Gamelan- A Javanese/Indonesian word for ensemble. The word “gamel” means to hammer something. A Central Javanese gamelan consists primarily of bronze instruments - horizontal and vertical gongs and metallophones - but also includes several stringed instruments, flutes, drums, and voices in performance. Gamelan orchestras are the traditional accompaniment to wayang shows, dances, feasts and ceremonies of Indonesia. Gamelan music consists of smooth, “impressionistic” tone clusters and intensely complex intertwining rhythms and textures.
This is the 2018-2019 culminating concert of MUSI 232, Yale Central Gamelan Ensemble Suprabanggo: An introduction to performing the orchestral music of central Java and to the theoretical, cultural and aesthetic discourses of the gamelan tradition.