘nem' is pronounce like the ‘e' in word ‘sing e r'.

In Bali , slendro is played for a song with a minor tone because it's played when the Balineses burn a dead person. Almost Balinese are Hindus and in the religion, every dead people must be burn.

But in Java, it's not for a minor tone. Otherwise, it has a mayor tuning. So, it can be played in wayang show with 3 kinds of pathet : nem, sanga, and manyura.

Pelog ( read : pélog)

This laras has 7 tone in an octave. They are 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 . The pronounciations are same like Slendro. 4 : papat, and 7 : pitu. The abbreviations, 4 : pat, 7 : tu. The tuning are different if they are compared with Slendro.

Pathet

Pathet is the transposition of a notation. In general music, it's like the main accord. For example, the first time we play a song in C. Then, we want to play the song in another main accord in G. We must transpose the accord to G. It means, the main accord change to G. So as in Gamelan. We can change the ‘main accord'. The different is, pathet has some kinds. There are some classification of pathet.

Like pathet in slendro :

Pathet Nem

Generally, it's written as ‘slendro nem'. This pathet is used in the lower tone till the 2 -3 th tone in an octave. It's used in wayang show before the midnight. ­ ­­

Pathet Sanga

Can be written as ‘slendro sanga' which means the slendro nine. This pathet is for 5 th and 1 st tone. This pathet is used as an interspace in pelog pathet nem in wayang show when beginning of night till the night.

Pathet Manyura

This pathet is for the 6, 2, and 3 th as the basic tone. The tone in Pathet Manyura is higher than in others. This pathet is used in the morning, beginning of night, and for special ceremonies.

And also in the laras pelog, there are:

• Pelog patet lima
• Pelog patet nem
• Pelog patet barong

Gendhing

Generally, Gendhing is a composition in gamelan. The rhythm, beat of kendhang, and gongan . But we can say also that gendhing is a song which is played by the gamelan instruments. Gendhing structure has 4 types : gendhing, lancaran, ladrang, and ketawang

Gendhing

Gendhing have two parts, a merong and a minggah (or "inggah").

Merong

Merong is one of Gendhing sections and it's the longest gamelan composition. It has musical ensemble that includes xylophones, drums, and gongs. Merong must be followed by Minggah, the other section of gendhing that may also takes ladrang. There are a single gongan and four kenongan as the ending. The merong section may include a ngelik , which would also have the length of a single gongan.

Merong are classified according to the number of kethuk strokes in nongan in each section and doesn't use kempyang or kempul. There are two pattern of it, they are arang, the infrequent pattern and kerep, the frequent pattern. The kethuk plays only at the end of gatra.

These are the example of Merong structure :

...T .... ...T ...N

...T .... ...T ...N

...T .... ...T ...N

...T .... ...T ...G

T indicates the kethuk
N for the Kenong
G for the gong and kenong

".” indicates the punctuation, where neither kethuk,kenong, nor gong don't play
Gong plays once, Kenong is divided into four parts

And another example :

.... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... ...N

.... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... ...N

.... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... ...N

.... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... .... .... ...T .... ...G

The nongan last 16 gatras (64 beats totally) and gongan 64 gatras (256 beats totally). The indications are same lke before. That structure has a slow tempo with a singla gongan that last many minutes.

Minggah

Minggah is the other gamelan section. It follows merong after the ompak. Minggah uses the kempyak and it plays with kethuk in the same pattern as in ketawang, but without kempul and kenong, only gong ageng plays in ketawang. In minggah, there will be four gatras in each nongan.

This is the sturcture of Minggah :

pTp. pTp. pTp. pTpN

pTp. pTp. pTp. pTpN

pTp. pTp. pTp. pTpN

pTp. pTp. pTp. pTpG

P indicates the kempyang
T for the kethuk
N for the kenong
G for the gong
".” indicates the punctuation, where neither kethuk,kenong, nor gong don't play

Every Minggah consist of one gongan with four nongan. But Minggah may also use the other structure, especially ladrang. So, the piece will be called as “minggah ladrang”.

