Gamelan is the traditional ensemble music of the Javanese, Sundanese, and Balinese peoples of Indonesia, made up predominantly of percussive instruments. The most common instruments used are metallophones played by mallets and a set of hand-played drums called kendang, which register the beat. The kemanak and gangsa are commonly used gamelan instruments in Bali. Other instruments include xylophones, bamboo flutes, a bowed instrument called a rebab, a zither-like instrument siter and vocalists named sindhen (female) or gerong (male).
Pelog is one of the essential tuning systems used in gamelan instruments that has a heptatonic scale. The other, older, scale commonly used is called slendro. Pelog has seven notes, but many gamelan ensembles only have keys for five of the pitches. Even in ensembles that have all seven notes, many pieces only use a subset of five notes, sometimes the additional 4th tone is also used in a piece like western accidentals.
Evan Ziporyn is an American composer of post-minimalist music with a cross-cultural orientation, drawing equally from classical music, avant-garde, various world music traditions, and jazz. Ziporyn has composed for a wide range of ensembles, including symphony orchestras, wind ensembles, many types of chamber groups, and solo works, sometimes involving electronics. Balinese gamelan, for which he has composed numerous works, has compositions. He is known for his solo performances on clarinet and bass clarinet; additionally, Ziporyn plays gender wayang and other Balinese instruments, saxophones, piano & keyboards, EWI, and Shona mbira.
Michael Tenzer is a composer, performer, and music educator and scholar.
I Nyoman Windha is one of the leading musicians and contemporary composers of Balinese gamelan music. He was born at Banjar Kutri, Singapadu, Gianyar, Bali. A graduate of the National Institute of Arts (ISI) in Denpasar, Bali, Windha has been a member of the faculty since 1985. He has composed dozens of compositions for Balinese gamelan in many genres but primarily in kebyar style. His compositions, such as Puspanjali (1989), have been incorporated into the standard repertoire of Balinese performing groups and many have won awards at Bali's annual gamelan competition.
Gamelan gong kebyar is a style or genre of Balinese gamelan music of Indonesia. Kebyar means "to flare up or burst open", and refers to the explosive changes in tempo and dynamics characteristic of the style.
The Music of Bali, Bali is an Indonesian island that shares in the gamelan and other Indonesian musical styles. Bali, however, has its own techniques and styles, including kecak, a form of singing that imitates the sound of monkeys. In addition, the island is home to several unique kinds of gamelan, including the gamelan jegog, gamelan gong gede, gamelan gambang, gamelan selunding and gamelan semar pegulingan, the cremation music angklung and the processional music bebonangan. Modern popular styles include gamelan gong kebyar, dance music which developed during the Dutch occupation and 1950s era joged bumbung, another popular dance style. In Balinese music you can also hear metallophones, gongs and xylophones.
Kotekan is a style of playing fast interlocking parts in most varieties of Balinese Gamelan music, including Gamelan gong kebyar, Gamelan angklung, Gamelan jegog and others.
A gangsa is a type of metallophone which is used mainly in Balinese and Javanese Gamelan music in Indonesia. In Balinese gong kebyar styles, there are two types of gangsa typically used: the smaller, higher pitched kantilan and the larger pemade. Each instrument consists of several tuned metal bars each placed over an individual resonator. The bars are hit with a wooden panggul, each producing a different pitch. Duration of sound intensity and sound quality factors are generally accomplished by damping the vibration of the bar with the fingers of the free hand. Balinese gong kebyar gangsas, as with other metallophones in gong kebyar ensembles, are played in neighboring pairs with interlocking, rapid-tempo parts that elaborate on the melody of a piece of music ; these pairs are tuned to be dissonant and create certain wavelengths of sympathetic vibrations to create a shimmering tone that travels long distances. The gangsa is very similar to the old gendér and the saron.
