Yes, Joey on Piano, but…

Joey on piano? Yes! But at the world theater.

I was late to be aware of an excellent Indonesian talent in music, Joey Alexander. The moment I heard about this young jazz pianist was that leading to the Grammy Award event in Los Angeles. When I mentioned about Joey’s nomination to my kids, they just laughed at me; stating the obvious---the out-of-date dad.

That said, my stumbling upon Joey was just by accident browsing about on youtube. I was trying to find some jazzy music by Tompi. I did found one video, Tompi singing his song Sedari Dulu at University of Indonesia’s Jazz Goes To Campus, November 2012.  And, there it was---Joey on piano. 

Everything was still so innocent, I should say. Tompi introduced that giant talent in tiny body as just “a little boy who can play piano”. He called him as just by “Joey on piano”.

continue reading Yes, Joey on Piano, but…

Truly, Asia is Indonesia

2008?

It is coming soon. You can have plenty of things to do. But, travelling to Indonesia may be one of best choices there is.

Yes, I am saying this because I am an Indonesian. But, if you have visited the country, you know what I mean. Even if you haven't, this is a valid invitation.

The thing is, 2008 is also a good timing since the Department of Tourism and Culture set it as the Visit Indonesia Year. You can always access its website for updates.

In fact, this coming year is also pledged as the Visit West Sumatera Year. I have been visiting to many countries before, seeing the beauty of many cities, but stopping by in Bukittingi or Maninjau Lake in West Sumatera is always my opted preference. You can explore the possibilities there.

What about security? In case you ask, that is so much a cliche rather than a fact. It is safe. Than again, the world is

People should avoid New York if 9/11 is the barometer. Or London, Madrid, Jerusalem, Bombay, Bangkok and what not.

Bali? Just recently the US Embassy in Jakarta released a confirmation that the Ngurah Rai airport in Bali is safe and comply to international security aviation standard.

What I am saying is that it is due for any world citizen to retake the joy of exotic Indonesia anytime.

Truly, it is Indonesia that is Asia. Others, you say?

You will find out yourself that what is wrapped and sold with a price elsewhere may just be a tiny cultural parcel abundantly available in Indonesia.

I tell you this, if someone sell you another person's treasures, what else you can make of it except...?

Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world. It is a very big country, very diverse and colorful. Saying just that already a proof of so many good things.

2008 is the Visit Indonesia Year.

LA/Nov/07

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Award for Ridiculing A Country

The job ridiculing a country can pay handsomely. More than that, you can even get a trophy of an international commendation. So far, a Golden Globe award, that is. We will still wait and see about Oscar.

This may not work for everyone though. But, at least, it works for Borat Sagdiyev, or, to be precise, Sacha Baron Cohen. Movie goers from all over the world must have all known him by now. Some may laugh out loud just by remembering Borat’s journalistic 'mockumentary' in America.

Sacha successfully badmouthed a sovereign country, Kazakhstan, down to the lowest level four screenwriters could possibly imagined. It was about a full portrayal of such backwardness.

The film, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan released in 2006, hit the world with a very high profit. Sacha is now one of the highly paid actor for his harsh and sarcastic jokes.

This is one movie where Jews are ridiculed badly (throw the Jews down the well) and not one knee-jerk commentators came forward shouting antisemitism. Knowingly, people just laughed---even Jon Stewart of the Comedy Central. Sacha Baron Cohen himself, who also take the role as Ali G in a hilarious British TV comedy, is a Jew and nothing to do with Kazakhstan. The joke is on the Kazakh people, of course.

When President Nursultan Nazarbayev visited President Bush in September 2006, Sacha used it for free advertisement by having a press conference in front of Kazakh Embassy in Washington DC. The Kazakh government even felt the need to launch a tourism campaign to counter the bad image caused by Borat. Though Kazakhstan's reactions divided and tactic changed, it is understandable that in the country people could just run berserk. It is not Kazakhstan the country Sacha representing, said a Kaszakh senior diplomat, but "Boratistan".

Of course, this is no longer news, since time always moves on. Sacha himself is now on a new project, Bruno. People go to theater to see newer movies and, sure, there are plenty of them. All are more civilized.

