THE SIGNIFICANCE OF PRESERVATION : TO SAVE OR NOT TO SAVE? 1 Patricia Matusky In a discussion of traditional styles and current trends in music and dance, a consideration of preservation is important. My involvement with the preservation and documentation of the traditional performing arts took place for many years in Peninsular Malaysia and in Sarawak. I would like to briefly discuss and illustrate why preservation is needed and, in fact, imperative when considering research in the traditional arts. I will also very briefly look at some issues and facts about the procedures involved in preservation. By way of background to this discussion and with a focus on Borneo, I would like to explain that as an ethnomusicologist, I have been involved with documenting traditional music in Sarawak since the mid-1980s when I made my second trip up the Rejang River to the Belaga District (the first trip on the Rejang was to Kapit as a tourist in 1976). My research trip to Belaga District in 1984 documented many genres of music of the Kayan, Kenyah and Kajang groups living up- and down-river of the Belaga bazaar, and particularly up-river near the area of the Bakun dam which, when built, would relocate several hundred people living in the area. 2 The objective here was to begin to document the existing music culture of the people living along the river near the Bakun dam site before the dam construction actually started. Another research trip followed in 1985-86 to the same general area and with the same objectives, but involved different longhouses as well as the Malay village at the Belaga bazaar. Subsequently, I have carried out research in the 1990s in other areas along the Rejang and in Kuching district. 1 This paper was prepared and presented for the panel on Preservation-Modernization- Reinvention in the Performing Arts of Borneo at the Borneo Research Council Conference 2002, 15-18 July 2002, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia. 2 This research trip, and the trip in 1985-86, were sponsored by University of Malaya where I was a senior lecturer, and carried out with the late Prof. Ku Zam Zam Ku Idris of the Department of Malay Studies at the University of Malaya at that tim 56
Preservation Defined When addressing some of the issues concerning the preservation of music and dance, I would like to begin by specifying my usage of the term preservation. 3 Preservation, or the process of preserving or keeping something, may be seen with slightly different meanings. Some of the meanings of this term are not relevant here, but others are. The different meanings are similar: First, if we preserve something, we may keep it safe from injury, or from being hunted and killed, as in preserving certain animals (like the rhinoceros, the hornbill bird and so on). Many times an area of land is set aside for the habitat of these kinds of endangered animal species and the land area is called a preservation. Secondly, when we preserve something, we may keep it from decay or spoiling, or sometimes corruption. This meaning is often applied to food, for we may use an agent like salt or sugar to keep the food from rotting. We say that the food is preserved. Thirdly, we may preserve something to maintain it in the same state, possibly for future use. We uphold it and sustain it; for example, we preserve peace throughout the country. If we maintain a genre of music in its old style for current and continual use, then we perpetuate that old style in actual performance. However, a piece of music or dance in its old style may also be maintained by recording it and keeping it stored in an archive or library. The aim here is not to perpetuate the old style in actual practice, but rather to save it so that performers who do not know the old style may study it or refer back to it as they develop new styles of the same genre of music or dance. Finally, if we preserve something, we may keep it safe from harm, loss, destruction or damage. We protect and guard it. It may change somewhat from time to time, but we still keep it in some form for current or future use. 3 Definitions are based on Webster s Dictionary, Unabridged edition (New York, The Literary Guild, 1940). The word preserve is derived from the Latin prae [before] and servare [to keep]. 57
Of these four different shades of meaning for the term preserve, the first two are not relevant to the topic and purpose of this paper. However, to maintain something in the same state, and to keep something from loss of destruction are both important when considering both traditional and new music and dance, and it is these two meanings of the term preserve to which I refer in this paper. Doing Preservation The preservation of the performing arts is usually tied to documenting the traditional arts. In addition, the preservation of new music and dance is also important and should be a part of the research planning. This is basically the work of the ethnomusicologist (for music) and the ethnochoreologist (for dance). There are many ways to document a music or dance event. We may use audio and video recording technology to save the actual sound, to save visual representations of movement and steps of dances, to record the method of playing a musical instrument, to record the way a musical instrument is designed and made and so on. A visual recording can also effectively record the kind of clothing or costume worn during the performance of a given genre of music or dance, especially in dance. It can also record the reaction of the audience to a particular dance or musical performance. In addition, the recording or documentation should also include written information about the music, the dance, the performers and the social context in which, or for which, the performance happens. The written documentation also must note details about the place of performance, the date of the performance, the titles of pieces, and information about the performers themselves. 4 In addition, the documentation should include precise information about the recording equipment used in the field or in the studio. All of this information is useful to the scholar or the student who is studying a given cultural group. Furthermore, this documentation is also useful and valuable to the practicing musician or dancer within the cultural group who 4 See A Manual for Documentation, Fieldwork and Preservation for Ethnomusicologists, 2 nd edition, (Bloomington, Indiana, Society for Ethnomusicology, 2001). 58
