Hexham Abbey Festival

22 September 2006 

Gamelan Naga Mas presents a programme of Balinese, Javanese and contemporary music for the Hexham Abbey Festival. Special guest KimHo Ip on Chinese dulcimer, Yang Qin.

The music 

Credits 

Musical Director
Signy Jakobsdottir

Artistic Director
Jon Keliehor

Special Guest Artist
Kim Ho Ip, Yang Chin

Musicians
J. Simon van der Walt
Jon Keliehor
Signy Jakobsdottir
Nick Addington
Natalia Bahrin
Colin Broom
Hooi Ling Eng
Ben McCulloch
Jane MacLean
Katie Shearer
Margaret Smith
Dania Soedibyo
Katherine Waumsley

Recording and Technical
Simon Fisher

The Performance

Gamelan music is a highly varied art form used throughout SE Asia to accompany dance, shadow puppet performances, classical concerts, celebrations, rites of passage, and contemporary performance.  It's amazing growth in performance and education in the UK, Europe and America has brought considerable attention to the cultures of its origin.

This evening's performance is a concert of traditional and contemporary gamelan music, featuring new works by composers Jon Keliehor, Katherine Waumsley, J Simon van der Walt, Margaret Smith and Joko Susilo. The instruments of Gamelan Naga Mas, named Spirit of Hope, were forged from bronze and iron in Java and brought to Glasgow for the year of culture in 1990.

The music for tonight's programme includes music from the Javanese Wayang tradition (shadow puppets), Balinese music for Topeng (masked dance), Javanese Dangdut (popular music), and contemporary gamelan music written by members of the ensemble (music for theatre and concert).

Traditional music for the shadow puppets of central Java is used both as a prelude to performance, and as underscoring for the dramatic voices of the puppeteer and puppet characters.  Pieces such as Wilujeng, Srepeg Kangsa, Kodok Ngorek, Gangsaran and Bendrong are characteristic in this style of presentation.

Dangdut music is often up-tempo and lively.  Repetitive gong rhythms act as bass lines to the melodies. Music in the popular Dangdut style might include Gambang Suling, Caping Gunung, and Jaran Teji. The Balinese piece Topeng Keras, has layers of intricate rhythm overlays, sudden dynamic changes and fiery drum rhythms.

Contemporary works such as, Domaine, Abyss, Gamelunk, Selunding Suling, Smaradahana, Treetopia and Memory Hammers Sword all present different ideas and atmospheres. Some pieces open up ambient aspects of tonality.  Some develop rhythmic and harmonic complexities, or focus on interactions of the musicians.  Some pieces explore electro-acoustic possibilities.  Gamelan music is the stuff that inspires composers.

Modern music

Although the music's deep traditional roots are still intact today, gamelan is as vital and innovative as any other music in the world.  Since the late 1800's gamelan has been studied and adopted by musicians, ethnomusicologists, and sociologists throughout the world.  The music has been imported and exported, collected and recorded by entrepreneurs and record companies. Margaret Meade, Colin McPhee, Jaap Kunst, Mantle Hood, Michael Tenzer and many others have made pioneering studies of the music and culture. Claude Debussy, Lou Harrison, Henry Cowell, John Cage, Phillip Glass, Steve Reich, Benjamin Britten and countless others have brought it's influences into their art.

The Instruments

The Gamelan Orchestra is primarily a metal orchestra of chimes and gongs. An ensemble can vary in size from 6 to 30 musicians. It is a predominately percussion oriented orchestra, where the various metal instruments are hand-forged, crafted and tuned specifically to each ensemble.  Made in Central Java by the instrument maker Pak Surhirdjan, the large set of instruments of Gamelan Naga Mas are representative of a typical classical Javanese orchestra.  They are tuned to a modal scale known as Pelog, which consists of seven, non-tempered tones, roughly representing the pitches: D  Eb  F  Ab  A  Bb  C.

With the emergence of the gamelan in the UK, a large range of new musical possibilities has become available to the western musician both in education and performance. The unusual character of these instruments and their tuning provides a wonderful opportunity for contemporary composers to explore different tonalities and scale constructions, idioms that deviate from standard western instrument tuning.  The ensemble uses additional instruments, which in this programme include several different Indonesian drums (Kendang), Indonesian flute (Suling), trumpets, harps, Chinese dulcimer (Yang-Chin) and the Chinese traditional fiddle (Erhu).

The Soloists

Soloists include Signy Jakobsdottir, who as Kendang player and leader of the orchestra, directs the group rhythmically from the drums, through a constantly shifting range of tempo; J. Simon van der Walt, is a composer, performing on trumpet and flugelhorn; Jon Keliehor, composer, plays both Kendang and Suling; and guest artist Kim Ho Ip, international performer and lecturer, performs on Yang-Chin and Erhu.

Kim-Ho Ip (Yang-Chin, Erhu) receives numerous awards in supporting his professional development in music. He performs on Yang-chin and cello with ensembles in Edinburgh, Glasgow, London, Bristol and York, and is the director of the Intercultural Music & Arts Project (iMAP). His compositions have been performed at the ISCM World New Music Days (2002), Music@Edinburgh Festival (2003), Edinburgh International Festival (2005) and worldwide. 

The composers 

Current composers within Naga Mas have played a key development in the growth of the ensemble by pursuing new music that explores ideas unique to western thinking, all the while remaining within traditional frameworks of Indonesian music. Expanding on rhythmic intricacy or opening up harmonic and melodic implications within the music, these composers have brought ample gifts of challenge and humour to the ensemble.  Composing music for Naga Mas are:

Katherine Waumsley (Memory Hammers Sword), was born in Inverness where she learned classical and folk music during her school years.  She undertook an applied Music degree at the University of Strathclyde, specialising in community music work and creative skills.  She works with Polyphony, a new music service for mental health inpatients in the Glasgow area, and plays flute and harp with Scottish singer, songwriter Jo Mango and Band.  Recent projects have included creative music and combined arts work with adults and children with special needs, children with communication disorders, family workshops, mainstream school and nursery age children. She joined Naga Mas Gamelan in 2001, and often incorporates gamelan music concepts in her community work and compositions.

J. Simon van der Walt (Gamelunk, Running In The Dark, Steadily Stop, Adrift and Afloat), composer, multi-instrumentalist and teacher, living and working in Scotland. His work ranges from the conventional to the experimental, by way of jazz, gamelan, electronics, theatre, and instrument building.  Best known as a salsa-jazz trumpet player, Simon has also been known to perform on the trombone, didgeridu, guitar, and various kinds of world percussion. He teaches sound recording and composition at Stevenson College, Edinburgh.  In his spare time he composes, plays music, and teaches.

Jon Keliehor (Domaine I / Domaine II / Domaine III, Abyss, Selunding Suling, Smaradahana), is an American born composer and percussionist living in Glasgow. His music for contemporary dance, ballet, theatre and film has produced a unique catalogue of percussion based composition.  He has created works for London Contemporary Dance Theatre, Royal Ballet, Lindsay Kemp Theatre, Theatre of Lies, Danza Hoy, and Gamelan Pacifica at Cornish College of the Arts. He is currently an artistic director of Gamelan Naga Mas and Luminous Music.

Margaret Smith (Treetopia) is a Musician and Storyteller working in the
community. She designs and facilitates workshops for children and adults of
all abilities encouraging creativity, communication and play. From a
training in classical flute, Margaret now travels into folk, world and pop
music often accompanying and devising music for singers, storytellers and
puppets. She enjoys new sounds and old, soft words and bold.