Unfortunately for the country and the people of Kazakhstan, the news is not yet over. Borat also made it into the more prestigious film festival nomination, the Academy Award, which is due this mid February. The short list of nominees for Oscar includes Borat as a nominee for writing (adapted screen play) category.

Inasmuch that some movie goers considered the Kazakh people need to develop a sense of humor, it seems only fair to kindly spare the country from more of such insulting gag. Borat is surely far more painful than that of the fondly funny, country-mate Crocodile Dundee for Australia.

International relations-wise, I think globalization should not have to also mean a free ride to humiliate a country and get more award for it. Even for a laugh, the dictum should read that if it is too much it is too much. When it is enough already, the category applied now should be 'poor taste'.

continue reading Award for Ridiculing A Country

How Foreign Are You, Really?

How will travel change you?

That is the question in a frequently-printed advertisement of the L.A. Times leading to a gala event of travel and adventure show in February.

Sure, the picture pasted in that ad shows a man wearing a suit paired with a pinned nose bone the Maori way; or a woman wearing a sea shell bra and long lei necklace. The gist is obvious: we surely adopt something as a result of traveling.

But, the point I am making here is how travel will change you, not.

Ok. This is all about focus of perspective. Both qualities, of changing or staying the same, are valid.

When you change a little, due to traveling or other contacts, most of your being just stay intact. Or, even if you change a lot, some part of you still holds on to that old thing from the past. No one changes totally.

Stiglizt may call it globalization. The fact is we are accommodating something foreign into our being everyday. As citizens of the world, we are all hybrids of so many cultures and backgrounds. But, even when we take in some, we will always keep some (of the old). The case is more complex when you do not just travel but live in a foreign country.

That is perhaps the reason why there is something of the old standing together with the new. Otherwise, how can we explain the existence of, for instance, a China town in New York or Los Angeles. There is this Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, even Little Saigon. Something that was left behind is being transformed into something of here and now.

Amazingly, a quickly flourishing part of the city of Los Angeles is, in fact, the Koreatown area.

If you are brought and dropped there blindfolded and suddenly open your eyes, you would probably think that is Seoul or Kwangju just by glimpsing at those so many Korean characters in business billboards. When you take a quick look and see so many Asians around, you would probably be more convinced and think that the white, black and Latino individuals passing by as just tourists.

True, that is Los Angeles, a very multi-cultured city in America.

The point remains---even if you change, what changed is just some part of you. It is within the foreign setting, however, that process of cultural accommodation occurs more deeply.

So, a person of Chinese, Korean, Philippino, Indian, Bangladesh or Indonesian background will pick up and adapt to the local way, acting like an American. While some may absorb the good quality, some others may just translate liberty or equality into self-centered attitude or sarcasm.

All of a sudden there stand the newly-cultured individuals that whine on everything else but failing on self-criticism. Only after a dose of Uncle Sam, you would also find some who would see their home country as just the place of the corrupt and the incompetent.

Yet, even so, people will never really change fully.

As Americans in other countries missing their home, including their favorite pancakes, foreigners in America experience the same things. Small things can be what are missed badly.

So the Middle Eastern immigrants will still go for the kebab, for instance, the Korean eat bulgogi, while for the Indonesians the ikan asin or salty dried fish will still be favorite.

Now, tell me, how will travel change you? Not?

continue reading How Foreign Are You, Really?

The Piano of Christine Utomo

Do you like classical music; those of Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Brahms, Debussy, Schriabin or even Barber the American composer?

If you don't---preferring the electric hip hop pop or other instead---imagine to get a Doctorate of Musical Arts in classical piano performance?

That is Christine Utomo, a shy looking pianist completing her top-level doctoral education at the University of Southern California, through her soft fingers running wild, say, in the tune of Samuel Barber---The Piano Sonata.

Yes, classical music is indeed the elite of any kind of music finesses of civilization.

This is indeed the kind of music by invitation, of which you should really be willing to come in order to enjoy it. Otherwise, you'd better off to associate yourself just to an easy listening program or the like at a local FM radio channel. It seems almost absolute that we really need to be mentally ready, and by letting go all other things around, in order to enjoy it, since it is precious like a antique porcelain. Be careful; otherwise, it will break.

