Rasa

The complex notion of rasa, as understood by Javanese musicians, refers to a combination of various qualities, including: taste, feeling, affect, mood, sense, inner meaning, a faculty of knowing intuitively, and deep understanding. This leaves us with a number of questions: how is rasa expressed musically? Who or what has rasa, and what sorts of musical, psychological, perceptual, and sociological distinctions enter into this determination? How is the vocabulary of rasa structured, and what does this tell us about traditional Javanese music and aesthetics?

Marc Benamou is Associate professor of music at Earlham College; his writings interweave aesthetics with various other domains, such as gender, food, language, ornithology, and ethics; has performed extensively in Java and abroad as a vocalist of traditional Javanese music, and has founded and directed a number of gamelan ensembles in the U.S.

Preface
Technical Notes
Chapter 1: The Musical Scene in Solo
Chapter 2: The Taste of Music: Rasaning Gendhing
Chapter 3: The Classification of Rasa Gendhing
Chapter 4: Having Rasa, Part 1: Linguistic and Cultural Perspectives
Chapter 5: Having Rasa, Part 2: Musicianship
Chapter 6: The Communication of Rasa, Part 1: General Considerations of Expression and Perception
Chapter 7: The Communication of Rasa, Part 2: Garap and Other Factors Contributing to Specific Rasas
Chapter 8: Why Rasa Talk Matters
Appendix A: Classifications of Rasa Gendhing from Oral and Written Sources
Appendix B: How Iråmå Works
Glossary
Bibliography
Dictionaries and Glossaries
Corpus: Works Having Citations of Rasa Terms as Used by Javanese Experts in Music and Related Arts
General Works
Discography of Recordings Referred to in the Text
Index