Sonic Liminalities of Faith in Sundanese Vocal Music Sean Williams Evergreen State College

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Volume 4 Number 1 Voice, Media, and Technologies of the Article 4 Sacred

2018 Sonic Liminalities of Faith in Sundanese Vocal Music Sean Williams Evergreen State College

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Recommended Citation Williams, Sean (2018) "Sonic Liminalities of Faith in Sundanese Vocal Music," Yale Journal of Music & Religion: Vol. 4: No. 1, Article 4. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17132/2377-231X.1091

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. It has been accepted for inclusion in Yale Journal of Music & Religion by an authorized editor of EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Sonic Liminalities of Faith in Sundanese Vocal Music Sean Williams

Sundanese sung poetry of West Java, Indo- markers, it is no surprise that the national nesia, has long represented a rich set of elite motto “Bhinneka Tunggal Ika” (Unity in values that often reflect Hindu, Buddhist, and diversity) is based on the lived experience of its animist ways of understanding the world. In a citizens. In their introduction to Divine region known for its current adherence to Inspirations: Music and Islam in Indonesia, Islam, the continuing presence of songs that coauthors/editors Anne K. Rasmussen and directly reference Hindu deities and narratives David D. Harnish note that “[some com- from hundreds of years ago seems like both a munities] embrace unique mixes of select startling anachronism and a commentary on Islamic principles with Hindu-Buddhist or the ways in which song can transcend con- indigenous animist practices.”2 Though Islam temporary religious and political identities. came to the Sundanese region hundreds of This article has as its focus the changing years ago, it encountered a foundation of relationship between Hinduism and Islam as Hindu-Buddhism deeply connected with local manifested in the performance of two animism.3 As is often the case in Indonesia, Sundanese songs—Ceurik Rahwana (The tears the practice of Sundanese belief tends to be of Rahwana) and Hamdan (The praised one)— layered, with little separation between religions, over thirty years of study of tembang Sunda, a leading to easy justification for their genre primarily associated with the hereditary coexistence. These codependent systems of aristocracy. In examining a song that reveals an faith allow multiple points of access to the older local connection to Hinduism (Ceurik sacred. Rahwana) and contrasting it with a contemporary popular song reflective of Muslim Liminal Beliefs among the Sundanese beliefs (Hamdan), the article highlights the The Sundanese are Indonesia’s second most overall changes in a musical genre and the ways populous ethnic group. Inhabiting the island of in which those changes are indicative of Java, just south of the nation’s capital, Jakarta, changes in Sundanese society. 1 Furthermore, they bear some similarities in language and the article reveals the ways in which the singers culture to their neighbors to the east, the who perform the songs reflect a liminal level of Javanese.4 Historically associated with Hindu- engagement with Hindu and Muslim cosmologies, respectively, in both lyrical and musical materials. Because Indonesia is renowned for the 2 David D. Harnish and Anne K. Rasmussen, eds., diversity of its people, its beliefs, its perform- “Introduction: The World of Islam in the Music of ing arts, its bioregions, and other important Indonesia,” in Divine Inspirations: Music and Islam in Indonesia (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 7. 3 Robert Wessing, “Sundanese,” in Muslim Peoples: A 1 The author wishes to gratefully acknowledge the World Ethnographic Survey, vol. 2, ed. Richard Weekes skills of Viviane Sukanda-Tessier in her translations of (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1984), 730. the songs Ceurik Rahwana and Kulu-Kulu Bem, which 4 The Sundanese number approximately 40 million; appear in the liner notes of the compact disc Tembang the Javanese, on the same island but further east, number Sunda: Sundanese Classical Songs (Nimbus NI 5378, 1993). over 100 million.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 43 Buddhist practices, 5 the Sundanese became older spirituality that includes ancestor worship adherents to Islam in a gradual process that and reverence for the natural world, including remains somewhat incomplete, based on some animals such as tigers and birds.7 This is the of their folkloric and ritualistic practices. Since Sundanese foundational belief system, overlaid the end of the twentieth century, however, with layers of other religious traditions and much of western Indonesian—and, by practices. Influences from Hinduism began to extension, Sundanese—culture has tended to appear by the first century c.e., and Buddhism emphasize the influences of Islam and de- was established locally by the sixth century. In emphasize the vestiges of Hinduism and general, the influence of Hinduism is part of a Buddhism. As the Sundanese have come to larger syncretic pattern that affected all of Java lean on increasingly outward expressions of by the tenth century.8 Islam is estimated to their Islamic faith—through the use of the have arrived in Sundanese territory by the Islamic headscarf and specific kinaesthetic cues fourteenth century c.e.,9 becoming established to one another, as well as through musical by the eighteenth century. means—it has been Sundanese women who The golden age of Sundanese cultural have consistently provided the most public history is locally believed to have arisen during expressions of West Java’s increasing Islam- the Hindu kingdom of Pajajaran (1333–1579). ization. Among those women who sing, re- This was a time of economic interdependence gardless of the genre, the presentation of and strength for the Sundanese, as the area’s beliefs, priorities, and faith traditions are on full pre-Islamic highland regions developed a rich display through both the lyrics and the musical trading culture. Although the area’s leadership elements of the songs. As Anne Rasmussen was continually in competition and sometimes points out, Indonesian women are significantly conflict with Majapahit, the East Javanese involved in public and popular expressions of Hindu kingdom, the era is seen as a time of Islam;6 as visual signifiers of Islamic identity in considerable health and prosperity, and of both rural and urban regions of West Java, connectedness with both the spirit world and women publicly delineate boundaries of belief. the ancestors. In short, it is the time that Locally sung poetry of various types tends people remember most fondly through the to highlight elements of Sundanese history performance of tembang Sunda songs.10 (animist and Hindu-Buddhist), the natural Javanese rulers colonized the Sundanese world, spirituality, and heartache. With a highlands after a battle (Pasunda Bubat) landscape that features volcanoes, rice fields, bamboo and conifer forests, and significant 7 See Robert Wessing, Robert, The Soul of Ambiguity: rivers and hot springs, it is a small step to The Tiger in Southeast Asia, Monograph Series on South- east Asia, Special Report No. 24 (DeKalb: Northern imagining the ways in which some of these Illinois University Center for Southeast Asian Studies, important natural resources might appear in 1986). songs, and how they might connect with an 8 Richard Tarling, The Cambridge History of Southeast Asia, vol. 1: From Early Times to c. 1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 178. 5 Wim Van Zanten, Sundanese Music in the Cianjuran 9 M. C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c. Style (Providence, RI: Foris Publications, 1989), 45. 1300, 2nd ed. (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 6 Anne K. Rasmussen, Women, the Recited Qur’an, and 1993), 4. Islamic Music in Indonesia (Berkeley: University of Calif- 10 Van Zanten, Sundanese Music in the Cianjuran Style, ornia Press, 2010), 16. 71.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 44 between Majapahit and Pajajaran in 1357. The religious traditions—with deep influences from later collapse of Pajajaran in the sixteenth much older animist beliefs—that work century occurred just as Islamic ideas and specifically in a Sundanese context. For ex- beliefs were becoming established in Central ample, the Sundanese play several types of Java in the kingdom of Mataram. The Dutch gamelan (bronze gong-chime) ensembles, which East India Company gained control over the date from pre-Islamic days. They also play Sundanese highlands in 1677, when the tuned bamboo rattles called angklung, which Javanese ruler of the Mataram kingdom ceded invoke the rice goddess, Nyi Pohaci (or Dewi the region to them as part of a favor he owed. Sri), in order to ensure the continuing fertility That territorial gain provided the company of the rice fields upon which their lives with much-needed plantations for tea, indigo, depend. The rice goddess functions as a liminal coffee, and other trade goods. One of the ways figure between animism and Hinduism; she in which the Dutch (who ultimately national- simultaneously features prominently in the ized the Dutch East India Company in 1800) earliest Sundanese origin myths, while having furthered their aim of colonization in the taken on the name of the more recently region was to support local performing arts imported Hindu goddess of agriculture.12 and the layers of social hierarchies, including in Mainstream Sundanese Muslims are not West Java. 11 This support—financial, social, Hindu, but their history does include Hindu- and political—kept the Sundanese class levels ism, Buddhism, and animism. In understand- in place. The hereditary aristocrats learned to ing contemporary Sundanese usage of tembang speak Dutch as well as Sundanese, and many Sunda and its inclusion of frequent references were able to function fluidly in colonial society to the Hindu kingdom of Pajajaran, however, it as local rulers under colonial law. Because the is helpful to remember that many adherents to Dutch were interested primarily in local natural Sundanese Islam continue to appreciate aspects resources rather than in large-scale religious of their collective past that help them to feel conversion, the Sundanese maintained their strong, locally vibrant, and sophisticated. If that layered religious practices of animism, Hindu- past includes references to Hinduism, and if Buddhism, and Islam for several hundred celebrating Pajajaran as the golden era of years. Sundanese culture serves as a uniting element By the late nineteenth and early twentieth among the Sundanese, then contemporary centuries, many of the forms of Sundanese Muslims will include it in their cultural per- performing arts that are still performed today formance practices. were becoming established and codified; When Indonesia declared its independence among them were genres that tended to in 1945, the old system of arts patronage under celebrate animistic or Hindu-based mystic the Dutch collapsed; many instrumentalists and spirituality side by side with those more closely singers moved into the regional colonial capital aligned with Islamic viewpoints. This musical city of Bandung to find work. As a result of syncretism reflects a local blend of both that dramatic shift, formerly royal genres

