Over four hours of 1930s films by Colin McPhee and Miguel Covarrubias are on the YouTube channel Bali1928.net with more films by Rolf de Maré and Claire Holt included on the Balinese DVDs. The McPhee films include illuminating footage of the natural environment and everyday life.

Here – in the upper left corner of each image below – are the film playlists from our Bali 1928 YouTube Channel. Please navigate from each film to another by using our playlist in order to avoid YouTube’s flow to random Bali-related videos:

Bali 1928 vol. I – Gamelan Gong Kebyar:
 Music from Belaluan, Pangkung & Busungbiu

Bali 1928 vol. II : Tembang Kuna • Songs from an Earlier Time: 
Tembang • Kidung • Kakawin from Geria Pidada, Klungkung, Geria Budha, Kaliungu, Banjar Abian Timbul, Geria Tampakgangsul & Penarukan, Singaraja

Bali 1928 vol. III – Lotring and the Sources of Gamelan Tradition:
 Semar Pagulingan, Palégongan, Gendér Wayang, Gambang & Gandrung (Pajogédan) from Titih, Kuta, Pagan, Pura Kawitan Kelaci Tanjung Bungkak & Ketapian Kelod

Bali 1928 vol. IV – Music for Temple Festivals and Death Rituals: 
Gamelan Gong Kebyar with Kakawin & Palawakia, Gambuh, & Angklung from Belaluan, Sésétan, Sidan & Pemogan

Bali 1928 vol. V – Vocal Music in Dance Dramas: 
Jangér, Arja, Topéng and Cepung from Kedaton, Abian Timbul, Sésétan, Belaluan, Kaliungu & Lombok

Mamik Ambar singing Pangkur Sasak & Dangdang Sasak

This video excerpt is one of two additional resources contained in the DVD Bali 1928, vol. II and DVD Bali 1928, vol. V recorded by project coordinator, ethnomusicologist and principal investigator, Edward Herbst, and published in Indonesia by STMIK STIKOM Bali as part of the Bali 1928 Project, “Restoration, Dissemination and Repatriation of the Earliest Music Recordings and Films in Bali.”

Mamiq Ambar (1920/1922–2014) was for decades the most celebrated singer of cepung, a Sasak musical genre based on the lontar manuscript Monyeh, written in a Sasak-Javanese script and sung in a combination of Sasak, Balinese and Javanese languages. A cepung group consists of suling ‘bamboo flute’, redep (rebab ‘bowed, upright, spiked fiddle’), pemakhitanaos ‘reader-singer’, punggawa ‘translator’ and penyokong ‘supporter’ who joins in the singing. In Lombok, the public perception of cepung could not be separated from the persona of Mamiq Ambar, often referred to simply as Ambar. Edward Herbst and his Balinese research team visited Ambar at his home in Cakranegara, Mataram, western Lombok, during two extended visits in 2006 and 2009, with an evening music session at the nearby home of his friend Ida Ketut Pidada. The posted video was made by Edward Herbst during a daytime singing session at Ambar’s home.