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Song in the Sumatran Highlands

Resource: "Gadih Suayan Tutup Usia"

Saiful Datuak, "Gadih Suayan Tutup Usia: Pelantun Ampekl Lenggek itu Telah Tiada" Surat Kabar Wawasan 2015.

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People: Gadih Suayan 16 Gadih Suayan was a well-known padendang. image_header 2021-03-19T12:25:29+00:00 -0.17798, 100.48907
Stage Name: Gadih Suayan (maiden/ young unmarried woman from Suayan): her stage name asserts a place affiliation with nagari Suayan. An obituary written by Saiful Hadi, a.k.a. Pak Ketua--his day job is a journalist--suggests that she acquired this name from fans. One can imagine when she started singing, she was known as the maiden from Suayan. As Saiful writes, this name "which she carried with her until end of her life, was more popular and known by fans of saluang klasik in Luak nan Tigo, West Sumatra, and moreover throughout Indonesia.”
Other Names: Kartini.
Role: Padendang.
Sex: Female.
Time Frame: Contemporary Figure.
Source: learned about Gadih Suayan by name through ethnography.
Born: @1959 (Sanday 2002:153)
Died: June 19, 2015.
Place of Origin: Suayan.
Place of Residence:
Year started performing: @1970s
Training:
Gadis Suayan...started attending performances when she was twelve or thirteen just to listen. She then studied with a saluang player by following him wherever he went just to listen. This man made her popular by including her in his group. (Sanday 2002:154)
Sanday does not provide details of who the tukang saluang was. It is interesting that her teacher was a tukang saluang rather than a padendang.

Trained: Eri Tamala, who is described as a "foster child." Its unclear whether this means literally or that it indicates a teacher-student relationship, or a little of both.
Performances: None. I never got to see her perform.
Songs composed: A number of Suayan titles, including "Suayan Anguih" (Hasnul Fikri, Syofiani Syofiani and Lolita Lestari 2017: 530).
Commercial Recordings: Many titles.
Other notes:
Sanday writes about Gadih Suayan in her chapter on saluang (2002). She writes how she was
One of [her] favorite female singers... because of her throaty voice and the passion with which she sings. She is about forty-three, wears her hair very short, smokes, and always dresses in pants. She was born in Suayan, a village near Payakumbuh, famous for four songs called the Four Suayan... Gadis Suayan has been married twice and is presently divorced from her second husband. She speaks of him withgreat sadness and longing. Much younger than she, he left her to live with his parents in a city in eastern Sumatra. She jokes with me about being sawah liek, that is, an arid rice field-the title of a famous song she will sing later in the evening about a woman who lies fallow, uncultivated and unfertilized because she has no man... (Sanday 2002:153)
Excerpts from her obituary:
For fans of saluang klasik the name “Gadih Suayan” is a very familiar name in their ears because the name ... raises the name of the nagari where she was born, which is known with dendang “Ratok Suayan", "Suayan Ampek Lenggek” [likely the tune referenced here as "Suayan Balenggek"] along with “Suayan Anguih” and lots of dendang klasik which were presented by her always get great praise from saluang fans, because indeed we recognize that the sound of this dendang maestro is difficult to find a match even now.
… there is not a young artist or a padendang which has the sound of the same caliber as her, moreover the level of memorization and understanding of these dendang klasik songs which have lots of kalorok, gumam, garinyiak, kadakuak, genggong, japuaik anta and cokoiak where the shrewdness of padendang play with anak suara.”
Eri Tamala, her foster child/ student, is quoted in the obituary as saying Gadih Suayan worked with younger singers to “share her knowledge.”
Her sound was excellent and her mastery of songs was perfect was a speciality of hers and there is not yet someone who can replace her position...

Her departure is a sign of uncertainty for the fans of the future of saluang klasik in the region of Luak Nan Tigo …. Because we see the development of saluang klasik recently is very worrying to us because a group of young padendang prefer songs that are accompanied by modern instruments, moreover a group of young padendang don’t know the klasik dendang at all and this will become the major work for all of us...
Resources:
- Saiful Hadi, "Gadih Suayan Tutup Usia"
- Hasnul Fikri, Syofiani Syofiani and Lolita Lestari, "Semiotic in Lyrics and Perception of Community of Nagari Suayan on Saluang Ratok Suayan Anguih"
- Sanday 2002