Pencak silat has gained more exposure in recent years thanks to popular movies from Indonesia, such as Merantau, The Raid and The Raid 2. While it can be a very lethal martial art, many pencak silat practitioners in its homeland consider it to be a sport, an art, a form of combat training and a tool for mental and spiritual development.
We previously shared some articles on How Learning with Music Can Change Brain Structure (link) and the relationship between Music, Dance and Martial Arts (link). In this article, Music for the Fight, Movements for the Soul (link), we can see how the movement, the martial art and the music compliment each other.
Paul H. Mason, PhD candidate in Anthropology at Macquarie University in Sydney, who has spent a number of years researching practices of fight-dancing in Indonesia and Brazil.
Reproduced under fair-use and with credit