12 Robert Wessing, “Bamboo, Rice, and Water,” in 11 Ernst Heins, “Goong Renteng: Aspects of Orch- The Garland Encyclopedia of Music, vol. 4: Southeast Asia, ed. estral Music in a Sundanese Village” (Ph.D. diss., Univer- Terry E. Miller and Sean Williams (New York: Garland, sity of Amsterdam, 1977), 36. 1998), 52.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 45 became associated with the city, including most deserving of the past spiritual glories of tembang Sunda. The hereditary aristocracy that Pajajaran, transmitted to the present.14 had supported the performance of sung poetry Sundanese society has historically been since at least the nineteenth century set down divided into different levels; these levels new roots in the post-colonial regional include divisions in language, kinaesthetic sig- government, and in that chaotic milieu, its nifiers of status such as body language, and performers and enthusiasts celebrated what sound. Sundanese societal divisions are reflect- they remembered of their aristocratic Hindu ed in musical choices. Among the dozens of past through performances of tembang Sunda. locally generated musical performance prac- By the end of the twentieth century, much of tices, tembang Sunda is most closely connected Indonesian society was moving toward an to the upper classes. In its contemporary con- increasingly conservative Islamization that text of connecting the upper classes to the time called its longstanding syncretic religious prac- of Hindu gods and, further back, a spiritual tices into question. connection with animist elements such as tigers, tembang Sunda embodies the continuing Tembang Sunda in Theory and Practice stratification of Sundanese society without necessarily making it explicitly Hindu. Tembang Sunda—the genre featuring aristocratic sung poetry accompanied by the boat-shaped kacapi zither and suling bamboo flute—is one of the primary sonic tools used for remem- bering—and commemorating—the feudal era of Hindu Pajajaran (see Fig. 1). Wim Van Zanten describes tembang Sunda as a “mystical practice conducted not by seclusion but rather by doing things properly in daily life.”13 The proper performance of tembang Sunda includes local customs of politeness, standards of performance that are upheld by competitions and specific teachers, and the use of precisely detailed systems of vocal ornamentation, in- strumental choices, and behaviors. Tembang Sunda simultaneously reinforces the class divisions between members of Sundanese society, and celebrates the highest classes as the people