Lancaran

It is the shortest of the gendhing structures. This structure is grouped into four. The basic colotomic structure is a cycle of 16 beats :

TWTN TPTN TPTN TPTG

T indicates the ketuk
P the kempul
N the kenong
G the gong.
W indicates the wela the pause where the kempul is omitted.

The gong plays once, the kenong divides that into four parts, the kempul divides each of those in two, and the ketuk divides each of those further in two. Note that except for the kenong playing on the gong, the instruments do not play when the next one plays. The kendhang plays in kendhang kalih style. A typical lancaran has four gongs, at the end the larger gong named gong ageng is played.

The rhythm of lancaran is played fast in irama lancar. From the language, lancar means fast in Javanese. Lancaran are often written in balungan nibani. Balungan nibani have special structure that uses rests which is symboled with dots between each note and having notes only on the strong beats. This is the example :

.5.2 .3.5

Gangsaran and bubaran are related structures that share the same colotomic structure.

Bubaran is played at the end while the audience starts to depart. It's played with a certain mode, usually in Irama tanggung that saron panerus plays twice per balungan note or balungan mlaku that don't have rests. This is the example :

2321 3123

The best-known bubaran is Udan Mas . Udan Mas means golden rain linguistically. It's popular in Central Java, especially in Yogyakarta . This bubaran can be played in a various pathet, including pélog pathet barang and nem, and sléndro pathet sanga and nem. It can also be played either in lancaran or a ladrang, with related balungan.

Gangsaran is a variety of lancaran which consists of simply a repeated tone and appears at the end of a composition.

Ladrang

The basic colotomic structure is a cycle of 32 beats :

pTpW pTpN pTpP pTpN pTpP pTpN pTpP pTpG

p indicates the kempyang
T the ketuk
P the kempul
N the kenong
G the gong
W indicates the wela, the pause where the kempul is omitted.

The gong plays once, the kenong divides that into four parts, the kempul divides each of those in two, the ketuk divides each of those in two, and the kempyang divides each of those in two.

The ladrang is resemble ketawang but the different is that four nongan comprise a gongan. It is also similar to the lancaran, but it's slower, and the kempyang plays in between each beat of the lancaran.

Ladrang have two sections. They are ompak and a ngelik, which specially have last one gongan. Ladrang can be played in any irama except in lancaran.

Ompak

Ompak or umpak is as the bridge in a section of gamelan composition, refers to opening of gongan of ladrang or ketawang. It has four gongans in lancaran. These sections are often repeated and also can called the “bubuka gendhing”. Ompak can also refers as the bridge which separate the gendhing sections, between merong and minggah. Usually consists one or two nongan, or sometimes whole gongan. The balungan may be different from the regular merong but the kendhang pattern is always different. The tempo of kendhang often increase to indicates the changing to ompak or to change the irama.

Ngelik

Ngelik or lik is nother gamelan composition that contrast from ompak and merong. The ngelik has higher picth an usually gerong sings the main melody of the composition. As many ketawang have the same ompak, the ngelik canbe the main determinant of what piece is.

In length, Ngelik is various. Usually longer than the surrounding ompak in ketawang. The same length as ompak in ladrang, and the same length as merong in gendhing.

Ketawang

Its colotomic structure is:

pTpW pTpN pTpP pTpG

p indicates the kempyang
T for the kethuk
N for kenong
G for gong and kenong
W for wela, the pause where the kempul is omitted

Thus, the gong plays once, the kenong divides that into two parts, the kempul (or wela) divides each of those in two, the ketuk divides each of those further in two, and finally the kempyang divides each of those in two.

Ketawang usually have the specific form of an ompak that lasts one gongan and may be repeated several times, and a ngelik that may last three or four gongan. Some ketawang have the same ompak but different ngelik. Ketawang often begin in irama tanggung and then slow down to irama dadi or slower.

The ketawang developed in the court of Prince Mangkunegara IV (1853-1881) of Surakarta .

