Legong Dance

Legong dance is one of Wali dance which function to performance entertainment,

historically this dance is develop in Keraton-keraton in Bali at 19 century the idea of this dance
is starting when a prince from Sukawati ubud (gianyar regency) that had the illness hard dream
and see two beautiful girls dancing with the graceful accompanied by the beautiful Gambelan.
When the prince recovered from the illness, the dreams that he had are set in the repertory dance
complete with the gamelan. The legong dance basically is a dance which has complicate
structure in body, eyes movement. Legong came from the word leg which means the
complicate movement from body, foot, hand and eyes. And gong means gambelan so legong is a
dance in complicate movement body from the dancer which followed with the instrumental
Gambelan which calls Gambelan Semar Pegulingan. At the beginning this dance are dancing
with two girl which is had not menstruation yet, virgin and dancing in the yard of Keraton down
in the moon light and bring out Kipas (fan) and in the development it had a additional dance
which call condong the other structure of this dance are papeson, pangawak, pengecet, dan
pakaad.
Kinds of Legong Dance
There are many kind of legong dance which these dance take some theme which presented in
dance here some kind of legong dance:

Legong Lasem (Kraton)

Legong Jobog

Legong Legod Bawa

Legong Kuntul

Legong Smaradahana

Legong Sudarsana

Philosophy of Legong Dance

Each of those dance are has the own characteristic like legong lasem it tell about the stories from
prabu lasem which kidnap the princess from Daha, legong jobog it tell about the stories from
Sugriwa and Subali from Ramayana epos, Legong legod bawa it tell about the stories from
competition Dewa Dewa Brahma and Vishnu when searching for the secret commemorative
Dewa Syiwa, Legong Kuntul narrate a pair of heron, which occupied sociality, and Legong
Sudarsana tok the stories about Calonarang.
The most common is the tale of the King of Lasem from the Malat, a collection of heroic
romances. He is at war with another king, the father (or brother) of Princess Ranjasari. Lasem
wants to marry the girl, but she detests him and tries to run away. Becoming lost in the forest, she
is captured by Lasem, who imprisons her and goes out for a final assault against her family. He is
attacked by a monstrous raven, which foretells his death.
The dramatics are enacted in elaborate and stylized pantomime. The two little actresses are
accompanied by a third dancer called a tjondong or attendant. She sets the scene, presents the
dancers with their fans and later plays the part of the raven.