13 Wim Van Zanten, “The Discourse on Islam and 14 Upon hearing the news that the author was Music in West Java, with Emphasis on the Music Group, studying tembang Sunda, multiple Sundanese people on Ath-Thawaf,” in Divine Inspirations: Music and Islam in separate occasions burst into song, singing the word Indonesia, ed. David D. Harnish and Anne K. Rasmussen Pajajaran, which—not coincidentally—begins the first (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 244. song of the evening.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 46 Figure 1: Tembang Sunda vocalists Teti Affienti, Mamah Dasimah, and Tintin Suparyani (left to right), accompanied by Rukruk Rukmana on the kacapi zither and Burhan Sukarma on the suling flute.

In its intimate, late-night performance contexts words, the evening performance is set in a with just a few insiders present, tembang Sunda is context that celebrates and honors the Hindu intended to celebrate all that is good about the past, not the Muslim present. Van Zanten Hindu past—for the upper levels of society— notes that “in tembang Sunda songs with even as it laments love lost in the present, historical references it is mainly the Hindu which on the surface level represents a risk for kingdoms that are mentioned. The historical the members of society as a whole. On a events after about 1600 are hardly com- deeper level, love lost reflects a type of longing memorated in the texts. Apparently, the poets for spiritual connection with one’s ancestors were not inspired by this period of colon- and with God. ization by the Javanese and the Dutch.”15 An evening of tembang Sunda often begins What follows is a series of sets of songs: with the performance of Lagu Rajah (Song of one or more free-meter songs, often focused the king), to ask permission for performing on Sundanese history (both literal and mytho- from the Hindu ancestors. Next, before be- logical), followed by a single fixed-meter song ginning the first set of songs in pélog tuning, the that usually connects heartache with an aspect singer—usually female—sings, “Daweung mé- of the natural world. For example, in the nak Pajajaran” (Now we will consider the noblemen/god-kings of Pajajaran). In other 15 Van Zanten, Sundanese Music in the Cianjuran Style, 77.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 47 historical song Salaka Domas, a very powerful In the performance of tembang Sunda, both man wants to fight against every weapon or the lyrics and the performance practices reflect opponent he encounters. Sundanese instru- an outer manifestation (lahir) of a deeper and mentalists and singers both describe this more important inner life (batin). The subject man—like them, the descendent of the very of many lively Sundanese discussions, these powerful King Siliwangi—as “the modern two concepts revolve around the idea of public Sundanese man, hampered by his current and private belief systems. When the Islamic circumstances but ready to spring into action at holy month of Ramadan comes to a close, a moment’s notice to defend himself and his many Sundanese people send cards with the nagara, or Sundanese nation-state.” 16 More phrase “mohon ma’af lahir dan batin”—asking directly, on five separate circumstances during forgiveness not only for one’s physical and multiple experiences of fieldwork in West Java, emotional wrongdoings, but also for both the author heard men in positions of power intentional and unintentional errors. On that referring to themselves, specifically, as “King final day of Ramadan (known as Lebaran), Siliwangi.” King Siliwangi was the last ruler of people visit friends, family, and important Pajajaran, and his disappearance—rather than people in the neighborhood to wish each other his death—has led generations of Sundanese to well and to ask forgiveness. In these words and believe that he will return one day, as strong as actions, there is an understanding that humans ever. Van Zanten states that “most noble fami- have an inner life and an outward manifes- lies claim to descend from King Siliwangi.”17 tation of that inner life, and that the two may Kadia banteng bayangan be different in character. Sinatria pilih tanding Because so many songs celebrate both the Toh pati jiwa jeung raga mundane and the spiritual, the corporeal and Seja angkat mapag jurit the emotional, and the power of the natural Najan di luhur langit world (including frequent use of the words lahir Hamo burung rek disusul sumujud ka ingkang rama and batin), it is clear that Sundanese composers Prabu Agung Siliwangi and musicians acknowledge the connection Layang domas, layang domas between the two. That the sound of the Didamel jimat nagara. instruments and the sung poetry serve to weave those two together is an important tran- Like a fabulous [mythical] water buffalo A heroic figure without peer scendent function for the genre. Sacrificing his soul and his body The kacapi zither functions as a type of Ready to depart in search of war spiritual gatekeeper or kuncen in that by Even at the highest reaches of the sky supporting the work of the singer, it connects It will be sought out contemporary urbanites with aspects of their He will pay his respects to his father 18 The great King Siliwangi rural past. Its boat shape, referred to as an [layang domas = powerful heirloom] “ancestral ship” by kacapi player Rukruk Made as a symbol of the nation. Rukmana, is said to carry people back to the time of the ancestors when they listen to it, 16 Sean Williams, The Sound of the Ancestral Ship: regardless of the context. In referring to it as a Highland Music of West Java (New York: Oxford Univer- sity Press, 2001), 221. 17 Van Zanten, Sundanese Music in the Cianjuran Style, 78. 18 Williams, The Sound of the Ancestral Ship, 212.