A House in Bali

by Colin McPhee, James Murdoch (Introduction)

"It remains one of the most penetrating and illuminating books on the island's elusive, alluring culture." -- National Geographic

A House in Bali tells the fascinating story of renowned writer and composer Colin McPhee's obsession with Balinese gamelan music, and of his journey to Bali to experience it first-hand.

In 1929, the young Canadian-born musician chanced upon rare gramophone recordings which were to change his life forever. From that moment, he lived for the day when he could set foot on the island where this music originated. He realized his dream and spent almost a decade there in the 1930s. Music and dance are second nature to the Balinese, and McPhee's writings and compositions proved seminal in popularizing gamelan music in the West.

In this lovingly-told memoir, McPhee unfolds a beguiling picture of a society like no other in the world--staggeringly poor in material terms, but rich beyond belief in spiritual values and joy. The young composer writes about his growing understanding of this astonishing culture where art is a preoccupation--and of all the arts, music reigns supreme. This is a book about passion, obsession and discovery, and of the journey of a supremely talented modern composer and writer.

Much has been written about Bali, but this classic stands alone!

Genres: Music, Travel, Nonfiction, Asia, Memoir, History, Biography

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1946

Reviews

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Even if I had had the cabin to myself I could not have slept, for I was filled with an inner excitement that kept me wide awake. I had come all this way on a quest of music—to listen to the gamelans, the strange and lovely-sounding orchestras of gongs that still made music, it seemed, in the courts of Java and the villages and temples of Bali, and as I looked out into the night I could hardly believe that this musical adventure was actually about to begin.”

In the 1920s, Canadian composer Colin McPhee discovered Balinese gamelan music from hearing a rare recording played on a gramophone. He traveled to the island of Bali in Indonesia to find out more about how this music is made. He ended up building a house and living there. He fell in love with the music, the people, and the cultural traditions, all of which are beautifully documented in his memoir. This is a snapshot of history. It portrays what life was like in Bali over the course of almost a decade in the 1930s, focusing on the music and performance arts.

This is some of the best writing I have seen in a memoir. McPhee was clearly a gifted writer. The following examples are representative of the evocative writing that continues unabated throughout the book:

He describes the gamelan music:
“Through a maze of intricate patterns a lovely melody was heard that slowly unfolded as the rest of the music rushed along at a breakneck speed. Suddenly the music changed. A short motif repeated over and over while the drums grew agitated. Tension increased like a spring being wound, but just at the moment when you felt it must surely snap the opening melody returned. Back and forth the two sections alternated until in a climax of syncopated drumming the music came to an end.”

and a dance performed in costume at Balinese festivals:
“DURING THE galungan holidays, the island was suddenly filled with magnificent masked beasts. With glaring eyes and snapping jaws, with elaborate golden crowns, great hairy bodies bedecked with little mirrors, and tails that rose high in the air to end in a tassel of tiny bells, they pranced and champed up and down the roads from village to village to the sound of cymbals and gongs, as though they had newly emerged, like awakened dragons, from caves and crevices in which for months they had been lying dormant.”

I enjoyed the photographs and the helpful glossary of terms. If you are interested in music and the arts in countries around the world, do not miss this one.

[Frank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Life in Bali when Kuta and Ubud were a tiny villages and Den Pasar was a small town.

The author never mentions in the book that he was married at the time at that his then-wife bankrolled his grand lifestyle--paying for homes, gamelans, festivals, etc.

[Charisse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lyrical prose, work of genius. Composer Colin McPhee, enchanted by Bali, writes about the decade he spent studying its music and culture, and enjoying the exotic beauty of the island. A must-read.

[Nicholas Driscoll · Rating 2 out of 5]

While certainly interesting to learn about the music and culture of a bygone Bali, and there are a number of memorable bits and fascinating morsels, I found the narrative less than captivating. For me personally at least, it was really meandering. I had trouble keeping the characters straight. I wasn’t sure what the purpose of the book was. Plus the book seems scanned into text, with some weird errors and random italics.

Sometimes fascinating, but I got tired of it unfortunately.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked A House in Bali so well that I feel aimless having finished it. It's exactly what I wanted from a book: entertainment, an easy read, and something to address my interest in Balinese music. McPhee's descriptive talent is very satisfying. Will recommend it to members of my local gamelan club.

[Gordon Mackenzie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book while commuting on the local BART train...I am instantly transported away to a lost in time colonial Bali of the early 1930's with the sounds of the gamelan and imagery of the legong dancers.

It makes me pine for a chance to visit Bali now.

[Edmund Meinerts · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75 stars

Lovely memoir/travelogue by a composer who spends some years in Bali in the 1930s immersing himself in the theater, dance and especially music of the island. McPhee has an engaging and vivid way of describing music that does not require any technical knowledge whatsoever - but which will ring true to anyone who has had the fortune to hear a gamelan orchestra perform. As will the accounts of the warm and welcoming Balinese people he encounters, who in the hundred years since have changed far less than the island they inhabit.

It's hardly the most dramatic of reads and can meander in places despite the relatively short length, but that is somewhat in the nature of this genre. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to learn more about this special island and its culture, but especially to those who know and love them already.

