Nice 'N' Easy-the Balinese Gamelan Rindik: Its Music, Musicians, and Value as Tourist Art

If you have ever visited the island of Bali as a tourist, it is certain that you will have heard the gamelan rindik play. For many tourists, this is the first Balinese music they encounter. Customarily, the moment of initial contact takes place something like this: People are sitting in a restaurant or entering a hotel lobby designed in neo-Balinese style. While they savor the succulent food or admire the elaborate architecture some sort of background music can be heard. It is quite likely that this "Nice 'n' Easy," "traditional Balinese bamboo and flute music"¹ they hear is not a recording, but instead is being played live by three musicians, hidden in one corner of the room or staged on an open bale² at the edge of the locale. Were you to look in that corner you would see three musicians, two of which are gently beating out notes on the bamboo-xylophone rindik, while the third one plays the bamboo flute suling. In many cases rindik music is considered part of the ambiance, something "typically" Balinese. Many tourists never turn to watch the musicians or rarely perceive them as anything other than quasi-cultural background tapestry.

But what is the history of this very present music of Bali? Why is the rindik both omnipresent and simultaneously given little regard? How can this discrepancy be explained? Why has no ethnomusicological study of the rindik been performed until now? With this article I hope to answer these questions by presenting the instrument rindik, its playing techniques, acoustics and tuning, its repertoire, the performing context and the performers. Thus I am offering—admittedly in a very abbreviated form³—potentially the first detailed ethnomusicological investigation of the gamelan rindik.⁴

Terminological Chaos

The rindik instrument can be briefly described as a bamboo-xylophone made of tuned bamboo-tubes. Not everyone will agree with this definition since a degree of confusion exists concerning the Balinese bamboo-xylophone's various names. Some call it tingklik, some rindik, while other times it is even called grantang. In order to untangle this terminological confusion and perhaps come close to solving it, two facts need to be examined: First, we need to check where and by whom which expression is used; secondly, the perspective needs to be broadened by means of regarding historical sources. The development of the rindik-terminology is closely connected to the instrument's regional evolution in Bali. So as not to increase the confusion I will first outline the present, regional use of the terms rindik, tingklik, and grantang:

rindik

In the southern regions of Bali (Badung region), rindik is the term generally used for a bamboo-xylophone made of bamboo-tubes, whereas in the south-central region of Gianyar, the term rindik is mostly used to classify an ensemble consisting of several bamboo instruments. In contrast, in northern Bali, rindik is the name for a xylophone with bamboo keys above external resonators.⁵

tingklik

The term tingklik is the common name for a bamboo-xylophone with bamboo-tubes in the Gianyar region.

grantang

Finally, in northern Bali this same bamboo-xylophone with bamboo-tubes—called rindik in Badung and tingklik in Gianyar—is called grantang.

As is the case in many aspects of Balinese culture, tradition and nomenclature differ considerably from region to region, even from village to neighboring village. Therefore it is no surprise that the three different names rindik, tingklik, and grantang stand for the same instrument, seeing as how different regions have different expressions. The confusing part about this discrepancy in nomenclature is that not only do several names exist for the same instrument, but in the case of the rindik, several different instruments are given the same name. This regional phenomenon could be accepted as it is, but certainly every present phenomenon is rooted in an historical development. In many cases researchers are forced to stop at this point due to a lack of historical sources or handed down information that could shed light on the history of various terminological developments. In the case...