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 48 kuncen, or key-bearer, players note that it serves of houses and stages in this matrilocal the function of a guard of a sacred place. society—women are the ones making the Someone who plays the kacapi is the one change in this Hindu-based repertoire through who—together with the singer—serves as a the musical incorporation of Islam. go-between. An evening of tembang Sunda goes through Celebrating the Hindu Past with Ceurik several different subgenres (papantunan, Rahwana jejemplangan, dedegungan, and panambih) and at The two great Hindu epics—the Mahabharata least two (if not three) different modes (pélog, and the Ramayana—are performed all over sorog, and saléndro). It is the songs of the Southeast Asia, and West Java is no exception. papantunan subgenre—the oldest, most histor- The Ramayana in particular appears in various ical of the subgenres—that tend to highlight Sundanese performing arts in a variety of ways, the Hindu past, the golden era of Pajajaran, one example of which is in tembang Sunda. In and the connection of the Sundanese rural past the story, the king Rama and his brother chase with the present. They are considered very after a golden deer that Rama’s wife, Sinta, difficult to sing in terms of technique, vocal desires, leaving her vulnerable. She is tricked pressure, and ornamentation, and are quite and abducted by Rahwana, and—after a serious in content. The modes of pélog, sorog, significant battle—is reunited with her and saléndro reflect the time of night, mood, husband.20 It is a popular story and, like the lyric content, instrument tuning, and song Mahabharata, is often divided into small pieces, choices.19 Papantunan songs are always perform- performed in sections because everyone is ed in the pélog mode, at the beginning of the familiar with the entirety of the story. evening. Songs from the other subgenres tend The tembang Sunda song Ceurik Rahwana to highlight love and loss; they are saved for (Tears of Rahwana) highlights the moment in later performance in the evening. They may be the Ramayana Hindu epic when Rahwana, in pélog or sorog or, more rarely, in saléndro. struck down by King Rama, comes home at However, only the papantunan songs reflect an the edge of death and apologizes to his wife, orientation toward or acknowledgment of Banondari. Rahwana (known as Ravana in Hinduism. India) begs her forgiveness for the fate that led The incorporation into tembang Sunda per- him to pursue another woman. After formance practice of a popular song cele- Rahwana’s death, Banondari sings a lament brating Islamic elements has begun not only to titled Kulu-Kulu Bem, in which she begs him not alter the specifically Hindu aspects of the to leave her. Within the tembang Sunda genre, genre, but also to cause a shift in genre-based Ceurik Rahwana is an important song requiring class distinctions. Just as women form the both a male and a female singer with significant foundation of the Sundanese home—celebra- vocal skills. Its presence—and the presence of ting the Hindu rice goddess with small shrines other specifically Hindu songs—in Sundanese in their kitchens, and dominating the interiors musical life has colored the ways in which tembang Sunda performers and audience 19 The pélog mode uses the equivalents of the pitches F, A, B-flat, C, and E. Sorog uses the pitches F, A, B-flat, D, and E. Saléndro uses a relatively equidistant tuning of 20 These two sentences may well serve as the F, G-sharp, B-flat, C, and D-sharp. shortest summary of the Ramayana in print.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 49 members think of the Ramayana, yet it is only in vibrato). The places of strong vibrato usage in Sundanese music that Rahwana experiences performance practice are referred to as tekanan, regret, asks for forgiveness, and weeps. In or pressure. These technical features are every other rendition of the Ramayana, he dies important aspects of tembang Sunda perfor- after the battle with Rama. mance practice. Ceurik Rahwana (and Kulu-Kulu Bem, Banondari’s lament that follows it) was written Rahwana: by a woman, Saodah Harnadi Natakusumah Banondari anu lucu, bojo kakang anu geulis (1922–1981). It engages the Hindu Ramayana (geuning, duh anu geulis) epic in ways unique to Sundanese culture, Kadieu sakeudeung geuwat, akang rek mere pepeling reflecting a locally relevant ethos. According to (aduh geulis, mere pepeling) Geura sambat indung bapa, samemeh akang pinasti. kacapi player Rukruk Rukmana, this song is the only one that “allows Rahwana to express his Banondari who is beautiful, wife of mine who emotions, which include irritation, joy, losing is lovely (oh, who is lovely) one’s patience, grief, and the fear of crying.”21 Here, just a second, emergency, I wish to give a In the lyrics, Rahwana says that he is fated to message (oh lovely, give a message) Go summon mother and father before I perish. die, but before he perishes, he begs to be forgiven, body and soul. He says he was drawn Banondari: to another, enchanted by Sinta, and—in a nod Aduh engkang buah kalbu sembaheun lahir jeung to the Hindu belief in karmic retribution—that batin (geuning, lahir jeung batin) the suffering one inflicts on others returns to Aya naon pengeresa tara-tara ti sasari (aduh geuning, ti sasari) oneself. The fact that Ms. Natakusumah led the Nyauran ragrag cisoca, abdi mah saredih teuing. tembang Sunda ensemble at Radio Republik Indonesia in Bandung from 1950 to 1958, and Oh beloved fruit of my heart, dedicated body was a respected composer of many songs and and soul (oh, body and soul) an accomplished performer, meant that her How should one feel from now on? (oh, from now on) compositions and choices of songs to perform Calling, streaming down tears, I am far more had a strong impact on the development of the than sad. genre during the middle of the twentieth century. Rahwana: In the accompanying transcription of Aduh Enung anu ayu nu geulis pupujan ati (geulis, pupujan ati) Ceurik Rahwana (Ex. 1), please assume that Akang tangtu ngababatang, samemeh akang pinasti there is much more than meets the eye. (aduh geulis, akang pinasti) Sundanese vocal music has five named types of Arek menta dihampura, lahir tumeka ing batin. vibrato, each of which occurs in specific places in this song. For example, in certain places, the Oh Darling who is so delicate, who is so lovely, praiseworthy heart vibrato sounds as if the singer is punching out I am fated to die, but before I perish (oh my notes in rapid succession (renghak), while in lovely, I perish) other places there is an actual rapid microtonal Let it be that I ask to be forgiven, body as well pitch variation (vibra, from the English word as soul.

