Colin McPhee: The Lure of Asian Music

1985 / 58 min. / color
Directed by Michael Blackwood

John Cage, Steve Reich, Aaron Copeland, Lou Harrison, Douglas Young, the Saarbrücken Symphony Orchestra, Dreamtiger Ensemble, and others.

Through composer and musicologist Colin McPhee’s passionate and detailed writing about his time in Bali it becomes immediately evident how strongly the country impacted the course of both his career and life. Seduced by recordings of Balinese music he heard in Paris in the 1920s, McPhee traveled to Bali, ultimately remaining there for six years. While there, he not only studied Balinese music and culture, he also documented Bali’s rapidly changing traditions. “Colin McPhee: The Lure of Asian Music” blends some of the composer’s most meaningful words regarding Bali and the time he spent there with observations and praise from fellow composers such as John Cage and Aaron Copeland. Among his writings are “A House in Bali,” from which the text of the film is taken, and “Music in Bali,” which is considered the definitive study of the island’s music.