For this Lunchtime Concert, we have two halves of music highlighting traditional music practice from Indonesia and China. We welcome our school Gamelan ensemble (Indonesia) and some Chinese musicians from around Wellington to demonstrating the capabilities of our new Chinese instrument collection.

CHINESE INSTRUMENT ENSEMBLE

The ensemble performing on the new Chinese instruments will be performing two pieces—"The Scenery of Su Di" and "Snow Lotus".

PERF250 GAMELAN STUDENTS

During an intensive twelve week course our students, from a range of ethnic backgrounds, come together tonight to present a selection of traditional and contemporary gamelan pieces from Java.

• Gangsaran and Lancaran Pelog - traditional gamelan repertoires: Gangsaran is the simplest gamelan piece and a distinctive lancaran piece which is played on one repeated tone.
• Lancaran Naraca Laras Slendro – a traditional gamelan repertoire: Lancaran is a formal structure in which each gong cycle is divided into 4 bars of four notes each.
• Umbul donga (offerings), new traditional pieces which include Javanese song of cleansing the bad influence around us.

ABOUT GAMELAN

Gamelan is a national music from Indonesia, particularly Java and Bali and is now played throughout the world. Gamelan instruments are mostly percussion - bronze metallophones and gongs which produce tones when struck with mallets (tabuh). Javanese gamelan uses two tuning systems (laras): five-tone (slendro) and seven-tone (pelog).

In Indonesia, gamelan is an essential accompaniment for dramatic forms, such as dance, dance drama, and wayang performance as well as ritual celebrations (e.g wedding receptions, circumcisions, village ceremonies and others). Klenengan (musical performances in their own right) are less common.