21 Rukruk Rukmana, personal communication with the author.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 50 Banondari: First verse: Duh engkang panutan kalbu, teu kiat abdi wawarti Geuning bet siga balebat, sumping teh ngan sajorelat (geuning, abdi wawarti) (duh) sumping teh ngan sajorelat Ulah sok ngumbar amarah antukna kaluli-luli Padahal ditunggu lami, dianti-anti ti wengi manis (aduh, geuning, kaluli-luli) dianti-anti ti wengi Nu matak mawa cilaka, kaduhung ngajadi bukti. Engke ulah waka angkat, ulah waka kebat ngejat dunungan, ulah wakada kebat ngejat; Oh you object of my heart, I am not strong, I warn you (I warn you) Just like dawn-rays, his presence was only brief Don't so follow anger, resulting in forgetting all (oh), his presence was only brief (oh, forgetting all) After all I waited for long, waiting since last Which apparently leads to catastrophe, regret night, love, waiting since last night becomes proof. Wait, don’t just leave, don't just hurry to depart my lord, don’t just hurry to depart; Rahwana: Kaduhung kakang kaduhung, kataji nu lain-lain Horeng ari nu nungguan tetela ambon sorangan (geulis, nu lain-lain) Sugan teh rek dipitineung, sugan teh rek dipiheman, Kaiwat goda rancana, kagembang ku Sintawati dunungan (aduh geulis, ku Sintawati) Manis, duh, horeng ngan ukur saliwat, ngan ukur Geuning kieu karasan, malindes malik ka diri. matak tibelat.

Regret, I regret, I was drawn by an Here is one who waits for one-sided affection extraordinary other (an extraordinary other) One would hope to be remembered, one Ensnared seduced temptation, enchanted by would hope to be loved, my lord Sita (oh lovely, by Sita) Beloved, oh, here [and gone] just like lightning, This is how it feels, the suffering [that one just like a memory inflicts] returns to oneself. Manis, ke heula atuh ke heula iklas teh kabina-bina Lah, alah . . . ulah miyuni balebat endah basa Banondari’s lament, Kulu-Kulu Bem, follows; it is samemeh liwat very challenging to sing because of its broad Ke heula atuh antosan, ulah waka luluasan, ayeuna range and vocal ornamentation, but the women mah geuning, ulah waka luluasan. who know it and listen to it have told me that they could only wish for such a heartfelt Beloved, oh, first wait, oh, first wait; apparently I have been too nice apology from their own straying husbands. In Ah, oh . . . don’t become like dawn-rays: this lament Bonandari uses liminal imagery beautiful just before they depart from the natural world, such as the rays of the First wait oh wait, don’t just go onward (Lord dawn and flashes of lightning, to describe his sir), now don’t just go onward. presence, his abrupt end, and ultimately his Second verse: disappearance from her life. She hopes only to Cimata abdi saksina yen abdi lama satia (duh), yen be remembered with love. The lyrics are added abdi lama satia here because Kulu-Kulu Bem, in its historical Yeuh badan abdi buktina, kapan sakieu resakna, connection with Ceurik Rahwana, is another manis, kapan sakieu resakna, geuning point that sets the Ramayana story apart from Hate teh awut-awutan ku lami puyang-payengan, dunungan, ku lami puyang-payengan. all other (non-Sundanese) performances. My tears are my witness to my long loyalty (oh), to my long loyalty

