'Indojazz' still in the air despite heavy foreign presence

'Indojazz' still in the air despite heavy foreign presence

By Johannes Simbolon

JAKARTA (JP): The performance of the Benko Dixieland Band from
Budapest, Hungary at the 1995 Jak Jazz festival, which closed on
Sunday evening, seemed at odds with the festival's mission.

The group played Dixieland, a style of jazz in a two-beat or
four-beat rhythm originally played in New Orleans, despite the
festival's intention of marrying jazz with Indonesian ethnic
music in the effort to find Indo(nesian)jazz.

Band leader Prof. Sandor Benko said Hungary also has its own
ethnic music and the group once tried to mix the ethnic elements
with Dixieland.

"But it was soon lost to the New Orleans original style," said
Benko.

Ironic, in Indonesia at least, is that the group has enjoyed
fame through what many Indonesians might call a lack of
nationalism.

The group has attracted millions of fans around the world and
received many international awards, including the grand prix at
the 9th Sacramento's jazz jubilee in 1982. Even President Ronald
Reagan once complimented them for what he called their promotion
of American traditional music throughout the world.

Indonesian jazz players were encouraged to achieve this level
of accomplishment through Jak Jazz 1995 and the development of
ethnic jazz.

"If local musicians just imitate the American artists without
developing their own style, how can they compete in the
international fora? American musicians have all the means,
including numerous schools and a long jazz tradition, to develop
their skill much better than Indonesian musicians," said Franky
Raden, the festival's program organizer.

The festival opened with the Dwiki Dharmawan Orchestra
performing with the Novi Budianto Gamelan Orchestra. Indonesian
jazz players who have experimented blending jazz with ethnic
music, including Krakatau, Elfa's big band, Sketsa, Tan Deseng,
followed. Then came contemporary musicians who could never be
categorized as jazz players, including Jadug Ferianto, Inisisri
with his group Kahanan, Ben M Pasaribu, I Wayan Sadra and Harry
Roesli, who is strongly oriented toward ethnic music.

The musicians were of two minds in their assessment of the
ethnic-jazz goal of the festival.

"People can play jazz with modern and traditional instruments
as Jadug Ferianto, for example, did. But music genres produced by
two kinds of instruments only loosely cling to each other. They
are never married," insisted Harry Roesli.

Nick Mamahit, a veteran Indonesian pianist, concurred, saying
that unless the traditional instruments are technically
engineered to play the diatonic scale aside from the ethnic
pentatonic scale, jazz and ethnic music can never be solidly
integrated.

While many local musicians dismissed the ethnic-jazz
experiment as a failure, foreign musicians like Arturo Sandoval
saw the effort as viable.

"When I was at the hotel I heard people in the lobby playing a
music which I am not familiar with. I thought it was Indonesian
ethnic music. I soon returned to my room to compose a melody with
the ethnic color," said Arturo Sandoval, a Cuban-born musician,
who played jazz with rich Latin flavor during the festival.

Some argue that the marriage woes of ethnic music ad jazz
can't be solved on a theoretical level, like the incompatibility
of pentatonic and diatonic scales.

Benko said the feeling of the audience is the prime criterion,
not the feeling of the musicians.

"If the audience feels good, then the music works, whatever
the style is," he argued.

What's wrong with Indonesian musicians, he added, is that they
play modern jazz, which requires full attention, seriousness and
a lot of knowledge about jazz for the audience to understand and
enjoy.

"This requirement is too much for the Indonesian audience, who
are mostly newly acquainted with jazz," he said.

"They should start with traditional jazz, which is not too
serious. After that, they can bring the audience to a higher
level of jazz," he said.

According to Benko, there are 15 times the people who love
traditional jazz than those who love modern and free jazz in the
world.

While Benko emphasized the entertainment value of the music,
some local musicians put the audience's enjoyment second.

"First of all, we should find out the most suitable style of
jazz for us. After that, we should think of how to make it
palatable to our audience," said Franky, who is known as a
contemporary musician.

Indonesian musicians' search for self-identity has been
limited to ethnic-jazz experiments, which they have received
acclaim for at several overseas musical events, including the
North Jazz Sea festival.

They will remain strangers in Indonesia if they continue to
focus on entertaining foreign audiences while overlooking the
local market.

Once local audiences grow, it will be far easier for musicians
to experiment seriously.

If the audience's taste is the reference, it will not matter
if jazz is blended with ethnic music or stays purely American,
provided people love it.

"The concept of Indonesian music is actually still indefinite.
In my opinion, music can only be judged as Indonesian music if
all Indonesians love it," said Nick Mamahit.

After all, is nationalizing jazz a very serious thing? Benko
Dixieland Band has gained success not by playing their own ethnic
music but by playing excellent Dixieland.