gamelan

gamelan (gàm´e-làn´) noun
Music.
An Indonesian orchestra composed mainly of tuned percussion instruments such as bamboo xylophones, wooden or metal chimes, and gongs.

[Javanese : gamêl, to make music + -an, suff. indicating means.]

Indonesian Music

Indonesian Music, music of the peoples of the islands of the Indonesian archipelago. Despite the vastness of the country and its many regional differences, certain common musical traditions can be found throughout Indonesia. Everywhere some form of ensemble exists that is made up of small tuned goo (gongs) and two or three laba (drums). Generally, these gong-and-drum ensembles accompany ritual and religious activities. Throughout the islands, historical and religious epics are sung, and they are often accompanied by a stringed instrument or a flute. Another common element is the belief that music is a means of communicating with unseen powers.

Although Indonesia has many kinds of solo vocal music, choral music, and music for wind and stringed instruments, it has more varieties of ensembles of gongs and drums than any other country in the world. The gongs of these ensembles, with their raised knob in the center and their deep, turned-down rims, are generally termed pot gongs. Made of bronze, they have been manufactured in Indonesia for at least 1000 years and possibly for 2000 or 3000 years, and they are sometimes believed to possess supernatural power. The simplest ensembles have only four or five small pot gongs (tuned to different pitches) and two or three drums. Each gong and drum starts playing one after the other; the individual players fit their parts between the beats of the other instruments. Some of the gongs and drums play short, continuously repeated patterns, while others play many melodic and rhythmic variations against these repeated patterns.

Of the drum-and-gong ensembles of Indonesia, the largest and best known are the gamelan ensembles of Java and Bali. The influences of Hinduism and Buddhism, which were widely followed in Indonesia between 500 and 1500, resulted in the development of unusually large musical cycles, sometimes as long as 512 beats. As the gamelan developed, many instruments were added to the basic drum-and-gong ensemble, including several varieties of metallophones (bronze-keyed xylophones).

• industrial funk release _Urban Gamelan_ by 23 Skidoo (1984)
  • 9. _Language Dub_
• track _Gamelah (Dub 1)_ by Banco de Gaia off of _Desert Wind_ CDs on Planet Dog/Ultimate (1993)
• electro acoustic track _Primary (Gamelan 3)_ MP3 by Vidna Obmana off of _Twilght Of Perception_ CD on Projekt (1998)

• track _Gamelan_ MP3 by Bisk off of _Strange Or Funny-Haha?_ CD on Sub Rosa (1997)
• ambient post rock drone track _Vienna Arcweld/Fucked Gamelan/Rigid Tracking_ MP3 (vK)(13:45)(19.8megs) by Set Fire To Flames off of _Sings Reign Rebuilder_ on Alien 8 (2001)
• track _Gamelah (Dub 3)_ MP3 by Banco de Gaia off of _Maya_ CDs on Planet Dog/Ultimat (1994)
• world beat track _Suling Degung (excerpt 4:45)_ MP3 by Javanese Gamelan
• track _Kinds Of Flowers_ 4:43 recorded by Robert Brown - Java, court gamelan, off of _The Sounds Of Earth_ copper 12" on the Voyager spacecraft

release _Gamelan Semarpegulingan I_ CD on JVC

• tarna jaya
• raja pala
• kebyar trompong
• legong kraton

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