Photo note: For photo information, see end of story.

Javanese percussion ensemble to perform at UNC’s Hill Hall

By GLENN McDONALD
UNC Music Department

CHAPEL HILL – "The Gong Show" is coming to Chapel Hill -- sort of.

Gamelan Nyai Saraswati, the Javanese percussion ensemble of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, will perform at 4 p.m. Nov. 23 in Hill Hall Auditorium.

The free public concert will feature compositions written expressly for Javanese gamelan, a traditional ensemble employing dozens of cast bronze gongs. Pieces will range from those created by ruling Prince Mangkunegara IV of Java in the mid-19th century to samba-inspired songs from the 1950s and contemporary fusion pieces.

The ensemble, of 23 players from the university and local communities, also will play composer Lou Harrison’s "Concerto for Violin, Cello, and Javanese Gamelan." Guest artists from the UNC music faculty, Richard Luby on violin and Brent Wissick on cello, will join the concerto performance.

"‘Gamelan’ is a Javanese/Indonesian word for ‘ensemble,’" said Dr. Sarah Weiss, ensemble director and a UNC assistant professor of music. "The word ‘gamel’ means ‘to hammer’ in Javanese, and indeed, ‘hammering’ is the way most instruments in the ensemble are sounded.

"Instruments are made from cast bronze and are in the shape of hanging gongs (gong, kempul) and racked gongs (bonang and kenong) – gongs lying on their backs facing up toward the ceiling. There are also metallophones (saron) – xylophones made from bronze polished to a gleaming luster – and drums (kendhang) played with the hands."

Gamelan music often is composed of several different cycles, each of which is repeated a number of times, Weiss said. Each series of repetitions can last from 30 seconds to 20 minutes, so pieces may last from a few minutes to more than an hour, rivaling a Mahler or Beethoven symphony in complexity, movements, and duration.

Besides the group of people who play the gamelan, the terms Gamelan Nyai Saraswati and "ensemble" also represent the collection of instruments they play -- and these collections usually are named. The university’s gamelan was named Gamelan Nyai Saraswati by Bapak Sutina, a renowned performer of shadow puppetry and father of the ensemble's previous owner, Midiyanto S. Putra, Weiss said.

"The ensemble was cast and forged nearly 20 years ago, long enough for the bronze to stop ‘shifting,’ which means that the tuning has settled. This ensemble's tuning has the highly valued and much sought quality referred to as ‘manis,’ or ‘sweet’ in Javanese," she said.

Paid parking will be available in the Swain lot off Cameron Avenue, behind Hill Hall. For more information, visit http://www.ibiblio.org/gamelan/ or call the music department at 962-1039.

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Photo note: To download photos, go to http://www.ibiblio.org/gamelan/images/index.php

Contacts: Glenn McDonald, 962-1039; Sarah Weiss, 962-8773
News Services contact: L.J. Toler, 962-8589