Instrumentation & choreography

“A more slick and expanded version of ketuk tilu”
Jaipongan takes much of its instrumentation from ketuk tilu ensembles. The ketuk tilu group is composed of pot-gongs. Besides the core three main kettle gongs (ketuk, tilu meaning three), the instruments include a rebab, a small upright bowed instrument, also known as a spike fiddle, other small gongs — a hanging gong and two iron plates, and two or three barrel drums. The traditional singer is female or a sinden, but also dances and invites men to dance with her sensually, so it is assumed she is a prostitute or ronggeng. The ensemble is small enough to be carried from village to village to places where a saron or kempul may be added.
Ketuk tilu songs, following a free rhythmic introduction, are structured sectionally, juxtaposing segments of short gong cycles (about 10 seconds) with those of longer gong-cycles (about 30 seconds) each section having a characteristic sequence of dance steps associated with it.
Gumbira took and retrofitted the dynamic and intense ketuk-tilu music. The role of the singer was emphasized to concentrate just on the vocals. He added to it traditional gamelan by expanding the drum section of the ketuk tilu as more of an urban, unique gamelan orchestra from two drums to six. He also sped up the music significantly, increasing the dance role. He also modified the accompanying dance. The modifications retained some of the original sensual moves of ketuk tilu, joining to them a popular martial art called pencak silat. Gumbira called it jaipong. Jaipongan cassettes really feature the singer with their name and alluring cover photos. The singer is given greatest prominence, no longer seen as a prostitute but professional and respectful. This goes with the market demand for solo-superstars.

The idiophonic accompaniment of jaipongan may also include a few saron or a gegung (an L-shaped row of gong chimes), and often a gambang (xylophone). Otherwise instruments are the same as in ketuk tilu.
The large hanging gong and smaller gongs used in jaipong, like ketuk tilu and gong-chime performance, serve colotomic functions, punctuating the time-cycles at regular fixed intervals. The several ketuk play a standardized three-pitch figure, high, low, medium-low. The spike fiddle often imitates the singer and solos when the singer is silent. All the musicians, and especially the drummer, freely supplement the texture with rhythmic cries and yells called senggak. The most important roles become the singer and the drummer. The drummer is more aggressive and assertive than in other Sudanese/Javanese ensembles, commanding attention with a variable cadential figure before a large gong stroke. Jaipongan drumming is more virtuosic and flamboyant, the drummer performs lively improvisations throughout, building up tension that culminates and is released at the gong stroke. A distinctive Sundanese feature is the variation of the pitch of the main drum, whose head tension is governed by the foot of the drummer. The singer is the central figure carrying the melody and dancing at the same time. It is this lively interplay between the drummer and the singer that was carried from ketuk tilu, and is an identifying feature. The dance is centered around the gong cycles, in which the tension is built up before each large gong stroke where the dancers will gracefully jerk their heads toward each other.
The male jaipongan dance style is less acrobatic and martial than that found in ketuk tilu, simpler. Whereas the female dancer in jaipongan is very active, more than the ronggeng in ketuk tilu. It is very choreographed with a sophisticated polish different than the coyness role played by the ronggeg for the male advances in ketuk tilu.
The sectional formal structure of ketuk tilu is one feature that has not carried over to jaipongan. A jaipongan piece opens with a few gong cycles, often in a different tempo than the rest of the piece, during which the spike fiddle player improvises over the idiophone and drum accompaniment. The vocalist then enters, usually singing four gong cycles consecutively, then allowing the spike fiddler to improvise for two of theses gongan. The piece alternates in this way until it ends with a deceleration leading to the final gong.
The melodies are set to madenda, the Sundanese variant of the pelog mode, or slendro, or a free combination of the two, or an alternating combination. The melodies are usually in the pelog or madenda scales, while the fixed pitch idiophonic accompaniment is strictly in slendro. This combination contrasts with the gamelan tradition. The scales of these modes, intonation and tonic are difficult and not consistent, for more detail on this see:.^[1] Intonation may be further obscured by the characteristic vibrato. These melodies in jaipongan can also be stereotypical; so much of the expressiveness and uniqueness comes in the introduction, improvised or pre-composed. It often establishes the modal pattern.
The verses are often organized into quatrains, each is one gong cycle, and in rhyme scheme aabbcc, each line having about eight syllables, as in most Sundanese folk and popular verse.