Gramophone Records and Radio in the Late Colonial Era, 1903-1942
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Music and media in the Dutch East Indies: Gramophone records and radio in the late colonial era, 1903-1942 Philip Bradford Yampolsky A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Washington 2013 Reading Committee: Philip D. Schuyler, Chair Ter Ellingson Laurie J. Sears Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Music © 2013 Philip Bradford Yampolsky University of Washington Abstract Music and media in the Dutch East Indies: Gramophone records and radio in the late colonial era, 1903-1942 Philip Bradford Yampolsky Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Associate Professor Emeritus Philip D. Schuyler Music This dissertation is intended as an ethnomusicological contribution to the history of music and media in Indonesia. It deals with topics and resources that have never been systematically examined for this region: gramophone records and radio broadcasting from the years before World War II, the last years of Dutch colonial control. The gramophone records are our only documentation of the sound of Indonesian music in the years before World War II. This dissertation tries to identify (and to some extent provide) the information one needs in order to understand the records and, by extension, stylistic trends during the pre-war period. Ultimately it is meant as an argument for the importance of making use of historical recordings and discography in ethnomusicology. The use of gramophone records from before World War II (“78s”) in musicology and ethnomusicology is growing. Robert Philip has done a careful study (1992) of changes in performance practice in European art music, based on comparisons of early gramophone records with later practice; Ali Jihad Racy’s dissertation (1977) is an extensive examination of the changes in Egyptian music documented in recordings; Sean Williams has a section in her 2001 book on what recordings tell about early practice of tembang Sunda; and Philip Schuyler (1984), Anne Sheeran (1997), Regula Qureshi (1999), Steven Hughes (2002), and Amanda Weidman (2006) have all looked at what Qureshi calls “gramophone culture” in reference to specific genres or categories of music in, respectively, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and, for both Hughes and Weidman, South India. The chapters here on kroncong and on the trajectories of popular music genres (chapters 5 and 6) are studies in this vein. The other chapters, however, seek to put these genre studies into the larger context of all the music recorded for the DEI and the music broadcast on DEI radio. This is perhaps the most unusual feature of the dissertation: it draws on the results of tabulations summarizing the entire range of record production and radio broadcasting in the DEI, and it combines those results with musicological understandings of genre and idiom to study the nature, processes, and aftermath of mediatization. Table of contents Abstract iii Table of contents v List of maps, figures, and transcriptions viii List of tables x Acknowledgments xi Terminology, conventions, and abbreviations xiv Dedication xvii Epigraphs xviii Map of Indonesia xix Chapter 1: Introduction 1 1.1. Structure 9 1.2. Red threads 12 Mediatization 13 The consumers 22 Fissures in DEI society 26 Strategies of distinction 32 The idea of Indonesia 44 Chapter 2: The record business in IMS: First phase, 1903-17 55 2.1. “Unsere Reise um die Erde”: The gramophone spans the globe 57 2.2. The record industry comes to IMS: Companies and tours 66 Phonographs and cylinders 66 Gramophones and discs 69 The Gramophone Company 69 Beka 74 Odeon 77 Columbia Phonograph Company, Gen’l 80 Anker 83 Lyrophon 84 Bintang Sapoe 85 2.3. Business practices 89 Branches, agencies, agents 89 Contracts 96 Trials of a branch manager 104 Custom jobs 106 Intermediaries 108 2.4. The recordings 114 Appendix: Detailed genre tables, 1903-17 122 Chapter 3: The record business in IMS: second phase, 1920–42 128 3.1 Recording returns 128 v 3.2 Companies and labels: European 135 3.3 Companies and labels: IMS 143 3.4 Business practices 150 Contracts with agents 150 Contracts with artists 153 3.5 The recordings 156 Appendix: Detailed genre tables, 1920-42 163 Chapter 4: Music on Dutch East Indies radio in 1938: Representations of unity, disunity, and the modern 173 4.1. On the air 176 Live vs. recorded music 177 A brief history of radio in the DEI 182 The Westersche Programma 190 The Oostersche Programma 194 Specific genres 196 4.2. In the air 209 East vs. west 209 East vs. east 216 The idea of Indonesia 220 A digression on nationalism 227 Modern music 228 Modern times 239 Appendix: Tabulations of NIROM