[Ingrid · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely read! These days many travel books are mostly about the author - their ideas, emotions, hopes, tragedies and anything else they went through while travelling or staying in the place in question. This book is refreshingly different! Colin McPhee writes about Bali, its music and people and does so with great sympathy and a kind sense of humour.

The book is deliciously slow, there are no major daily worries and occasionally you come across gems from a totally different era of life and travel - no way not to love it when someone goes camping with a tent and brings a gramophone and discs. Or finishes what is described as a frugal dinner on the seashore with a gin and tonic and a bit of Proust.

And it does tell you a lot about Bali, too.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting if you are into music and foreign cultures. Through his fascination with music, the author reveals a lot about life in Bali in the 1930s. I enjoyed especially since I'll be visiting Bali ,again, for the second time, in a month or so. It really is a unique and beautiful place, and many of the things that made it special nearly a century ago remain today (albeit a bit modernized).

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much more accessible than his big academic book on Balinese music, this is an intimate memoir of his years in Bali back when it seemed much more exotic and far away. A wonderful classic of travel literature. And a portrait of the island at a time when it was much more unspoiled by icky western influences.

[Edward Irons · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enchanting look at a bygone Bali. McPhee was clearly in love with the place, and focused on the images and memories of that love.

[Melina Watts · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author is a composer. At a party, he hears a recording of the gamelan in the 1920s in NYC and is so smitten that, after borrowing the record for a weekend, he returns the album and then immediately boards a ship to move to Bali to learn the music.

From the moment he describes an Indonesian variation on a slushy as "one of the hilariously colored ices of the tropics" i was helplessly in love with his narrative.

For a long time this was out of print and the father of my first child earned huge points by finding an out of print copy for me early on in our relationship. Now "A House in Bali" is available again and I'm sure this book is in the running for books I have given the most copies of as gifts. McPhee makes Bali sound like the kind of dream world that you wish real life could be like ... only ... it is real life, for him. We should all be so lucky to have one human being see us with the love and care and accuracy and devotion that he regards this island; as a writer I hope that I am as faithful to my own chosen corner of the world.

[Philip Guy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderful insight into how Bali was in the 1930s. I have visited Bali several times and often wondered about the culture and the people. Sometimes it is difficult to follow as the author meets and works with a lot of people who's names are difficult to recall as they come and go in the story. The colonial white mans privilege and power is also very evident although sometimes it is used for the good as in buying instruments and facilitating lessons etc but the power imbalance between the rich westerner and the poor farmer or cook is all to evident. Colin McPhee used his skills to record the history of traditional Gamelan music and through this we see his love and appreciation of the culture and the people. I found it amazing that his wife who must have been a huge presence during this time has been made to disappear.

[Sue Fleming · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written in the 1940s after Colin McPhee had spent most of the previous 10 years living in Bali and studying the traditional gamelan music and the dances that accompany it. You don’t have to have a knowledge of music to revel in a Bali of the past, where culture, music and dance were such important parts of life so that it seems that this is what life was about. McPhee kept detailed notes on his life in Bali and the music and dance he experienced. His descriptive writing brings this Bali of the past to life. So much of what he experienced has been lost but not completely. Spiritualism, festivals, music, dance and shadow puppet performances are still very much part of life for the Balinese people.

[Sairam Krishnan · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's not much I can say about this classic that has not been said before. But this is such a heartfelt book, written with so much feeling and love that it is quite difficult not to be moved, even though the writing itself isn't sentimental at all.
Its beautiful, carefully drawn picture-portrait of Balinese culture is priceless, and Colin McPhee's book deserves the place in the pantheon it holds.

[Debbie Keen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got this for my trip to Indonesia and read it a bit while in Bali. I tried to finish it once I returned home but found it weighed down with details about music and locals that just did not keep my interest. It was a good pick for anyone traveling to Bali as it describes the island as it once was long ago.

[Rick Gross · Rating 5 out of 5]

A snapshot in time of the author living for several years on Bali at two different times in the 1930s. His observations of living on Bali and the people he encountered is beautifully written. His wife was with him during this trips, but he makes absolutely no mention of her. In my mind that makes his story less than complete.

[Grace Kelmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a fun read. I had the privilege of playing in a gamelan ensemble in college, and this book gave context to the music that I have held such fond memories of ever since. The author has curated his story significantly, particularly regarding his personal relationships, however I was here for the musical and cultural content, and was not bothered by that decision in the least.

[Steve Castley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great portrait of Bali in the early 20th century. I've read it before but a second reading reminded me of a Bali past and all the changes that have taken place. It also reminded me of the resilience of the Balinese culture. It is worth a read if you love Bali.

[Peter Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although the book was written 70 years ago it really gives one an insight to life in Bali and as Colin McPhee was a musician, the gamelan music is fully explained.

[John Marius · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great little piece of history. A fantastic perspective to experience Balinese culture- respectful and in awe of the different ways of doing and understanding things.