needs to hear or see the music or dance from an earlier time, perhaps in order to intelligently create new music and new dance versions of the same genre. If the objective is to obtain an authentic or true picture of what the event actually sounds or looks like, then the recording (or documenting) should be carried out in the natural environment where the performing event usually happens. In this case, the musicians or dancers should not be taken into a studio or studio-like setting for the recording. Their performance needs to be recorded in the environment where it would naturally take place. To do a recording in a studio setting should be done only for special purposes, for example, to record the details of a singing style or dance movements and steps, or to clearly record the lyrics of a sung piece and so on. In addition to doing the actual recording, the scholar will eventually need to process the documented material. Once the recording and basic written notes have been done (usually in the field), the scholar makes an inventory of all the existing music types in the form of written lists based on his recordings of the music or dance. Then a classification of the different types of music or dance may be developed using the native typology, that is, the types of music (both vocal and instrumental) as perceived by the people who perform the music, or by using some other kind of classification scheme. Eventually an analysis of the structure and cultural context of the music and dance is done. Here the scholar or student describes and analyzes the musical sound and dance movements. He examines the purpose and function of the pieces, how they are composed or created the meaning of the lyrics of songs, and so on. Finally, the scholar generates written works about the performing art. Preservation and Processes of Change Scholars often do preservation of traditional music or dance to study the processes of change that occur in the music or dance over long, or even short, periods of time. Sometimes young people leave their traditional habitats to live in urban or other places. And, sometimes groups of people may be moved or relocated to new geographical environments where their patterns of daily life change. 59
With these changes in their life style, their music that is often closely tied to ceremonies and activities of daily life, may also change in the new environment. The scholars involved in the preservation of traditional music or dance often examine the continuity of survival and development, particularly in urban settings that are constantly bombarded with music from films, the latest rock and other kinds of music and/or dance movements. In examining the processes of change, the use and value of a preserved form of music may be seen in examples of traditional music that were recorded at Kayan and Kenyah longhouses in the Belaga District of Sarawak. During field trips to the longhouses Uma Apan and Uma Nyaveng (at Kaki Menjawah) and Uma Kenyah-Badang (at Long Dungun) from 1984 to 1986, a number of pieces to accompany certain dances were recorded, including music for the ngajat, the tarian perang (also called lekupa ) and the datun julud. Among the Kenyah and Kayan groups in this region, the ngajat and datun julud dances were traditionally accompanied by a small ensemble of two sape. Sometimes the jatung utang wooden xylophone was added to play the melody in unison with the sape. Furthermore, in keeping with the old, traditional style as it was performed in 1984, the tarian perang was accompanied by an ensemble of hanging gongs and a drum. The video recording of these dances in the Kenyah and Kayan longhouses documented the dances and their musical accompaniment, and showed the instrumentation that was acknowledged to be the old, traditional music accompaniment. 5 In contrast, one of Kenyah groups known as the Kenyah-Badang, who, at that time, had recently moved into the region at Long Dungun, performed the same or similar dances, but with an ensemble consisting of one harmonica, a guitar and the traditional jatung utang xylophone. The main melody of the dance music was played on the Western harmonica and duplicated by the jatung utung xylophone. The guitar, apparently replacing the original sape stringed instrument, was also used to strum some parts of the melodic line in parallel thirds harmony with the main melody instruments. (The melody may even 5 The music for these events is discussed in Patricia Matusky, Aspects of Musical Style among the Kajang, Kayan and Kenyah-Badang of the Upper Rejang River: A Preliminary Survey, Sarawak Museum Journal, XXXVI: 57 (New Series, 1986), pp. 185-229. 60
have changed, although we had no earlier recording with which to compare, and the musicians did not know if the same melody had been used to accompany this dance a generation ago). The musical sound was starkly different from the melodic and rhythmic patterns played on two sape or by hanging gongs. Yet, the music was still acceptable to the ears of the performers and the longhouse audience. At this longhouse the impact of Western music was evident, while basic dance movements, costume and probably other elements of the performance remained traditional (or old) in style. 