Violist Luluk Purwanto back in town for Jak Jazz '94

By Paul W. Blair

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta is much more than just another tour stop for violinist Luluk Purwanto. Although she is now the best-known Indonesian jazz musician abroad, her greatest pleasure is to come home to play for, and with, friends.

Look for her at Jak Jazz '94, the four-day music festival that begins this evening at Plaza Timur in Senayan. She will be onstage with a hand-picked all-star group led by Jak Jazz founder and organizer Ireng Maulana. Luluk credits her with giving Luluk many valuable opportunities to play jazz early on in her career, both in Indonesia and at overseas festivals.

Luluk Purwanto earned musical degrees from the Sydney Conservatorium and the Institute of Art in Yogyakarta. In recent years, she has been performing mostly in groups that also feature her husband, Dutch-born pianist Rene Van Helsdingen. They did two typically playful sets at The Stage on Tuesday evening.

The pair has just returned to Jakarta after being away for more than a year. They had played regularly at The Stage before their departure soon after the end of last year's Jak Jazz festival.

"After we left here at the end of last October," says Rene, "we traveled around the U.S. for about two months and played at several clubs in the Los Angeles area. Then we went to Amsterdam, hoping to line up some performance dates in Europe. But that was difficult to do on such short notice, since most of the major festivals are booked many months in advance."

"Then Mikhail David from The Stage came to Holland for a visit. We were kicking around the idea of creating our own special vehicle to give us our own way to travel and perform across the Continent. Mikhail and his organization decided to provide us with some of the up-front funding we needed to literally get rolling."

"This whole project involved cooperation between ourselves and a friend named Aart Marcus, a performance artist who has the technical expertise we needed. We bought a huge orange Mercedes bus that is 12 metres long, 5 metres wide and 4 metres high. It had been working the streets of a city called Dordrecht for some time. We started by cutting a huge flap out of one side of so it could be lowered to form a stage."

"We all worked hard for about a month, changing our design just a bit as we went along. We installed a 30,000 volt audio- visual system with a 16-channel mixing board in the back. Now when the bus is parked and the stage is opened up, there are four large-screen video monitors visible from out front. The audience see changing color patterns generated by the sounds coming from four microphones, one for each member of the quartet."

Recent photos of the bus make it obvious that it will never again be mistaken for a part of the Dordrecht municipal transportation fleet. It is now painted a dramatic black with white detailing. The Stage's logo is prominent on the side, it is a rolling promotion for the Jakarta club. Rene says that he and Luluk wanted to spread the word across Europe that there really is an active jazz scene in Indonesia. That's why her Indonesian background was given considerable prominence in all announcements and news stories about The Stage Bus.

"We flew two friends over from the U.S. to play with us. Donald Dean was the drummer and Kent Brinkley played bass. We bought a grand piano and carried in the bus. In fact, with all of our equipment inside we were able to practice and jam while rumbling down the highway. This is one of the larger European buses that is licensed to go somewhat faster, so we really did cover the miles. We didn't sleep in the bus, though. With all the equipment, there was no space. Local promoters provided us with hotels or other accommodation along the way."

"Meanwhile, I got on the phone and contacted about 300 organizations and festivals across Europe to line up performances. After lots of calling and lots of follow-up, we eventually scheduled 110 performances over the course of five and a half months in Holland, Belgium, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, France and Switzerland. One of our most pleasant experiences was playing at a festival in Lugano. We were there for three days -- and I'm happy to say that they've invited us back for seven days of concerts for the 1995 festival."

Rene notes that the group eventually got to the point where they could set up The Stage Bus in just fifteen or twenty minutes. The actual stage area is covered by canvas supported by a system of poles and cables. For surprised passersby, the visual effect is not unlike happening upon a giant grasshopper in a town square. During the tour, there were occasions when other groups also used The Stage Bus for their own performances: another jazz group in Lugano, an entire big band in Assen and even a hip-hop group at a pop music festival in Brussels.

A new compact disc by the quartet, billed as Luluk Purwanto and the Helsdingen Trio, is now available locally. It's entitled The Stage Bus. Three tracks documents the quartet's music as recorded during the bus' stop in Roelofarendsveen this past May.

Rene says that he and Luluk are heading back to Europe in two weeks to begin planning for another season of touring across Europe. This time, he adds, they're aiming to do 150 concerts between May and November. They'd like to expand the number of performances in France and possibly add dates in Italy, Spain and Greece. Returning to their home base in Amsterdam will give them the lead time necessary for all the elaborate logistical planning required. Before this second long tour is over, they expect to be able to pay back their original financial backers and even earn a little profit themselves.

"After the next tour ends, we have several options," says Rene. "We could, of course, sell the bus in Europe. Right now, I don't think there's another performance bus anything like this on the Continent. Or we could have it loaded onto a ship and sent to the United States or even to Indonesia. We think it would be fun to take our music across this country."

"We even carried portable seating for 100 persons on the bus. Originally, I was hoping to drive the thing myself. But at the last minute, I had trouble getting a bus driver's license since I nicked four cars during my road test."

Tonight's Jak Jazz '94 program begins at 6:00 PM and the music is scheduled to last until 2:00 AM. Artists and groups performing on the five outdoor stages in Senayan include Bubi Chen and Friends, the Embong Project with Ruth Sahanaya, Elfa's Big Band and Singers, the Ireng Maulana All-Stars, trumpet player Terumasa Hino (from Japan), singers Phill Perry and Coco York (from the United States), ITSLYF (from Austria), the Jeremy Monteiro Trio (from Singapore) accordionist-singer Eddie Monteiro (from the U.S.), the Fumio Itabashi Duo (from Japan) and the Percussion Orchestra (whose members come from Switzerland, Iran, Ghana, India and Senegal). Dutch saxophonist Candy Dulfer's group performs at 9:30 PM, while the Icelandic group Mezzoforte is scheduled for 11:15. All-inclusive tickets are Rp 25,000 and are available at the gate.