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 51 Oh my body is the proof, when it’s breaking, dying; those tears are the sign of his final sweetheart when it’s breaking defeat. My heart is all confused because we are long torn apart, lord, long torn apart. Understanding Hamdan Kapan saur ti kapungkur, dagoan satutup umur Ayeuna abdi ngantosan, sugan nu nilar rek mulang, The related genre of kawih, which is also geuning accompanied by a zither and (sometimes) other Manis, duh, sugan teh jangji rek jadi, mo gajlig, ti instruments, is believed to be older than saur tadi. tembang Sunda at least partly because term is mentioned in some of the earliest texts, written When it was said from before, [we would be as 22 one until] the close of life on palm leaves. While the original meaning of Now I wait; maybe the one who left will come kawih was close to the idea of knowledge or home skill, and it was the earliest word used to refer Sweetheart, maybe the promise will come true, to Sundanese singing, in contemporary usage it you can’t go back on your promise. denotes (primarily) fixed-meter popular sung Manis, kukupu gegeleberan sugan teh anu ngiberan poetry performed primarily by women. It is Lah, alah . . . Rek sumping nu diantosan jangji teh locally considered in contrast to the more rek ditedunan refined genre of tembang Sunda, and its Sataun abdi ngantosan, geura paparin putusan performance practices accordingly use less (panutan) elevated language, vocal skills, and imagery. Ayeuna mah, geuning, geura paparin putusan. Furthermore, the genre is open to new Sweetheart, a butterfly flutters past, maybe compositions, lively kacapi playing and singing, someone might come and a continual infusion of popular influences. Ah, oh . . . He who is awaited will come [and In its lyrical content it is much more flexible in the] promise will be kept that it can refer to contemporary themes A year I have been waiting, let it pass quickly, this separation (immediately) outside the traditional boundaries of tembang Now let it pass quickly, this separation. Sunda. In doing so, the genre of kawih speaks to a much larger population than the much In discussing this song with various Sun- more closely circumscribed performers and danese artists, nothing seems unusual about the audience members of tembang Sunda. fact that Rahwana offers an abject apology to In recent years, the more contemporary his wife; in fact, a number of Sundanese men kawih song Hamdan (The praised one), written privately noted that “men have plenty to by the composer Koko Koswara (1917–1985) apologize to their wives for.” While everyone and containing both Arabic words and melodic understands the importance of local tradition markers, has gained popularity to the point that and interpretation of the two major Hindu it appears in contexts formerly and formally epics, it is nonetheless a phenomenon unique associated only with tembang Sunda. It is to Sundanese culture that Rahwana apologizes, accompanied by the kacapi zither, as are most and weeps. Because the image of a man kawih songs. As a composer of pop songs— weeping is locally considered undignified, it is 22 See Dr. Saleh Danasasmita and Dr. Atja Dana- clear that Rahwana has been destroyed and is sasmita, Sanghyang Siksakandang Karesian (Bandung: Proyek Pengembangan Permuseuman Jawa Barat, 1981).

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 52 including, for example, the very popular Hearer and Knower, blessing Muhammad the Badminton—Koswara was well acquainted with Messenger, his family, and his companions. both the kawih and the tembang Sunda social, status, and musical worlds. The song illustrates Hamdan lirobbil ‘alamin in every way what the Sundanese ethnomusico- Allohu rohman warrohim logist Deni Hermawan describes as musik Qod koruba fatul mubin islami, Sundanese music with an Islamic flavor. Innahu huas samiu’l alim It has a simple melody, like many kawih songs, Praise to Lord of the Universes and is easy to sing (particularly its chorus). God the Most Gracious and Merciful While Hamdan is not entirely in Arabic, it Qod koruba, the sign of victory contains enough Arabic words to firmly locate For Him, He is the Hearer, Knower it outside the genre of tembang Sunda. By Puji kagungan pangeran performing Hamdan with its Sundanese and Nu Maha Welas tur (tus) Eman Arabic words—rather than Sundanese and Gusti mangka buka pura bahagja Sanskrit, as in aristocratic tembang Sunda—the Alloh ya Robbi Mantenna Maha Uninga song bears multiple signifiers of the middle class, of Islamic practice, of group prayer, and Praise to the Lord Most gracious and Most Merciful of Islamic popular song. It is a twentieth- The Lord will open happiness century middle-class Muslim song within a The Lord who understands several-hundred-years-old aristocratic Hindu- based genre within a diverse contemporary Solawat, solawatan Muslim societal context. Barokat barokatan A’la Muhammad Rosulih The late tembang Sunda vocalist Euis Wa’ala alih wasohbih Komariah was frequently asked to teach Hamdan to groups of women who would not (recitation of praise) normally have anything to do with either Bless Blessed tembang Sunda or its aristocratic context. They For Muhammad the Messenger And his companions would come to her house and cluster in groups of ten or more as she led them through the Salam sinareng solawat song phrase by phrase. She also traveled to Muga netes ka Muhammad gathering places where she would teach groups Natrat ka para Karabat of women to sing it. As she explained, Hamdan Para ahli jeung sahabat was for women who could not see themselves Peace and praise singing popular Islamic songs with electric descending to Muhammad instruments and plenty of hip swinging such as and also for his family they saw on television; it was more dignified and his companions and “sounded older” to them than tembang Sunda, even though it is a twentieth-century The performance of Hamdan in a Hindu-based composition (Ex. 2). tembang Sunda setting speaks not only to the The lyrics for Hamdan are ones of praise idea that it is welcoming to people outside of a for God, and they describe His attributes as the tembang Sunda performance, but also to issues of class.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 53 Example 1: Ceurik Rahwana, first verse