Westersche & Oostersche broadcasts / Additional song texts 249 Chapter 5: Kroncong revisited: new evidence from old sources 263 Preliminaries, 1: the term kroncong 264 Preliminaries, 2: standard kroncong 266 Preliminaries, 3: Recording in Indonesia, 1903-1942 271 5.1. Early kroncong 275 Origins 275 Folk kroncong (?1880s−1900) 279 5.2. Popular kroncong, nascent phase, 1900-ca. 1924 284 5.3. Popular kroncong, phase II, ca. 1924-35 295 5.4. The last phase of popular kroncong, 1935-42 305 5.5. Coda: slowing down as an adaptive strategy 314 Appendix: List of audio examples & transcriptions / Transcriptions 1-6 318 Chapter 6: Three genres of Indonesian popular music: Their trajectories in the colonial era and after 326 6.1. Kroncong 327 Standard kroncong (1940s-1970s) 334 Late kroncong (1970s-present) 338 vi 6.2. Stambul 343 6.3. Gambang kromong 353 From orkes gambang to gambang kromong (?1700-1900) 354 Gambang kromong in the late-colonial period (1900-1942) 359 Lenong (?1920s-present) 367 Gambang kromong after Independence (1945-present) 370 6.4. Summary and conclusion 376 Conclusion 383 Bibliography 389 vii List of maps, figures, and transcriptions Map of Indonesia xix Figure 1.1. Columbia record label, with detail of matrix number. 6 Figure 1.2. 1931 advertisement for gramophones and records. 20 Figure 1.3. 1920 cartoon, “Evolutie.” 21 Figure 2.1. Beka advertisement, 1907. 62 Figure 2.2. Advertisement for DEI cylinders, 1904. 68 Figure 2.3. Record label: His Master’s Voice, ca. 1914-15. 72 Figure 2.4. Gramophone Company catalogue, 1907: Malay Records. 73 Figure 2.5. Two Beka-Grand record labels from 1906. 76 Figure 2.6. Two Odeon record labels from 1907-08. 79 Figure 2.7. Two record labels: Columbia (USA), ca. 1907 / Anker, ca. 1912. 82 Figure 2.8. Two record labels: Lyrophone, 1911 / Bintang Sapoe, ca. 1909-14. 86 Figure 2.9. Record label: Columbia (USA), 1912, “made by Tio Tek Hong.” 101 Figure 3.1 Beka and Odeon record labels from the late 1920s. 137 Figure 3.2 Columbia catalogue cover, ca. 1930. 138 Figure 3.3 HMV catalogue supplement, May 1935. 139 Figure 3.4 Hindenburg label, 1928. 142 Figure 3.5 Angsa and Delima record labels from the late 1930s. 148 Figure 4.1 Java map showing locations of main radio stations. 174 Figure 4.2 Lief Java’s kroncong and jazz divisions. 206 Figure 4.3 Two gambus ensembles. 238 Figure 4.4 Popular novel cover: Nona Modern?, 1939. 245 Figure 4.5 Popular novel cover: R. A. Moerhia, 1934. 246 Figure 5.1. Toto Salmon CD cover 268 Figure 5.2 Popular novel cover: Dari Gadis Djadi Boenga Raja, 1924. 290 Figure 5.3. Early kroncong structure (16 bars/16 chords). 292 Figure 5.4 Page from the Columbia catalogue (Figure 3.2), ca. 1930. 296 Figure 5.5 Cover of a popular collection of pantun and syair, 1922. 299 Figure 5.6. Kroncong after 1925: the 32-bar form. 302 Figure 5.7. Record label: “Oh, Boenga Melati” (Canary), ca. 1939. 304 Figure 5.8. Chord schemata for various 1930s kroncong melodies. 312 Transcriptions 1-6 320-25 Figure 6.1abcd. Performer-centered marketing: Miss Alang. 331-34 Figure 6.2. CD cover for Kroncong Tenggara, featuring Ubiet, 2007. 341 Figure 6.3. CD cover for Keroncong in Lounge. 342 Figure 6.4. Stambul II chord stucture. 348 viii Figure 6.5. Beka record label showing “stamboel” as a descriptor. 350 Figure 6.6. Score of “Pobin Ma To Djin” in Chinese characters. 361 Figure 6.7. Two gambang kromong cassette covers, 1980s-1990s. 377 Figure 6.8. Two gambang kromong cassette covers, 1980s-1990s. 378 ix List of tables Table 1.1. Civil service employees categorized by race and rank (1938). 25 Table 1.2. Salaries of employees in Western firms (1931). 25 Table 2.1. Estimate of total number of unique recordings (sides) produced for IMS, 1903–17. 114 Table 2.2. Summary of M/S known recordings (sides), all labels, 1903–17. 117 Table 2.3. Summary of DEI known recordings (sides), all labels, 1903–17. 117 Table 2.4. M/S popular music category, 1903–17 (known recordings). 120 Table 2.5. DEI popular music category, 1903–17 (known recordings). 120 Table 2.6. Detailed Genre Table, known recordings (sides), 1903–17 – M/S. 123 Table 2.7. Detailed Genre Table, known recordings (sides), 1903–17 – DEI. 125 Table 3.1. Estimate of total number of unique recordings (sides) produced for IMS, 1920–42. 159 Table 3.2. Summary of M/S known recordings (sides), all labels, 1920–42. 160 Table 3.3. Summary of DEI known recordings (sides), all labels, 1920–42. 161 Table 3.4. M/S popular music category, 1920–42 (known recordings). 162 Table 3.5. DEI popular music category, 1920–42 (known recordings). 162 Table 3.6. Detailed Genre Table, known recordings (sides), 1920–42 – M/S. 164 Table 3.7. Detailed Genre Table, known recordings (sides), 1920–42 – DEI. 167 Table 4.1.