The reyong is a musical instrument used in Balinese gamelan. It consists of a long row of metal gongs suspended on a frame. In gamelan gong kebyar, it is played by four players at once, each with two mallets.
Gamelan semar pegulingan is an old variety of the Balinese gamelan. Dating back from around the 17th century, the style is sweeter and more reserved than the more popular and progressive Gamelan Gong Kebyar. Semar pegulingan is derived from the ancient flute ensemble gamelan gambuh which utilizes a 7 tone scale. Semar pegulingan also uses the 7 tone scale which enables several pathet to be played. Semar is the name of the Hindu God of love and pegulingan means roughly 'laying down'. It was originally played near the sleeping chambers of the palace to lull the king and his concubines to sleep. The ensemble includes suling, various small percussion instruments similar to sleigh bells and finger cymbals, and trompong - a row of small kettle gongs that play the melody. A similar type of ensemble, Gamelan Pelegongan, substitutes a pair of gendérs for the trompong as the melody carrier and plays the music for a set of dances known as legong.
Gamelan Sekar Jaya is a Balinese gamelan ensemble located in the San Francisco Bay Area. It has been called "the finest Balinese gamelan ensemble outside of Indonesia" by Indonesia's Tempo Magazine. It performs the music and dance of Bali in many different genres of Balinese gamelan, mainly gamelan gong kebyar, gamelan angklung, gender wayang, and gamelan jegog. Past performances have also featured ensembles playing in other styles as well, including gamelan joged bumbung, gamelan semar pegulingan, kecak, gender batel, gamelan gambuh, genggong, and beleganjur. GSJ has also performed contemporary pieces featuring instruments from the Western tradition.
Gamelan gong gede, meaning "gamelan with the large gongs", is a form of the ceremonial gamelan music of Bali, dating from the court society of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, associated historically with public ceremonies and special occasions such as temple festivals.
I Wayan Suweca is a highly respected performer of Balinese gamelan. Since the 1970s, he has taught and performed extensively throughout Asia, Europe, and America. In the early 1980s, along with his students Michael Tenzer and Rachel Ann Cooper, he founded and led the famous Sekar Jaya gamelan ensemble in Berkeley, California. In 1993, he cofounded the ensemble Giri Kedaton in Montreal. From 1982 to 2004, he was professor at the National Arts Academy of Indonesia (STSI) in Bali. From 1987 to 1993, he was a guest teacher at Université de Montréal in Canada and in Rochester, USA. For other students, See: List of music students by teacher: R to S#I Wayan Suweca.
I Nyoman Renbang (1937–2001) was an Indonesian musician, composer, teacher and instrument maker. He is considered by many ethnomusicologists as one of the most influential Balinese musicians and composers of the twentieth century.
Gambuh is an ancient form of Balinese dance-drama. It is accompanied by musicians in a gamelan gambuh ensemble.
Condong is a Balinese dance which is often performed as a preface to legong and accompanied by the semar pangulingan style of gamelan. The term also refers to a stock character, a quintessential representation of the maidservant, found in the condong dance, as well as the legong, gambuh, and arja dances.
Kebyar Duduk is a traditional Balinese dance created by a Balinese man I Ketut Marya and first performed publicly in 1925. Inspired by the development of the quick-paced gamelan gong kebyar, kebyar duduk is named for the seated and half-seated positions taken by the dancers. It does not convey a story, but is interpretative.
Gamelan orchestral instruments were introduced to New Zealand from Java in 1974. There are several gamelan ensembles in New Zealand and gamelan has influenced many New Zealand composers such as Jack Body and Gareth Farr.
I Made Lebah (1905?-11/18/1996) was a musician and teacher from Peliatan, Ubud, Bali who taught Colin McPhee, Michael Tenzer, Evan Ziporyn and many students of Balinese music. He knew many of the seminal musicians and dancers from the birth of the Kebyar style. He was a co-founder of the Gunung Sari Gamelan ensemble and traveled all over the world leading performances of that group.
