Rebab, Rhythm and Reinvention
ZAIDI AZMI | 30 September 2025
The Baizam Generation team is ready to wow you with 'Sentuhan Warisan Pantai Timur', a spellbinding journey of tales and music through the East Coast.
THE lights will dim. A single note from the rebab will linger in the air, raw and fragile, like wind skimming the sea. Soon, the sound of the strings and woodwind will rise to meet it, wrapping the ancient sound in orchestral grandeur.
This is how Sentuhan Warisan Pantai Timur is set to begin – a concert that promises not just music, but a narrative. Presented by Orkestra Kuala Lumpur in collaboration with Baizam Generation, it invites audiences on a spellbinding journey through the East Coast. On Oct 4 and 5, Auditorium DBKL will become the vessel for this story, as a Raja travels through Pahang, Kelantan and Terengganu – guided not by a formal emcee, but by the Tok Dalang and the Pak Yong.
Here, narration will not be delivered from behind a podium but sung, chanted and acted out, just as it has been for centuries.
“We didn’t want someone to simply announce the next act,” explains Baizam’s Zamzuriah Zahari, who is also the repertoire arranger, as well as sought-after performer and a lecturer at the National Arts and Culture and Traditional Heritage Academy (Aswara).
The dance-academician explains: “The performers themselves are the storytellers. The Raja’s journey is our frame, but the audience will feel as though they’re travelling too. They will discover each tradition along the way.”
Makyong master practioner Zamzuriah Zahari takes on the role of Pak Yong, as well as serving as the composer and lyricist in the 'Sentuhan Warisan Pantai Timur' Concert.
Each stop on the Raja’s journey will be marked by a certain sound.
In Kelantan, audiences will be diving into a medley of Dikir Barat reframed for modern ears, even featuring a hip hop twist.
Terengganu will offer the haunting performance of the Saba, a macabre dance of the folks in Hulu Terengganu in olden days. A royal plate dance, the Tarian Piring Diraja from Pahang, will echo with the ring of porcelain.
But these pieces will not be performed as “museum relics”.
They will be alive, reinterpreted, translated and sometimes transformed. The Tok Dalang, usually the master of shadow puppets, will act as guide; the Pak Yong will become narrator. Together, they will blur the lines between concert and drama.
The Wayang Kulit and Makyong performance by Baizam Generation will feature young talents, Kamarul Baiquni,10, and Kamarul Baihaqi, 15, as well as mastter practitioner Kamarul Baisah Hussin.
Kamarul Baiquni and his younger brother, 8-year-old Kamarul Bairon, both students of Sekolah Kebangsaan Taman Universiti.
For the musicians, the journey ahead is as challenging as it is inspiring.
“The hardest part is making sure the tones match,” explains Baisah Hussine, rebab player, Tok Dalang, and director for the traditional segments. “The rebab doesn’t stay in one pitch, so we have to work carefully with the orchestra. It’s not just about tuning; even the tempo is different,” says Baisah.
To bring them together, one side has to bend without being consumed by the other and to Baisah that’s where the challenge and the beauty lie in the upcoming, concert.
This bending of traditions will indeed create friction, but also sparks.
Orchestral musicians from City Hall’s (DBKL) Orkestra Kuala Lumpur, trained in Western classical traditions, will learn to loosen their grip on rigid time.
Whereas traditional players of the Baizam Generation troupe, used to improvisation and oral transmission, will adapt to the orchestra’s notated scores. Such risk, Baisah admits, may unsettle purists.
Baisah says: “Some may say we are spoiling the Malay traditional artistry. But for many in the audience, this may be their very first taste of it. And if it sparks curiosity, if it leads them to seek the real thing, isn’t that valuable?”
For Isabella Pek, Head of Music at DBKL, the uncertainty is part of the allure.
“Some musicians doubt whether it can work. They are wary of it. And honestly, we, too, do not know if it will,” she says, with a half-smile. “That uncertainty is what makes this exciting. Maybe we’re stumbling onto a new trend, a new way of hearing our heritage.”
Pek sees the orchestra not as a dominating force but as a medium of translation. Where one instrument cannot travel, where its timbre, scale, or rhythm might clash with the Western ensemble, the orchestra can adapt, absorb and reinterpret. In this way, she believes, traditions are not erased but instead, reframed.
For Zamzuriah, the larger hope is connection. She wants the audience to feel that these traditions are theirs too.
The Kuala Lumpur Orchestra... ready to take on any challenge with a smile!
“If KL audiences can embrace the East Coast, maybe next time we’ll bring the arts of the north or the south. Malaysia’s heritage is vast. Why not let people fall in love with it again?”
In the end, Sentuhan Warisan Pantai Timur will be both homage and experiment, preservation and reinvention. It is about listening to traditions not as dusty artifacts but as living languages capable of new expression.
As Pek puts it: “We’re not sure exactly what the audience will take away. But maybe that’s the point. If they leave curious, moved, or even unsettled, then we’ve done something right.”
Sentuhan Warisan Pantai Timur takes the stage on Oct 4 (8.30pm) and Oct 5 (3pm) at Auditorium DBKL, DBKL Tower 1, Jalan Raja Laut, Kuala Lumpur. Admission is free, but do reserve a spot here.
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