6 Another example of change or innovation was noted during the same series of field trips at the Kayan Uma Apan longhouse. A performance of vocal music accompanied by two sape was recorded on video and audiotape. While the sape is normally played in pairs to accompany dance or for general entertainment, in this instance the two sape were played by men to accompany a vocal piece sung by a woman. This performance points to either the revival of an old practice or to the initiation of a new musical style. In any case, change had taken place. In order to study the process of change in a performing art, and even to create new works in music or dance, the scholar needs a basis or foundation to which he may refer. He needs knowledge of the performing art from some past time, or even from the near recent time of his research. With this knowledge, he then has a foundation from which he may begin to make comparisons to the art form in question. Preservation and Archival Centers The ethnomusicologist and ethnochoreologist will also be involved with storage and safe keeping of the materials they record in the field. Ideally, the recorded materials need to be stored in a proper archive or library with adequate storage facilities. 7 These 6 This performance is discussed in Patricia Matusky, Musical Styles among the Kayan, Kenyah-Badang and Malay Peoples of the Upper Rejang River: A Preliminary Survey, Sarawak Museum Journal, XLI: 62 (New Series, 1990), pp. 115-149. 7 Patricia Matusky, Ethnomusicology and the Musical Heritage of Sarawak: Implications for the Future, Sarawak Museum Journal, Vol. XL, No. 61 (New Series), Part I, 1989, pp. 131-149. 61
facilities must include adequate and appropriate methods of shelving, temperature and humidity control, as well as the cataloging and indexing of the audio and video tapes, slides, photographs and even field notes. There must also be facilities for viewing and hearing the recorded tapes. Documentation centers such as archives and libraries at the national, state, academic and even private levels are places where materials can not only be stored, but where on-going research by local as well as foreign scholars may be carried out. The preserved or documented materials must be easily accessible to scholars, teachers and practicing musicians and dancers alike. The archives or libraries, serving as documentation centers, provide a data bank from which textbooks, scholarly works or information booklets may be generated and disseminated back into the community and, in fact, throughout the country. In effect, information about the traditional and the new style of music and dance is re-cycled and fed back to students at the college level through courses in culture and performing arts, to students and composers in the academies in the country, to the teachers in the public schools, and to the interested people in the communities in general. This information is gotten from the archive or library that keeps the original, preserved materials. A documentation center with its data bank of materials in music and dance is particularly important for educators in the public and private schools throughout the country. An essentially Westernbased music program in the government schools, using guitars and pianos and harmony-based melodies of native tunes, obliterates any sense of ethnic identity and certainly Malaysian identity. Indeed, a true identity of any kind becomes lost if the basic elements of indigenous instruments, music and dance are not used directly in a daily educational situation for children. Programs of music instruction based on the local culture are now underway in some government schools in Malaysia, but more textbooks and instruction books are needed, and in order to generate these materials for teachers, the music and dance from the field (from the different communities) is needed. The preserved materials from the field are crucial to the development of these kinds of materials for government school music and dance teachers. Here, then, is another reason to save and preserve the traditional and current genres of 62
music and dance and to urge the establishment of adequate documentation centers accessible to performers, students and teachers. The issue of advantages and benefits of preservation has already been briefly noted in the foregoing discussion. If we consider whether to save or not to save traditional music and dance in some kind of documented form, we must consider some of the benefits of preservation. The preservation done by music and dance scholars in past decades, in many places in the world, has: provided a historical record of the art forms in question, aided in the study of processes of change in society, given a basis for the comparison of old and new styles and genres of music and dance, provided materials for university students to study old, traditional styles of music and dance in their attempts to understand contemporary society, provided materials for music educators in the government (or public) schools, provided scholars the raw materials from which books, textbooks and articles may be written provided the contemporary musician and dancer with a source of materials for examining old styles of a particular genre in his or her effort to create new styles. As we begin to discuss the traditional genres and styles of music and dance in Borneo and the changes taking place in them, we need to be aware of how much an understanding of the preserved old styles is important and, in fact, crucial to the creation of the new styles. 63
Bibliography Matusky, Patricia. (1990) Musical Styles among the Kayan, Kenyah- Badang and Malay Peoples of the Upper Rejang River: A Preliminary Survey, in Sarawak Museum Journal, XLI: 62 (New Series), pp. 115-149. Matusky, Patricia. (1989) Ethnomusicology and the Musical Heritage of Sarawak: Implications for the Future, in Sarawak Museum Journal, Vol. XL, No. 61 (New Series), Part I, pp. 131-149. Matusky, Patricia. (1986) Aspects of Musical Style among the Kajang, Kayan and Kenyah-Badang of the Upper Rejang River: A Preliminary Survey, in Sarawak Museum Journal, XXXVI: 57 (New Series), pp. 185-229. Society for Ethnomusicology. (2001) A Manual for Documentation, Fieldwork and Preservation for Ethnomusicology. 2 nd Edition, Bloomington, Indiana. (1940) Webster s Dictionary. Unabridged edition, New York: The Literary Guild. 64