Performing Arts in The Bahamas

Gabber Modus Operandi:

The hard, fast, abrasive club sounds they have been making since 2018 owe a lot to both Indonesia’s aforementioned heavy metal obsession and gamelan — percussion-based, traditional ritualistic music that plays a similarly integral part in the country’s culture. “Indonesia definitely isn’t the kind of place where you can call the police if someone is being loud,” Kas laughs. “Metal, punk, noise — the tolerance of loudness is high, because gamelan has been such a big part of society for centuries.” Despite the name, the pair are quick to stress that their music isn’t actually gabber — certainly not in the traditional European sense.

Swapping nihilism for something altogether more optimistic, Kas summarises their sound as a “retranslation of gabber and hardcore culture” into music that Indonesian audiences can relate to. Rather than sampling gamelan, they make tracks using traditional gamelan scales, ending up with rhythms so fast that they “somehow flip you out”.

Bahasa Indonesia
/bəˈhɑːsə ˌɪndəˈniːʒə/

noun
the Austronesian language, closely related to Malay, that is the official language of Indonesia.

Indonesian is a form of Malay, spoken in Indonesia. The term “Indonesian” is political rather than linguistic, as Indonesian Malay (called Bahasa Indonesia in Indonesia) is virtually identical with Bahasa Melayu, another variety of Malay, as spoken in Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei. The term “Indonesian” was adopted in the beginning of the 20th century, as Indonesian became the national language of Indonesia.

Indonesian belongs to the Austronesian language family. The Austronesian language family is one of the largest linguistic families of the world. According to the most widely accepted classification of the Austronesian languages, Indonesian belongs to the Western branch of the Malayo-Polynesian group of the Austronesian family. According to Ethnologue, Indonesian is classified in the following way: Indonesian < Local Malay < Malayan < Malaic < Sundic < Western < Malayo-Polynesian < Austronesian. Related languages include Javanese, Madurese, and Sundanese.

It is believed that the homeland of Malay was in Sumatra (western Indonesia), and proto-Malay people came there shortly before the beginning of our era. The earliest texts, written in an archaic form of Malay, date back to the 7th century AD. These early texts (stone inscriptions) were written in the ancient Pallavi script, which evolved out of southern varieties of Indian Brahmi script. They were created in the early stages of the Srivijaya empire, a powerful Buddhist state, and one of the most powerful states and main cultural centers of that time. Its capital was Palembang, one of the largest cities of that time. In the course of time Srivijaya declined, and was succeeded by other empires, the most extensive of which was the one established by the successors of prince Vijaya, with the capital Majapahit. This empire underwent a major crisis in the middle of the 15th century, and gradually disintegrated. In the 15th century Indonesia adopted Islamic faith, and has been predominantly Islamic until the present day.

During the epoch of Srivijaya and other empires, Indonesia was an important trade center, and Malay emerged as the main trade language of the region. In the course of time, under influence from the languages of traders of non-Indonesian origins, such as Arabic, Chinese, later also Western European (Portuguese and Dutch), this language underwent major changes, becoming essentially a pidgin language. The Malay spoken by traders, was generally called “bazaar Malay”. On the contrary, the Malay as spoken in the Indonesian court remained more or less unaltered. Court Malay is considered “classical Malay” and is the language in which the large corpus of medieval Malay literature was written. The beginning of the 20th century marked the beginning of a new era for the Indonesian language. In 1928, the Indonesian Youth Congress took place in Jakarta, and in this Congress it was decided that Indonesia should have an official national language, which would thenceforth be called “Indonesian” (bahasa Indonesia). As the base for this language, classical Malay was selected. The pronunciation of Jakarta was chosen as the standard Indonesian pronunciation. (Source:
Language Materials Project http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/Profile.aspx?LangID=89&menu=004)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj9aLW3S9-s

https://www.duniakana.com/34-indonesian-traditional-musical-instruments-and-how-to-play-them/