European gamelan orchestra receives accolade in Yogya

By Asip A. Hasani

YOGYAKARTA (JP): "You may say it is a translation of the traditional Javanese or Balinese gamelan orchestra into a western way of thinking, although we still respect the traditional gamelan very much," said Roderik de Man, a composer for the Dutch contemporary music group Ensemble Gending.

The audience considered the musicians somewhat eccentric when they performed seven compositions at the Purna Budaya Art Center here on July 2 and July 4. The group was participating in the Yogyakarta Gamelan Festival '99. Similar to an "ordinary" classical music show, the orchestra was led by a conductor, who stood in front of nine musicians with musical scores before them.

When the music began, the Javanese audience could feel they had entered a strange environment, where they could hear familiar music, although it sounded not entirely Javanese. The beat was starkly different from that of the original Javanese musical instruments which respect harmony. Ensemble Gending forced the audience to concentrate in order to understand and enjoy its compositions.

Only a few of the seven compositions played by the Ensemble in the festival were readily understood by the Javanese audience. Two of these pieces were Sonata da Camera by composer Klaus Kuiper and Soekarno Suite -- the soundtrack of a film called Soekarno in Holland. The group played Sonata da Camera on its second show on July 4.

Jurrien Slighter, the group's artistic director and conductor, said the basic idea of the group's composition was acculturation, the spirit to promote mutual understanding among nations. For this reason, Ensem compositions combine gamelan percussive instruments and western musical instruments.

"We combine gamelan with western voices, and in another program with electronic devices. So we are always looking for new combinations, using the gamelan and adding something else," said Slighter, a music teacher at the High School of the Arts in Utrecht.

This is particularly true in Sonata da Camera, a composition by Klaus Kuiper, or in the Soekarno Suite.

Kuiper said of the dynamic beat of Sonata da Camera that it blended Western conventional music with its own ornamental devices and Balinese Gajah Legong music.

"I want to do something which is immediately recognizable," said the composer who creates works for the theater.

Spontaneous appreciation came from the audience attending the July 4 performance of the Soekarno Suite. In addition to the familiar gamelan sounds, the composition was enhanced with the addition of vocals and electronic piano.

Vocalist Saskia van Grevenstein offered light relief with her blues rhapsody after the group played the more serious compositions in the first show. The mention of Soekarno, Indonesia's first president, stirred the audience's curiosity.

Slighter said the movie Soekarno in Holland was a fiction about Dutch Queen Juliana's secret plan to meet with the first president to discuss the prevention of violence between Dutch and Indonesian troops. The plan was canceled.

Unlike Kuiper's works, Frederik de Man's Shining Orchestra was a complicated composition; a work not all contemporary music lovers could immediately comprehend. The acculturation idea was strongly present in the piece, and it literally used light as an element of the composition.

"The idea of the composition is to do a program with light, not projection of images, but projection of colors, movements, and light. Beside using real light, the composition also suggests dancers," said de Man, who teaches music at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague.

Modernist musician Sapto Raharjo, who chaired this year's festival, described Ensemble Gending's performance as "perfect". He said it did not matter whether the audience could understand the compositions featured at the event.

He noted that three of the seven compositions that the Ensemble presented in the festival were easily appreciated by the local audience. He said spectators would have to "concentrate" to understand the rest of the group's program.

The three "easy" compositions presented a familiar atmosphere, although one with a western interpretation.

"Ensemble Gending presented Gending compositions perfectly. They performed in a highly disciplined way and used a musical score as any classical music concerts do," he said.

Sapto said Ensemble Gending did not have the spirit of the Javanese gamelan or gending (musical composition for gamelan), which uphold harmony. "In traditional gamelan music, each player can improvise to a certain extent."

Slighter said he could understand the criticism, noting that the East and the West have very different cultures and different ways of expressing ideas.

He expressed the hope that the audience could learn something from the Ensemble about the innovative possibilities of the gamelan wonder, because Javanese youths were increasingly alienated from the music of gamelan orchestras.

He said Ensemble Gending refused to be constrained by the exotic image of oriental culture and refused to color their involvement in nice ways.

"We try artistically not to play exotic things, but we hope our composers will be really involved with the culture behind the instruments so that the idea of acculturation flows," Slighter said.

Slighter said the Ensemble members were quite well-versed in Javanese traditional songs and music.

"Half or more of our players also play traditional gamelan, but Ensemble Gending will not play traditional gamelan because Javanese could do that much better than us."