Example 2: Hamdan, first verse

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 54 In performances, members of the audience, Harnadi Natakusumah may well have including the sponsors of the evening (but not established the importance of the lower range the instrumentalists), are assumed to belong to of tembang Sunda songs; in her many the hereditary aristocracy. My teacher, Euis performances on Radio Republik Indonesia, Komariah, spent considerable time discussing she always preferred to be accompanied by exactly how Hamdan was a necessary addition lower-pitched instruments.24 Hamdan also dif- to the aristocratic context, even as it remained fers from most tembang Sunda songs, however, outside the genre of tembang Sunda. First, its in its melodic material. Several Sundanese status as a kawih song meant that it belonged to musicians with whom I spoke said that the a much larger proportion of the Sundanese “Arabic sound of the melody gave them chills” populace, and could cross social and class and reminded them of the “importance of boundaries in a way that a song such as Ceurik Islam,” particularly for those who do not pray Rahwana could not. As she put it, “Many more regularly.25 Its ease of singing allows new access Sundanese people have become Muslims these to tembang Sunda social and musical circles. days, and they want to know that there is a Singers performing Hamdan enjoy imitating place for them too.”23 In fact, locating a song the Arabic language as they sing, emphasizing of the musik Islami type in a Hindu-based genre the accents and back-of-the-throat sounds that is simply a reflection of larger movements Arabic affords them. For example, they might taking place in Sundanese society that imitate what they perceive to be an Arabic emphasize public expressions of Islamic faith, accent while speaking Sundanese or Indo- such as attending mosque on Friday, dressing nesian, the national language, or say “Allah” in a more Islamic way, and using more Arabic- (God) with the double l’s in the back of their based conversational customs such as the throats, accompanied by conspiratorial grins. praise Tembang Sunda singers of the upper classes“ ,ﮫﻠﻟ اﻟﺤﻤﺪ) ”!expression “Ālḥāmdulillāḥ God!”) when one is grateful for the cooler jokingly tease one another about how Arabic temperature inside one’s home on a hot and they sound and imitate each other, but only humid day. within earshot of those who understand the Hamdan is sung at a comparatively high jokes as insiders. Since the 1980s, the song’s pitch register, which is not at all consonant strong increase in popularity has reflected an with tembang Sunda. Many kawih songs such as increasing societal interest in, and outward this one are performed in a high register, which expression of, Islamic faith through the use of is a signifier of a lower class on the part of the clothing, the popularity of Islamic music of singer and her audience. Whereas Ceurik various types, and in conversational topics. Yet, Rahwana peaks at middle A (A4), the highest as Anne Rasmussen points out—in her book pitch of Hamdan is nearly an octave higher, on on women and Islamic music in Indonesia— the pitch of high G (G5). If the higher register women who become more outwardly Islamic of the song—particularly its middle section— are not retrenching or experiencing some kind indicates lower class, then it is alien, in many ways, to the tembang Sunda context. The aforementioned composer and singer Saodah 24 Van Zanten, Sundanese Music in the Cianjuran Style, 116. 23 Euis Komariah, personal communication with the 25 The phrase “the importance of Islam” (kepentingan author. Islam) is usually spoken solemnly.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 55 of revival of Islamism.26 Instead, the women nostalgia, and bitterness. English has no word who perform Hamdan are choosing to tran- for it, though “bittersweet” might account for scend both religion- and class-bound rules of how someone might experience wa’as. participation. Multiple Sundanese artists described it Because Hamdan has no connection to specifically, over time, in this way: One feels colonial feudal days and the strong divisions in wa’as at the rural sights and sounds of sunset societal hierarchies associated with those times, over terraced rice fields, as the farmer walks his it is much more contemporary and close to the water buffalo back home and a young child emotional surface in terms of how people sitting on the water buffalo’s back plays the regard it. Knowing it well allows one to play at suling bamboo flute, with the Islamic call to being aristocratic in the liminal Hindu-Islamic prayer in the background. One feels wa’as context of tembang Sunda, without abandoning during a late-night performance of tembang Islam as a central faith tradition. The combi- Sunda as the conflicting thoughts of colonial nation of crossing class levels to be part of memories, the lost kingdom of Pajajaran, tembang Sunda and crossing faith boundaries heartache over a once-urgent love, youth, and while singing an emphatically Islamic song is old age converge in one’s mind. Wa’as surges immensely freeing for some of the women up in one’s heart as one smells the scents of performing the song. one’s childhood—the foods, the neighbor- In a series of interviews conducted with hood, the sounds, the voices—that one feels women learning to sing Hamdan, several torn at having left behind for mixed reasons. comments were quite revealing. One older Neither happy nor sad, but genuinely both and woman said, “I have wanted to sing tembang more, wa’as is precisely the feeling that tembang Sunda ever since I first heard it as a little girl, Sunda is supposed to generate.27 Each of these but my father refused because it wasn’t Islamic descriptions arose from instrumentalists, enough.” Another, who enjoys singing pop singers, and composers during late -night Indonesian songs, said that she was learning performances of tembang Sunda, and collectively Hamdan so that she could produce an Islamic they represent a very local way of under- song that would please her family. A third said, standing the world. “I am a good Muslim and I want to sing a song Ceurik Rahwana and its accompanying that reflects the strength [kekuatan] of my lament, Kulu-Kulu Bem, create and express wa’as beliefs without swinging my hips.” They all lyrically through the deliberate expression of agreed that Hamdan was easier to sing than simultaneous commitment and betrayal. In the anything in the tembang Sunda repertoire. lyrics, Rahwana’s apology, expressions of love, and recognition of karma are reflective of his Expressing Wa’as continuing commitment to his wife into death, in spite of being “drawn by an extraordinary If there was ever a more liminal sensibility than other.” In Banondari’s lament, she simultan- wa’as, one would be hard pressed to find it. eously expresses her joy in him and her despair Wa’as is the perfect balance between the emo- in his violent passing. Musically, the shift back tions of happiness, wistfulness, joy, longing,

27 Many other languages recognize this sentiment 26 Rasmussen, Women, the Recited Qur’an, and Islamic and describe it with words such as duende (Spanish), ṭarab Music in Indonesia, 20. (Arabic), and cumha (Gaelic).

