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A gamelan is a kind of musical ensemble of Indonesian origin typically featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums, and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings, and vocalists may also be included. The term refers more to the set of instruments than the players of those instruments. A gamelan as a set of instruments is a distinct entity, built and tuned to stay together — instruments from different gamelan are not interchangeable. The word "gamelan" comes from the Javanese word "gamel", meaning to strike or hammer, and the Malay-Indonesian suffix "an" makes the root a collective noun. Instruments and characteristics A gamelan is a musical ensemble, which originated from Indonesia. The huge range of timbres typically featured in gamelan include: metallophones, xylophones, drums, gongs, bowed and plucked strings, and vocalists are also sometimes used. A gamelan as a set of instruments is built and tuned to stay together — instruments from different groups are not interchangeable. Gamelan artists would use the pentatonic scale, so ‘B’ and ‘F’ wouldn’t be used. Every player would use an ostinato, occasionally changing it if they think they can make the piece better. Sometimes, two players will get up, silently, and swap instruments. Balinese gamelan varieties
Javanese gamelan varieties Cultural context Gamelan is often used to accompany dance, wayang puppet performances, and rituals. Some performances are associated with royalty, such as visits by the sultan of Yogyakarta. Certain gamelans are associated with rituals, such as the Gamelan Sekaten, which is used in celebration of Mawlid an-Nabi (Muhammad's birthday). In Bali, almost all religious rituals include gamelan performance. In the West, gamelan is often performed in a concert context, but may also incorporate dance or wayang. Tuning
Influence on Western music The gamelan has been appreciated by several western composers of classical music, most famously Claude Debussy who heard a Javanese gamelan play at the Paris Exposition of 1889 (World's Fair). (The gamelan Debussy heard was in the near-diatonic madenda scale and was played by Sundanese musicians.) Despite his enthusiasm, direct citations of gamelan scales, melodies, rhythms, or ensemble textures have not been located in any of Debussy's own compositions. However, the equal-tempered pentatonic scale appears in his music of this time and afterward, and a Javanese gamelan-like heterophonic texture is emulated on occasion, particularly in "Pagodes," from Estampes (solo piano, 1903), in which the great gong's cyclic punctuation is symbolized by a prominent perfect fifth. Direct homages to gamelan music are to be found in works for western instruments by Béla Bartók, Francis Poulenc, Olivier Messiaen, Colin McPhee, Benjamin Britten and Steve Reich. In more recent times, American composers such as Barbara Benary, Lou Harrison, Dennis Murphy, Michael Tenzer, Evan Ziporyn, Daniel James Wolf and Jody Diamond as well as Australian composers such as Peter Sculthorpe, Andrew Schultz and Ross Edwards have written several works with parts for gamelan instruments or full gamelan ensembles. I Nyoman Windha is among contemporary Indonesian composers that have written compositions using western instruments along with Gamelan. American folk guitarist John Fahey included elements of gamelan in many of his late-60s sound collages, and again in his 1997 collaboration with Cul de Sac, The Epiphany of Glenn Jones. The experimental art-rock band King Crimson, while not using Gamelan instruments, used interlocking rhythmic paired guitars that were influenced by Gamelan. Experimental pop groups His Name is Alive and Xiu Xiu use Gamelan percussion in many songs. Many Americans were first introduced to the sounds of gamelan by the popular anime film Akira. Gamelan elements are used in this film to punctuate several exciting fight scenes, as well as to symbolize the emerging psychic powers of the tragic hero, Tetsuo. The gamelan in the film's score was performed by the members of the Japanese musical collective Geinoh Yamashirogumi. Gamelan outside Indonesia See gamelan outside Indonesia. See also Javanese gamelan Footnotes Listening | |||||||||||
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