Gamelan Melodic Phrase Representation based on The Question-and-Answer Segmentation Rule

A melodic phrase can be analogized as a conversation containing question-and-answer segments. Gamelan music, a Javanese traditional music, has a melodic phrase concept called padang-ulihan that has the characteristic of causality in the format of questioning and answering continuously and recursively starting from the beat level that expands to the bar and line levels. The concept needs to be mapped in the data rigidly so that the system can recognize it. Without applying the concept of a melodic phrase, the resulting melodic generation tends to meet the rules but lacks in melodic feel. This is the motivation to develop a symbolic question-and-answer segmentation-based model for the representation of Gamelan music melodies. The concept of the melodic phrase in Gamelan music is represented into question-and-answer segments recursively, which is then mapped into 11 sub-segments starting from beats, bars, and lines, in which all the sub-segments is formulated into seven types of marks using combinations of question, exclamation and asterisk marks. The proposed method can be used to generate a sequence of notations that meet the melodic phrase pattern which is still a problem in melodic generation.