Gamelan festival opens

Gamelan festival opens

YOGYAKARTA (JP): Vice President Try Sutrisno opened an
international gamelan festival at the Prambanan temple compound
yesterday.

Fifteen groups from seven countries are taking part in the
festival to show the global reach of the traditional Javanese
percussion orchestra. Besides host Indonesia, there are gamelan
groups from Japan, the United States, Britain, Germany, France
and New Zealand. The Indonesian participants come from Denpasar,
Bali, and Surabaya, Surakarta, Yogyakarta, Bandung, Banyumas and
Banyuwangi in Java.

Sri Hastanto, the head of the festival committee, said gamelan
was introduced outside Indonesia as far back as 1580, when Sir
Francis Drake took a set back to Europe. Sir Stamford Raffles
further introduced gamelan to the world in the early 19th
century.

Sri Hastanto said a number of people from Asia and African
countries had expressed interest in taking part in the festival,
but could not make it here on time.

The American orchestra is the South Bank Center Youth Gamelan
while the two Japanese orchestras are Sekar Djepun and Kodomo No
Shiro, while France is represented by a team from the Galerie
Conore. Most of the gamelan players will be wearing traditional
Javanese garb.

The festival will be closed on Sunday by Coordinating Minister
for Political Affairs and Security Soesilo Soedarman. (har)