Then again, that is only the way I see it every time. I am no expert on this but a regular man in the street. Yet, once a while I do like to sit and listen to the numbers by a genius, even long dead, like Mozart. Or of else.

I am so much a regular guy who does not even have a special pick to mention. Any pick goes just fine. In fact, apart from a rare, quite listening of a classical CD in the living room, the classical distance I have may just be listening to an open concert presented in a public hall.*

But, invited to the recital by Christine Utomo in the evening of January 18 as a presentation by the Flora L. Thornton School of Music, USC, I was so much engulfed sitting in the back row listening attentively to every tune played by her.

This is the Christine who started playing piano so very young and even performed a recital in public at the age of five. She was the award holder of prestigious piano festivals and earned a Dean Scholarship in her USC education.

There performed skilfully were Debussy's Image Book II, Schriabin's Sonata No.9, Beethoven's Piano Sonata op. 109, Mozart's Piano Sonata K.332 and Barber's Sonata for Piano.

Up in the front center, the glowing Christine commanding the piano under a single spotlight was really catching the breath of the audience. One thing about classical music is its magical lure stiring you heart into many kind of feelings. The soft and longing tunes would fly you far away, the sad turn could even bring you tears, while the forceful glares would wring your heart in turbulence. Very often in a composition, all together would just take turn to play you.

And watching Christine playing, while she was so playful---even child-like---in soft tunes and jumped up from the seat for Barber's four parts Piano Sonata, was really a due treat for me. Perhaps even for everyone.

When she elegantly bowed upon finishing the whole performance perfectly, the room was full of applauses. As an encore, she also played a piano improvisation of the joyful “Kopi Dangdut”.

I am not only happy for the chance of being there, but even proud knowing that she is not just an excellent pianist, but an Indonesian talent completing a doctoral degree and anxious to go back home.

Congratulation, Christine!

*) Even that, was already far back to 1996-1997 when I studied in Brisbane, Australia. There a concert performed once a week at the heart of Queen Elisabeth Mall.

continue reading The Piano of Christine Utomo

Qariah Maria Ulfah in LA Times

The Los Angeles Times, Sunday edition of 17 December published an interesting article about an Indonesian Quran reciter, a qoriah, Maria Ulfah. The piece, Her Koran Recitals Says A Lot, is authored by John Glionna, the Times staff writer, who has written several stories about Indonesia, in collaboration with Dinda Jouhana, the correspondence in Indonesia.

The article is very interesting particularly due its unbiased perspective. In fact, the whole piece is quite sympathetic and open---the perspective that is not always seen among many Western journalists. You must be aware that the usual approach taken by many Western media in the pretext of 'balance' is more likely to start with a few obvious good things, sided together with a bunch of regular criticism or such. This one is not like that at all; this is almost perfect.

Let us read some of Glionna's words:

In Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, most schools have Koran recitation clubs. And women here, unlike in other Islamic nations where they often are excluded from the public sphere, are afforded higher status by a comparatively moderate culture. Girls are encouraged from an early age to compete alongside boys.

It is an atmosphere in which Ulfah thrived. In 1980, she won the women's title in an international Koran recitation contest in Malaysia, earning her national acclaim back home in Indonesia and launching Ulfah into the artistic and intellectual spotlight.

Suddenly, her voice was broadcast regularly on radio and television. She won recording contracts and was invited to perform her melodic recitations throughout the Islamic world and in the West.

In Indonesia, her performances filled football stadiums. In her a cappella recitations, Ulfah's wide-ranging voice brings a distinct mood to each Koranic text, as she uses flourishes, tempo and pitch through the use of various melodies. The result is a unique religious musical performance — more singing than chanting, as spiritual as it is artistic.

Yes, for many Indonesians, Maria Ulfah is certainly known widely.

I have known abou her myself since her well-remembered success in winning the recitation contest of 1980, Musabaqah Tilawatil Quran (MTQ), in Malaysia. I also remember Nanang Qasim as an Indonesian popular male reciter or qari along with Maria Ulfah.

