Balinese Dance, Drama & Music: A Guide to the Performing Arts of Bali

This is the only recent book on this topic. It is authoritative, beautifully illustrated and a complete bargain for the price. People go to Bali and hang out on the beach and go to cheap tourist performances. This book tells the lay person (and even many experts) about the true ritual life in Bali which is enormous, complex and infinitely fascinating. The authors are two of the most authoritative researchers on Balinese traditional performance. Highly, highly recommended.

This book touches on many aspects of the performing arts in Bali. It is a very good overview and place to start as one delves into the music and dance traditions of Bali. I even appreciate the chapters that cover makeup as well as specific attention to certain dances.

Great book! Explains different parts of the culture in detail. Of course, for more depth, you will need to consider additional resources. However, this book is visually beautiful and will make your trip to Bali much more culturally worthwhile! Enjoy

As a graduate student this book gave me a great history of the Balinese Dance Drama and a lot of details of the process, the history, the cultural relevance, with colorful pictures.

Beautiful book! Chock full of information and gorgeous photographs!

Americans are extremely cultural-centric. They assume that everybody wants to be an American, and tend to ignore other cultures. OK, part of that is the media, which leaves out a lot. This is not useful. Humility is useful. This book is a fairly nice coverage of an alien culture with very interesting characteristics. It covers Balinese dance, drama, music, and puppetry, and the shadow puppets of this area are very interesting. A performance can last all night, and use more than 15 languages, from Java's history. The puppetmasters memorize all this stuff. I think even a teenager could enjoy this, well a teenager who wasn't into video games, and other such addictions. This one even covers history, how the art forms embody Balinese values, and specific genres, from Gamelan Gong Kibyar, to Wayang shadow puppetry. There is even a listing of useful CDs and books. Nice stuff. The authors clearly love their subject, and it shows. I love a book that reeks of the love of its creator, for the subject, it just satisfies my heart, somehow. Music Cultures of the Pacific, the Near East, and Asia (3rd Edition) was my introduction to this fascinating culture, starting with the music.

This excellent book provides an extensive, reader-friendly overview of Balinese dance, music, drama and culture. It's the book we've all been waiting for. Written in an informal and high accessible style with wonderful pictures and illustrations it will no doubt be treasured by academics, Baliopihiles or anyone wanting to visit Bali and more deeply experience it's powerful culture. Rucina and Dibia (I know them both) are extraordinary and passionate lovers of all things Bali and have written and taught extensively for decades. If anyone was to write this book, they were the obvious choice. There are dozens of books on this subject - most far too academic and inaccessible - including some of the classics. They got the information right, found the right expressive tone, and the layout is stunning. A wonderful experience throughout! Michael Wiese, filmmaker, publisher and Baliophile

Excellent book for both those who are Bali newbies and those who already know about it, although it might be a little too detailed for some novices. Informative, with fantastic photos and drawings.

Having been to Bali several years go and fallen in love with the dance, I was so pleased to find this book. Nits a great book, lots of pictures, a great reminder of a beautiful holiday spent falling in love with Bali and its dance culture.