[Margaret Russell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful to get a musicians perspective in love with the Balinese music and dance.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

“A House in Bali” is the story of Colin McPhee, the Canadian writer and composer, and his trips to Bali in the 1930's - long before the island became "Popular". The purpose of his journeys and months spent there was to understand the unique gamelan music of this magical island, comprised of an ensemble of players and percussion instruments.

I’ve been to Bali on a half dozen occasions, and have really enjoyed its unique culture, being a Hindu Island in many Muslim Indonesia. The culture of the island is distinct shaped by religious and cultural forces but also by the climate and volcanos that shape the island. It’s a fusion of good and evil forces – as marked by the ubiquitous black and white checkerboard fabrics found across this island.

The book is really Colin McPhee’s memoire recorded during his time in Bali. He was enchanted with some rare gramophone recordings of Balinese gamelan music and set out from the West (Canada, the United States and France) to find its source in the 1930s. In searching for this music, the book captures his encounters with the people, music, dance and lifestyle of the Balinese – before the island was “discovered”. It’s a book about passion, obsession, and discovery in a “strange” (from the author’s perspective) land.

I love the romanticism of the book and could identify a bit with the search to find unique culture in an increasingly homogenised world. It was so well written that I felt I was part of the journey.

There was nothing I disliked about it.

That said, don’t expect big revelations in it. It’s just a light fun travelogue of a place that was magical before and remains magical today – but just more crowded and “developed”.

It's a fun read…….especially if you love travel, discovery, and have experienced the joys of Bali.

[Nelson Minar · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely memoir of a Canadian's few years residence in Bali, a perfect read for my own trip to Bali trying to learn a little something about the culture and music. The author's ethnography and music background makes his observations unusually insightful. But the book remains a personal and readable account, not academically dry. So (for instance) there are several lovely expositions on how to properly build a Balinese house, but they're told in terms of his friendships and quarrels with various locals.

The centerpiece of the book is the descriptions of music and musical culture; McPhee's studies in Bali were central to teaching North Americans about Balinese music. Unfortunately these descriptions are by necessity a bit limited, being neither technical nor accompanied with actual music. I'd love to experience a version of this book that came combined with musical samples, that'd be amazing.

The other centerpiece of this book is the young dancing boy Sampih. A lot has written about the presumed pedophilic nature of this relationship. Of course the book never says anything directly about that but it's clear McPhee was quite enraptured with the boy. Sort of a Death in Venice, only without the ironic distance from the narrator. I found the author's writing about Sampih more sweet than creepy but it's definitely eyebrow raising. There's film online of Sampih dancing shot by McPhee; he's an amazing dancer.

[Evalynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful, historical account of a handful of years spent living in Bali, studying & greatly admiring gamelan. This book was entertaining for the most part, though I will admit it often put me to sleep in record time after only 3 pages or so at a time. I held onto it for about 6 months after finding it at a library sale, & was excited to read it after seeing my first Balinese gamelan performance in California with my Indonesian husband. I learned a lot about the people McPhee encountered, & all of their different types of gamelan. I especially enjoyed hearing about what life was like in Indonesia, pre-World War II. I am grateful McPhee undertook fostering the traditional music of so many, encouraged creativity, & left pieces of his work at UCLA. It is sad to know how his life went once he left Bali never to return, deeply missing their community & drinking himself to death.

[Elisa Stargirl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Inspiegabile come una lettura attenta, dovuta al fatto di aver tenuto come ultimo libro delle vacanze estive nella megavaligia dei libri un malloppo che parla di un etnomusicologo occidentale innamorato dell'isola di Bali, dovuta al fatto di non avere null'altro da fare se non leggere sotto il sole di Bali, dovuta al fatto che forse pure io ci ho trovato un po' di magia in quell'isola, mi abbiano fatto amare un libro che in realtà è un trattato di musicologia. Un po' di storia e geografia dell'isola, un po' di sociologia della comunità balinese e il resto è una grande descrizione degli strumenti tipici e sconosciuti dell'isola.
Bello.

[Mark Eveleigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book as part of the research for a Bali-based magical realism thriller and, almost 80 years after A House in Bali was published, was still charmed by McPhee's passion and fascination for an island way of life that has almost completely disappeared from most parts of the island. True lovers of Bali still know where those hidden corners are and it would be nice to think that the McPhees would fall in love with it again if they could ever return...

[Eileen Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazingly enchanting.

I am so pleased I came across this book while on a trip to Bali. I had never heard of Colin McPhee, and am now reading about the life of Walter Spies. That these two actually met during their lifetimes is fascinating. Men who had a fascination with Balinese culture and actually produced lasting records of the daily lives as well as the arts are surely rare.

[Farishad Latjuba · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great depiction of life in Sayan, Kuta, Denpasar around the time before the war and Japanese invasion. Even, there is a snippet of Japanese spies visiting McPhee’s Sayan House in the book. Well, then, he didn’t or missed to describe the Japanese visitors as spies. But, surely for the modern readers, it was an espionage activity of the area.

[Mona Schorow · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent background to gamelan music/Bali. Visiting Bali soon after finishing the book, I appreciated this 1940s view of Bali through the eyes of a British ex-patriot musician. Chaotic cacophony indeed. Five stars to anyone wishing to immerse themselves in the musical magic of Bali.