All my brothers and sisters must have also been very familiar with her beautiful recitals, particularly because our father really loved to play the cassette loudly every morning, including to wake the children up for shubuh prayer (shalat).

Reading this piece is, therefore, truly heartening, given the way the LA Times describes Maria Ulfah. It is true that through her Quran recital skill, Ulfah has shown the world of her own effort to portray the true image of woman in Islam. This is in fact an issue of equality in gender which Islam teaches, even though to many non-Muslim it is seriously misunderstood.

Ulfah is 51 years old now and she has surely inspired many younger ones. As Glionna wrote, much of Ulfah success is due to her father's dream to show the world that woman is equal to anyone.

continue reading Qariah Maria Ulfah in LA Times

Listening to Tompi

How do you start liking the works of a singer?

The music---that is mostly the answer; or the voice, the lyric, the style and so on. Every bit of them mixed together is perhaps the reason I start liking Tompi's songs.

As a new, groovy comer in the Indonesian music industry, Tompi is one of those popular singers whose debut attracted increasing attention. Particularly for those who like jazz- or soul-based music, Tompi is a fresh charm.

When I was young, being brought up in Riau and watched Malaysian TV broadcast, I really enjoyed the songs of P. Ramlee. He was very popular in 1970s, perhaps even to early 1980s. His jazzy touch, a colour of saxophone, poured in a silky voice rich with deep lyrics, never failed to blanket me in serenity.

I am no expert of music, not even very sure the specific or particularity of jazz, soul and blues. They could all be the same for me, the ensemble of sweet and deep rhythm voiced by horn instruments or not. Yet, compared to rebellious heavy metal sounds, rhythm and blues music may be a treat of soulful tunes.

That is the way Tompi reached my ears. I felt like having another P. Ramlee, different but reminiscent. Tompi is young and new and he has only released two albums as of now. But his music career can be promising. The color of his voice is rather one of its kind, a bit light and high but fits nicely in his own songs.

However, his first album was rather general I think, the R&B way like those of others. Nevertheless, a bit brave though, since Tompi also came out with several songs in English lyrics. An opening entry to the global music, it was said as the consideration, which is certainly constructive. In fact, he also had good collaboration with foreign musicians. We do need our singers to go global, not just entertain locally.

But the way Tompi really got me was through his latest album released during the Ramadhan this year. Anyone can point out that Tompi might be only another addition to the increasingly becoming-more-popular tradition among singers who released religious albums to commercialize the fasting month. But Tompi was unique since his contribution was "a soulful Ramadhan", the kind of music that never before joined the merrymaking.

I enjoy his songs such as that "Ramadhan Datang" (Ramadhan is Coming), "Muhammad Tlah Mengajarkan Kita", "Assalamualaika" and the rest.


He sang thankfulness to God the Merciful; he revered the Prophet; he called for faithfulness.

Of course, Tompi’s credit is not on his devoutness. For me, he is special when he is singing Aceh to us all varied in the lexicon of the Acehnesse which I don’t quite understand. But the tune is sweet, transpiring the fullness of meaning. I need no more.

That is when I regard Tompi as a rich and deep singer who has a lot of potentials. He is a medical doctor by education, but he is a promising vocalist in the map of music.

Therefore, I am joining those who hope Tompi could reach up to greater international collaborations and bring the Indonesian music to the world.

Jakarta/LA, Oct-Nov 2006

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Flag and Nationalism

In Indonesia, every August is the month of festival as a nation-state. It is about the Independence Day of 17 August. Early in the month, or even since late July, the mood of national celebration has, in a way, always been started. Everywhere you go, you will find flag vendors, the stand-by or roving ones. The national flags, the red and white, blow with the wind in every size. There are the outdoor-, indoor-, table- or triangle-size flags. Wood or bamboo flag poles are in display together. The roving sellers would push their carts around the housing areas. All red-and-white.

True that once awhile you will wonder: is there still any household in the whole country that is yet to own a flag? Would the case be that those flags made of cotton clothes are not reusable? Would all the good citizens throw their flags away after August last year? Do we need to buy all new flags this year?

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