The Children’s Traditional Music Festival was held in Gedung Kesenian Jakarta (the Jakarta Playhouse on July 2 through 4 2009. The participants includes about 100 or so elementary and junior high students of the 29 groups from the 29 provinces of Indonesia. Most of them are about 7 – 12 years old. Among the 29 provinces are Western Nusa Tenggara, Jambi, Bali, Lampung, West Sumatera, North Sumatera and Maluku.
According to Sulistyo Tirtokusumo the Director if Art for the Director General NBSF of the Department of Culture of The republic of Indonesia in his opening speech of the event, the stagnated condition of the Indonesian traditional music was the basic awareness that lies behind the event.
Many of the traditional art form of Indonesia has already been left behind by its community. The shifting values of the society tends to make the younger generation prefers the popular culture and leave the traditional ones.
Because of this according to Sulistyo, this festival is an effort to give understanding as well as a mean of appreciation to the younger generation so they are not alienated from the tradition art forms in their areas.
Each day about ten groups performed representing their province. Each group tries to highlight the uniqueness of their culture and traditions. Appearances of the participants were assessed by jury consisting of Rahayu Supanggah, I Wayan Sadra, Ben Pasaribu, Mairusya Nainggolan, and Deni Hermawan.
The group from Jakarta performs on the second day. This group presents a song of a new arrangement titled Berbenah (Tidying Up). The song urges the people living in Jakarta to improve themselves as individuals over time as well as preserving the abundance of cultural wealth in Jakarta. The nuance of Jakarta’s traditional music, Gambang Kromong dominates the song. While the children of this group wears some kind of a “hybrid” costume that combines Betawinese ethnic traditional costume with that of the ethnic Chinese.
Bengkulu presents a song inspired by the Lembak Delapan tribe of the Tanjung Perdana Village in Central Bengkulu. According to Bambang Parmadie, the coach as well as the composer of the piece, he made his composition using traditional musical instruments of Bengkulu, for example Klentang ( which has similarities to Saron in Javanese Gamelan) and Ketuk Kerbau ( the Buffalo Bell). In addition he also uses the children’s game Sekencang as the basis of his choreography. The children made a big circle, which become smaller and smaller as the game progress, eliminating some of the children in the smaller circle.
Sekencang is a form of children’s game which have nearly vanished from the land of Bengkulu. “ Once the game was a very popular form of past times among children of Bengkulu. They play this after herding the buffaloes.” But the spread of the more modern form of children’s play resulted in the diminishing popularity of Sekencang.
Bambang only managed to find a limited literary resources on the game,“ When I decided to put the game into my composition I only found several people who used to play the game when they were children. Most of them are very old,” said the man who hold a graduate degree in Karawitan.
Watching the different types of traditional art form on one stage people will truly realize how Indonesia is a country with a wealth of priceless cultural value. “ Indonesia, is truly magnificent,” said one of the audience captivated by the performance.
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