- These are some other type of gendhing :

• Gendhing Laras Pélog Pathet Lima
• Gendhing Laras Pélog Pathet Nem
• Gendhing Laras Pélog Pathet Barang
• Gending Laras sléndro pathet nem
• Gending Laras sléndro pathet sanga
• Gending Laras sléndro pathet manyura
• Gerongan Laras sléndro pathet nem
• Gerongan Laras slendro pathet sanga
• Gerongan Laras slendro pathet manyura
• Gerongan Laras Pelog Pathet Nem
• Gerongan Laras Pelog Pathet Barang

The various type of   Gendhing Laras Pelog Pathet Lima

Tembang

Tembang is nearly like gendhing. But tembang is a song which is sang by a singer. Person who sing in gamelan play is pesinden or sinden. Tembangs are often sang by sinden in the same time when the gamelan plays. Usually, Javanese gamelan is accompanied by the Javanese tembang while it plays.

Javanese tembang has rules in it. There are some terminologies in Javanese that related to the rules. To make it easy, pretend tembang is like a poem. Every tembang always has pada (couplet), and pada association is called pupuh . The important thing, every tembang has guru gatra (the quantity of row in tembang), guru wilangan ( the quantity of syllable in every row), and guru lagu ( the ending vocal in each row). The total of guru wilangan in each row is 4 up to 12 syllable.

These are the examples of some Javanese tembang and the rules that usually written like this :

Mijil : 6 gatra (10i, 6o, 10e, 10i, 6i, 6u)
Wirangrong : 6 gatra (8i, 8o, 10u, 6i, 7a, 8a)
Pocung : 4 gatra ( 12u, 6a, 8i, 12a)

Tembang Mijil has 6 rows in tembang. The first row has 10 syllables and the last vocal is i . The second row has 6 syllables and the last vocal is e . And so on. These rules are avaible in all Javanese tembang.

There are some kinds of Javanese tembang in the new version:

•  Tembang Gedhe

The examples of tembang: Mintajiwa, Kumudasmara, and Citramengeng.

•  Tembang Tengahan

There are some rules in this tembang. It has guru gatra, guru wilangan, and guru lagu.

The examples of tembang :
Juru demung : 7 gatra (8a, 8u, 8u, 8a, 8u, 8a, 8u)
Balabak : 6 gatra (12a, 3e, 12d, 3d, 12a, 3e)
Wirangrong : 6 gatra (8i, 8o, 10u, 6i, 7a, 8a)

•  Tembang Cilik/macapat

This tembang tells about the story of human beings. From the unborn child, till the death. Tembang Macapat is divided to 11 tembang. Each tembang tells about human being's phase in life. They are

Maskumambang : Unborn child that still in its mother's womb
Mijil : When a child is born
Kinanthi : Human as a child starts to know the world, starts to be taught how to walk.
Sinom : Child grows to be a teenager, a phase to be adult.
Asmaradana : In this phase, the child changes to be more adultly and not going to be a child anymore because this phase tells about when a human falls in love.
Gambuh : After falling in love, this person is married.
Dhandanggula : This phase describes the happiness of human, in a adequate family with a child.
Durma : During the happiness, a human has compassionate to give each other. It's because of the religion and humanity.
Pangkur : Pangkur word is from the word mungkur in Javanese that means holding desire after getting happiness and making good deeds.
Megatruh : The death comes, humans end their life.
Pocung or Pucung : This is the last phase. According to Javanese tradition, a dead people must be shrouded of unbleached cotton. So, Pocung is when a human is ready to be buried.

This is the example of tembang Dandanggula with its rules :

Yen wong anom ingkang anastiti,
Tan mangkana ing pamanggihira
Den wulang ibu ramane,
asila anem ayun,
wong tuwane kinarya Gusti,
lunga teka anembah
iku budi luhung
serta bekti ing sukma,
hiya iku kang karya pati lan urip
miwah sandhang lan pangan

Guru gatra : 10. It has 10 rows in the tembang.
Guru wilangan and lagu : (10i, 10a, 8e, 7u, 9i, 7a, 6u, 8a, 12e, 7a). It means, the first row has 10 syllables and the last vocal is i in the word anastit i . Other explaination, the fourth row has 7 syllable and the last vocal is u in the word ay u n.

The tembang is in Javanese. This is the translation in english mainly :

The young people who be careful,
it's because of their parents who creed
and teach them about sensibleness, devotion in soul,
and to be the slave of the God who dominates life and death,
and who gives prosperity.