Lisa Gold is a Lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley where she earned her Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology with a specialization in Balinese and Javanese music in ritual & theater, gamelan gender wayang, and shadow puppetry. Other research interests include transmission and communicability, folklore, instrumental and vocal music of Ireland and the UK, oral performance and improvisation, music and space and place, mediatization, performance eco-systems, and musical analysis. She is a member of Gamelan Sekar Jaya, Gamelan Sari Raras, and ShadowLight. She has performed and conducted extensive ongoing research in Bali and the U.S. since 1981, and is the author of Music in Bali: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Oxford University Press Global Music Series, 2005), and a number of articles and book chapters. These include “Music in Bali: The Sound World of a Balinese Temple Ceremony,” in Global Music Cultures: An Introduction to World Music (Oxford University Press, 2021), the Bali article in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, a chapter in Performing Arts in Postmodern Bali: Changing Interpretations, Founding Traditions. (Graz Studies in Ethnomusicology 2013), “Musical Expression in the Gender Wayang Repertoire: A Bridge Between Narrative and Ritual,” in, Danker Schaareman, ed, Balinese Music in Context (Basel: Amadeus, Forum Ethnomusicologicum 4), a published paper presented at the International Seminar and Festival of Indonesian Music, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC (2016, https://asia.si.edu/essays/article-gold/) and a dissertation on the relationship between theater and ritual in Balinese shadow puppetry (1998), based on close work spanning decades with dynamic leading performers from former times. She is currently recasting this work as a monograph in light of her ongoing research in Bali on the contemporary situation of transmission of musical and wayang knowledge that spans a century of performance. Her recent studies have also taken her deeply into the study of traditional Irish flute performance and transmission.
Lisa continues to give scholarly lectures and presentations, including “Balinese Gender Wayang: Musical Knowledge, Innovation, and Transmission from Zaman Dulu (a Bygone Era) to the Present,” Nusantara Gamelan Masters Guest Lecture Series, Buffalo, NY. https://nusantaraarts.com/guest-lecture-series/.
Courses Lisa has enjoyed teaching include Music and Theater of Southeast Asia, Music of Bali, Music, Ritual and Theater of Bali and Java, and Music in Ritual and Festival Soundscapes (case studies worldwide), along with the Balinese Gamelan performance ensemble where she directs an annual Hertz Hall noon concert. She believes in integrating performance and creative projects in her lecture courses so that students have experiential learning.