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 56 and forth between Rahwana and Banondari is a to the emergence of the Hindu kingdom continuous repositioning of perspective from Pajajaran, the mythical tigers that roamed the male to female and back, again and again. At forests, it is the expression of wa’as that allows no point in Ceurik Rahwana does the listener and supports the liminal place in which one feel settled with one single perspective, but sings in the tumultuous present, yet lives at must always be unstable. The exceptionally least part of the time in the stable, feudal past. wide vocal range of Kulu-Kulu Bem, and its Indeed, performing that stable, feudal past is a challenge in effective performance, put it well way of connecting to, and receiving the ap- out of the capability of anyone other than a proval of, the ancestors. committed practitioner of tembang Sunda. As is The relationship of Hamdan to the often the case with this genre, listeners hearing experience of wa’as is tied primarily to the Banondari’s lament feel her heartache in their Islamic calendrical cycle. At certain times of own lives, no matter how happy they might the year, such as the Prophet’s birthday and the otherwise be. The result, in performance first and final days of Ramadan, all Sundanese practice, is that many of the listeners are are more mindful of being Muslims. On the moved to tears by both Ceurik Rahwana and last day of Ramadan in particular, people visit Kulu-Kulu Bem: wa’as has been achieved. each other’s homes, tidy the graves of their The Sundanese characterize themselves as deceased relatives, eat very rich and delicious cheerful and fun-loving. They enjoy practical food, and reaffirm their social (and sometimes jokes, double entendre, and wordplay. Yet at political) ties. It is a very happy time for all. By their most private times—the late-night singing Hamdan during these times, feelings of sessions when the children and the outsiders wa’as in connection to one’s family, childhood, have long since gone to bed—this elite subset and one’s deceased relatives are common. of Sundanese society revels in historical and Romantic heartache is not a part of this array mythical songs that awaken what they regard as of feelings, whereas it is deeply connected to their true Sundanese selves. The heartache tembang Sunda. What one feels at this time both celebrated in so many songs leads to tears of is and is not wa’as. In the climate of increasing understanding during the evening, as they feel Islamization—socially and politically—the the loss of the Pajajaran kingdom as deeply as aristocratic Sundanese find themselves in the the loss of love in their own lives. The term liminal place of being caught between regional kasundaan—the essence of Sundanese-ness—is identity issues that allow for variation of belief every bit as important to them as the deeply and the presence of multiple musical genres, Sundanese sense of wa’as, and achieving that and the national “project” that requires Sundanese-ness through performance practice allegiance to the state and at least some kind of is a powerful pathway to personal and regional public allegiance to Islam in the name of identity. By being simultaneously cheerful and political/personal advancement. deep, fun-loving and weepy, and public and Tembang Sunda is a nineteenth-century private, the hereditary aristocracy of the genre in a twenty-first-century context. Many Sundanese live their experience of liminality at of the song lyrics date from the nineteenth all times, but feel and discuss it most keenly century, the instruments date from the nine- during all-night performances of tembang Sunda. teenth century, and even the hairstyles—large For descendants of King Siliwangi and, prior sanggul, or wigs of thick hair in buns—date

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 57 from the pre-independence days when women Thirty Years of Development still wore their hair very long and tied it up in In 1987,28 Hamdan was still relatively new— buns for formal occasions. Most important, the about twenty years old. A few people sang it, hierarchies that divide the singers, especially, but they were thought of rather dismissively by from the instrumentalists and everyone else are those who sang tembang Sunda because it is so from a much earlier time. That time, referred easy and has such a (low-class) high range. At to as zaman feodal, or “the feudal era,” is the time, almost no Sundanese women wore enthusiastically celebrated by those who stand Islamic clothing, preferring skin-tight blouses to benefit from it the most. In zaman kiwari— and skirts. By the mid-1990s, approximately 20 the present—the use of technology appears to percent of women dressed more conservatively have both simplified and complicated the than before, and most older women wore hijab, existing blend of old and new. the traditional Islamic head covering. In 2007, What technology has done, in the larger Hamdan was often performed toward the early sphere of tembang Sunda performance practice, part of the evening in a tembang Sunda session, is to simultaneously make learning songs easier and about half the women singing wore hijab while also awakening upper-class concerns and other signifiers of Islamic clothing, at least about the possibility that some people from when they were outdoors. By 2017, most outside the older hierarchical divisions of women were dressed modestly, wore hijab both society—in which the “Hindu-ish” Muslim indoors and outdoors, and sprinkled their hereditary aristocracy is above the solidly conversations with Arabic words in the midst mainstream Muslim middle class—might be of any normal conversation in Sundanese. stepping above their station. The truth is that Hamdan had become a tembang Sunda standard, this type of transgression has always happened, linked with the gradually increasing Islami- but the wide-open nature of Internet access to zation of Sundanese society. formerly somewhat restricted song forms The performances of both Ceurik Rahwana cannot be ignored. Several of the tembang Sunda and Hamdan—often in a single evening of singers interviewed for this article said that they tembang Sunda—reflect the development of a “blame the Internet” for the growing liminal regionalism in Sundanese culture, in popularity of Hamdan, a song from outside the which multiple genres of music and multiple genre and one that was written a little too levels of society represented in the music can recently for the maintaining of a liminal façade coexist in the same performance venues, of nineteenth-century respectability. Whereas performed by the same people. In particular, the liminal point between the nineteenth and performing the relatively new song Hamdan has the twenty-first centuries sits easily in the body become a means by which middle-class of the Muslim woman singing about the Hindu Sundanese women may enter the rarefied air of past, the inclusion of Hamdan pulls the singer the musical elite. Rather than reflecting a one- well into Islamic territory. dimensional emphasis on any one religious tradition, Sundanese women’s musical performance practices are not only open to

28 The author’s initial fieldwork on the subject of tembang Sunda began in 1987, lasted two years, and was resumed multiple times over the next thirty years.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 4, No. 1 (2018) 58 outside influences but also include specific places in which those influences may be revealed. Both the Islamic nature of Hamdan and the fact that Ceurik Rahwana contains the specifically Sundanese apology of a major Hindu character to his wife reflect the importance of a simultaneously Hindu-Islamic balancing act for the Sundanese, who wish only to be considered Sundanese above all else.

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