Claude Debussy and the Javanese Gamelan

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CD Track 1 Example of Cycle Slide C2 Transition between two gongan House Lights UP Handout outline of form of Topeng Cirebon CD Track 3 Topeng Cirebon (First 2:05) CD Track 3 Topeng Cirebon (first 2:05) Brent Hugh, Page 6 • (2x) The large gong plays every eight beats, marking the beginning of the cycle. • (4x) A smaller gong divides the cycle in half, playing every four beats. • (4x) Yet smaller gongs divide the cycle into fourths. • (8x) An even higher gong will divide the cycle into eighths. • What we hear now are the punctuating instruments. • After a cycle is repeated several times, the drummer gives a signal, and at the large gong beat a new cycle begins. We will now listen to a gamelan piece entitled Topeng Cirebon. As we listen, please follow along in your handout, which outlines the form of the piece and mentions several important events to listen for. We will listen to an excerpt from Topeng Cirebon twice. The first time I will count each beat of each cycle. You might want to follow the number line in the middle of your page and see if you can hear the larger gongs on the most important beats. Example: play Topeng Cirebon This time I will call out the first beat of each cycle (A, B1, B2, etc). You might want to follow the outline on your handout and see if you can notice the different characteristics (under “Notes”) Example: play Topeng Cirebon Topeng Cirebon is a traditional gamelan piece and would be very similar to the gamelan music Debussy actually heard at the 1889 exposition.
Turn Off Slide Projector House Lights DOWN Aspects of Gamelan Music that Influenced Debussy Brent Hugh, Page 7 Now we will examine some of the particular aspects of gamelan music that Debussy admired, and see how he appropriated them and adapted them to his own purposes. Form In the year 1910, over twenty years after he first heard the gamelan at the Paris Exposition, Debussy wrote of “Javanese rhapsodies, which instead of confining themselves in a traditional form, develop according to the fantasy of countless arabesques.” 4 Western tonal music—the “traditional forms” Debussy refers to—is goal oriented; musical forms are carefully designed to “develop” ideas and to move towards climaxes. By contrast, the cycles in gamelan music represent not movement forward in time— progress—but rather the oriental view of endless cycles of history, of death and rebirth, of the rise and fall of empires, cycles that have continued since eternity and will continue into eternity. The gamelan cycle, which may be repeated any number of times and does not develop at all in the Western sense of the word, is a perfect analogue of this static view of history. This static, timeless element became a part of Debussy's music as well. One device that Debussy commonly uses to give this static quality to his music is ostinato. 4 Claude Debussy, (Paris: Bibliotheque Nationale, 1962), p. 30, quoted in Tamagawa, p. 22
Page 1 and 2: CD Tracks 7,8,9 (may use 6,7,8 on O
Page 3 and 4: Slide B2 Gamlan in Pendopo Slide B1
Page 5: Slide B16 Dancers Slide B17 19. Gam
Page 9 and 10: Brent Hugh, Page 9 fragmentary, and
Page 11 and 12: Sound Figure:“Lune” • The mel
Page 13 and 14: CD Track 5 Slendro Scale (plays twi
Page 15 and 16: Slide Goldfish Print Brent Hugh, Pa
Page 17 and 18: Bibliography Brent Hugh, Page 17 Ba

Claude Debussy and the Javanese Gamelan

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