Some Dance Performances in Bali

The Barong and his friend, the monkey

The Balinese world of performance has accommodated itself to the tourist industry. Once nighttime dances traversed dangerous borders between good and evil spirits, but now they fit into daytime slots for the schedules of tour guides. 

We saw the classical Barong dance, depicting the eternal fight between good and evil spirits. The costumes are massive and monstrous, like the monsters that decorate the temples--they are often displayed in palaces or temples. The narrative contains as much farce and coarse comedy as it does refined dancing--a rather wonderful combination. I was especially fascinated by the fingers of the costumes. Classical dance from Java uses codified hand gestures, or mudras from India and the fingers are often in constant motion, I have been told, because of the

The innocent prince is sent out to the forest

incessant flow of life. But the monsters have, instead, limp white extended fingernails with evil powers.

We saw a morning performance, which became interesting because that day turned out to be the new moon. The elaborately costumed beasts are include the good Barong versus the bad witch Rangda (the very one who lives on Nusa Penida, see the blog on ceremonies), but the supporting cast steals the show with broad physical comedy and highly refined classical dancing. For example, one beast is killed and as the performing dwarfs mourn him his massive penis pops up, which involves a huge amount of stage business. On the other hand Sadewa, the prince, is

Dead best with unruly penis

played by a ravishing woman whose every gesture has a breathless beauty.

But tourists were only a part of the audience on this day of the new moon. Balinese themselves had come to see the final act, the kriis dance. Men in checkered sarongs, in trance, begin to go beserk over the witch Rangda, whom she casts aside one by one. They turn their kriis'---the classical crooken dagger of Bali--on themselves and stab and stab, but are protected by their trance. Mangkus, shamans who deal in good and bad spirits, come

Kriis dancers stabbing themselves

onstage sprinkling holy water, protecting from the evil. Finally the dancers are restrained and enter into normal consciousness.

At least this is what we're told. It was sometimes a little hard to believe, but then who are we to say? In the banal light of 11am it was hard to believe that people who were performing for tourist schedules were actually in trance. But who knows? I tend to credit it--the men were actively stabbing at themselves, they drew no blood. But my traveling companions doubted.

Performance during a political meeting

Even more perplexing is the Fire Dance, Kecak, which also closes with a trance dance, this one performed at night to dramatize the fire aspect. The Kecak is striking in that the orchestra is a
group of 100 men making orchestrated music without instruments: chanting, shouting, taking different parts of an orchestra, call and response, sometimes almost doo-wop, a capella tones, hypnotic rhythms, with a story being told. A tree of fire stands onstage. The men sit in different formations or lie down on each other in chains to form the scenery.

Ramayan in Kecak dance

First the Ramayana is performed in a tight circle between the fire tree and Kecak men, beautiful women playing the main roles except for a buffoonish Ravanna and the costumed Hanuman and other monkeys. Then the bright tree of fire vanishes, and two very young girls dance, vestige of an older version where the girls themselves would go into trance and enter fire unscathed. They still represent virginal angels who combat evil spirits.

But instead of the little girls entering fire, a man with burning eyes and jutting chin came out clothed in a straw horse and meditated with a mangku. A basket of coconut husks was soaked with petrol and lit. The mangku shouted for him to GO and he danced into the fire. Neither he nor his straw horse were burnt. Twice he attacked the flames, stomping into the fire, grabbing the burning coconuts, almost eating them as if hypnotized by them until a man grabbed him and flopped him down sitting, hands tightly around his waist till he came out of his trance. And then he joined the bowing performers, looking a little bewildered.

"Angels" in Kecak dance

I asked Wayan, why does the straw remain unburnt? The trance, he said, also protects the straw. It was absolutely true that straw entered into petrol-soaked fire and emerged without a trace. The man's feet were black, naturally. But Wayan felt the performer was not in the best trance. A better trance would have made him attack the fire more aggressively. It is a skill like any other, cultivated among gifted children, a specialty that leads to a career. Kecak dances are advertised everywhere in Bali, any night of the week. The trance seems to be pretty routine.