Loading Balinese Dance The Ancient Traditional Dance Form
Indonesia is an Asian region rich in culture and is home to various art forms that flourished over the centuries. The Balinese dance emerges from ancient dance, drama and music tradition that is a part of the religious and social expression among the Balinese people. The Bali region lies at the centre of the Far East and Middle East trade route and hence has a vast influence on its traditional art forms from the culture and art forms of these regions. The Balinese dance is one of the traditional dance forms attracting many thousands of people with its coordinated body gestures, excellent costumes and intricate display of mind and body control by the performers who have been taught to perform this Balinese dance right from the time of their birth.
The entire Bali region has more influence of Hindu religion of India and the Balinese dance has a sound foundation on the characters of the Hindu religion especially that of Parvati, Uma or Durga the consort of the Lord Shiva. Moreover the characters and storyline for this oldest traditional dance forms takes the shape and inspiration from the epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata. The special character of the Balinese dance is that the performers of this unique dance perform the dance with dramatic characters depicting a story and hence this is performed more as a dance drama rather than a mere dance.
The common character Rangda that is found in these dances depicts the forms of Durga and this dance is performed at the time important village ceremonies and temple festivals. The main theme of the Balinese dance is shaped by way of a battle between mythical Rangda characters that are evil in nature against the Barong, the lion or dragon that represents the good. There are various dance variations in the Balinese dance and among them the Barong, Legong, Kecak are very important.
Bali Dancers are highly trained from the early days of their life with their official training beginning at the age of seven. They are taught to give highly coordinated dance movements as per the rhythms produced by the Gamelan that is specific and a unique music accompaniment of the Java and Bali regions. The special feature of the Balinese traditional dance is that they are able to express various mudras or emotions using their face, eyes, hands, arms, hips, and feet with movements that are closely coordinated to the percussive sounds.
The culture of Indonesia is shaped by long interaction between the original customs that is native to this region as well as the ones derived from the multiple foreign influences from various religions like Hinduism, Confucianism, Islam, Buddhism and Christianity. The Balinese dance forms practiced in the Bali region is thus a well mixed art form of various cultures and their influence on the Bali region and its own religion. As such the Balinese dance is an exhibition of this diverse cultural and religion influences as transformed by the cultural will of the Balinese people. Those visiting the Indonesia are stunned by the performance of this traditional art form and are one of the symbols of the unique and specific cultural heritage in this wonderland of ancient custom.
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