Pelog (Sundanese:ᮕᮦᮜᮧᮌ᮪,romanized: Pélog /pelog/,Javanese:ꦥꦺꦭꦺꦴꦒ꧀,Balinese:ᬧᬾᬮᭀᬕ᭄,romanized: Pélog /pelok/) is one of the essential tuning systems used ingamelan instruments that has aheptatonicscale.[2][3] The other, older, scale commonly used is calledslendro.Pelog has seven notes, but many gamelan ensembles only have keys for five of the pitches. Even in ensembles that have all seven notes, many pieces only use a subset of five notes, sometimes the additional 4th tone is also used in a piece like western accidentals.
Pelog is a Javanese term for one of the scales ingamelan. In Javanese, the term is said to be a variant of the wordpelag meaning "fine" or "beautiful".[4]
Since thetuning varies so widely from island to island, village to village, and even amonggamelan, it is difficult to characterize in terms of intervals. One rough approximation expresses the seven pitches of Central Javanesepelog as a subset of 9-toneequal temperament. An analysis of 27 Central Javanese gamelans by Surjodiningrat (1972) revealed a statistical preference for this system of tuning.[5]
As inslendro, although the intervals vary from one gamelan to the next, the intervals between notes in a scale are very close to identical for different instruments within the same Javanesegamelan. This is not the case in Bali, where instruments are played in pairs which are tuned slightly apart so as to produceinterference beating. The beating is ideally at a consistent speed for all pairs of notes in all registers, producingstretched octaves as a result. This contributes to the very "agitated" and "shimmering" sound of gamelan ensembles. In the religious ceremonies that containgamelan, these interference beats are meant to give the listener a feeling of a god's presence or a stepping stone to a meditative state.
Sundanese gamelan has its ownpélog tuning. Both Javanese-likepélog and Sundanese pélog (degung) coexist in Sundanese music. Javanese-like pélog has the 2nd note more neutral (Javanese 2 [ro], Sundanese 4 [ti]) and Degung has the 1st note leaning (closer to Javanese 1 [ji], Sundanese 5 [la]). The Javanese pélog is only found ingamelan pélog instruments, while degung is found widely on any instrument, such ascalung,angklung, andgamelan degung.
Notation equivalents forpélog in both Javanese and Sundanese notation:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ji ro lu pat mo nem pi
5 4 3 -3 2 1 +5 la ti na ni mi da leu
Although the fullpelog scale has seven tones, usually only a five-tone subset is used (see the similar Western concept ofmode). In fact, many gamelan instruments physically lack keys for two of the tones. Different regions, such as Central Java or West Java (Sunda), use different subsets. In Central Javanese gamelan, thepelog scale is traditionally divided into threepathet (modes). Two of these, calledpathet nem andpathet lima, use the subset of 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6; the third,pathet barang, uses 2, 3, 5, 6, and 7. The remaining two notes, including 4 in everypathet, are available for embellishments on most instruments, but they do not usually appear ongendér,gambang, orinterpunctuating instruments.
The notes of thepelog scale can be designated in different ways; In Central Java, one common way is the use of numbers (often called by their names inJavanese, especially in a shortened form. An older set uses names derived from parts of the body. Notice that both systems have the same designations for 5 and 6.
| Number | Javanese number | Traditional name | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Short name | Full name | Literal meaning | |
| 1 | siji | ji | bem | head |
| 2 | loro | ro | gulu | neck |
| 3 | telu | lu | dhadha | chest |
| 4 | papat | pat | papat | four |
| 5 | lima | ma | lima | five |
| 6 | enem | nem | nem | six |
| 7 | pitu | pi | barang | thing |
In Sunda, the notes ofgamelan degung have one-syllable names. A peculiarity of Sundanese solfège is that scale degrees are given in descending order.
| Sundanese pelog degung | Javanese pathet lima |
| 1 (da) | 6 |
| 2 (mi) | 5 |
| 3 (na) | 3 |
| 4 (ti) | 2 |
| 5 (la) | 1 |
In Bali, all seven tones are used ingamelan semar pegulingan,gamelan gambuh, andgamelan semara dana (a seven-tonegamelan gong kebyar ensemble). All seven tones are rarely heard in a single traditional composition.
Like in themusic of Java, five-tone modes are used, which are constructed with alternating groups of three and two consecutive scale degrees, each group being separated by a gap. Unlike Java, there are only five names for the notes, and the same five names are used in all modes. The modes all start on the note namedding, and then continue going up the scale todong,deng,dung anddang. This means that the same pitch will have a different name in a different mode.
The three most common and well-known modes areselisir,tembung andsunaren.Selisir is the most often encountered, being the tuning of the popularGamelan gong kebyar, and may be considered the "default" pelog scale.
Two other modes,baro andlebeng, are known fromgambuh andsemar pegulingan, but are rarely used and more loosely defined.[6]Baro has at least four different interpretations;[7] one common one (3-4-5-7-1, according to I Wayan Beratha and I Ketut Gede Asnawa) is shown below.Lebeng contains all seven tones, but only insemar pegulingan; ingambuh it is pentatonic, but has a more elusive character.[6]
| Classical Balinese modes | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tone | Selisir | Tembung | Sunaren | Baro | Lebeng |
| 1 | ding | dung | — | dang | ding |
| 2 | dong | dang | dung | — | dong |
| 3 | deng | — | dang | ding | deng |
| 4 | — | ding | — | dong | deung |
| 5 | dung | dong | ding | deng | dung |
| 6 | dang | deng | dong | — | dang |
| 7 | — | — | deng | dung | daing |
With the advent of thegamelan semara dana and renewed interest in seven-tone music, a number of other modes have been discovered by extending the 3/2 rule to other possible positions. They fall into two groups: thepengenter modes and the"slendro" modes.[8]
The two"slendro" modes,slendro gedé andslendro alit are named for their resemblance toslendro proper. In these modes,ding is often placed at the first note of a two-note sequence in the 3-2 pattern, reflecting common practice inslendro ensembles.Slendro gedé is associated with the tuning ofgender wayang, whileslendro alit is identified with the four-tone scale of gamelanangklung.
Thepengenter modes were discovered as theoretical extrapolations by I Nyoman Kaler. They exist only in recent modern compositions.
| Tone | Slendro gedé | Slendro alit | Pengenter gedé | Pengenter alit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | — | (dong) | dong | deng |
| 2 | deng | — | deng | — |
| 3 | dung | deng | — | dung |
| 4 | dang | dung | dung | dang |
| 5 | — | dang | dang | — |
| 6 | ding | — | — | ding |
| 7 | dong | ding | ding | dong |
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