"Ardhanariswara" for string quartet and dance
- Submitting institution
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School of Oriental and African Studies
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 24507
- Type
- J - Composition
- Month
- July
- Year
- 2017
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
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- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Ardhanariswara is presented as a single item: a composition recorded on video, supported by contextual information consisting of a programme note, score, plus online article. Initial research questions included:
How can my knowledge of Balinese gendér wayang and postminimalist music interact to evolve a new language suitable for string quartet?
How can an ethos of dance-music interaction derived from South East Asian models help develop this new approach to the traditionally “absolute” musical form of string quartet?
If McClary’s (1991) dissection of gendered narratives within musical structures of the Common Practice Period hold for the string quartet canon, what alternative approaches might be drawn from, for instance, Balinese music?
The work is particularly informed by gendér wayang and composers such as Ida Wayan Oka Granoka, Terry Riley, Kevin Volans, Sofia Gubaildulina, and Harrison Birtwistle.
Following McClary (1991) and based on research into the figure of male-female Ardhanariswara in South and South East Asia, my piece attempts to explore other, more positive gender aspects within a string quartet structure, following a Balinese-influenced approach to instrumental symbolism based on complementary opposites with a mediating centre (De Vale and Dibia 1991).
Music was conceived with dance as an integral and integrating role: as a unifying centre to the four musicians in a play between numbers one to four. Ideas were passed collaboratively between myself, Kali Chandrasegaram and Hi Ching who choreographed the dance between them.
As a practitioner, refraction from this project opened up further possibilities for the exploration of ritualised layout, intercultural exploration of ideas such as gender and fluidity and dialogues between Balinese and postminimalist musics. It laid groundwork for current and planned collaborations with choreographer Ni Made Pujawati exploring flow and transformation in Balinese thought.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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