Luminous Gamelan
Music and Performance
education
Luminous Music have developed gamelan programmes for adults and young persons
that offer a challenging learning environment for the interested student. They
provide an opportunity for pupils to explore the unique elements of ensemble
music-making that gamelans allow. Our programmes offer traditional gamelan
skills as well as voyages of creative exploration. They are a looking glass to
help understand the culture from which the instruments come.
What makes gamelan so interesting? The instruments themselves are fascinating. They simply sound amazing. A first
time encounter with the gamelan brings the individual into a world of new
instruments, metallic sounds, a carefully tuned orchestra of chimes and gongs.
Learning gamelan music is like trying to solve a wonderful puzzle. There are
unusual problems that require interesting solutions. As pupils learn to play
the music many special skills are acquired in each session.
Shadow puppets, masks, songs, dances and helpful methods of learning music can
presented in the course of a session, or during special workshops. Visiting
artists often bring traditional insights from their own culture and family
traditions, and we try to pass these along.
For more information on these programmes, follow the two links below:
performance
We are interested in creating new music for gamelan performance and are keen to
help in the development or recording of new gamelan music by composers and
ensembles throughout the world.
What is the role of new music in the gamelan?
Gamelan music is the stuff that has inspired composers in all cultures, and
there are good reasons to encourage the develpoment of new music. Gamelan is as
vital and innovative as any other form of music in the world.
Technical challenges within traditional music open doors to a wealth of
knowledge. Stepping away from the traditional repertoire is not always easy,
particularly when an individual is beginning to gain some mastery of the
musical elements involved. New music provides one possible pathway for
technical achievement.
There are many different approaches to contemporary gamelan music. Some
compositions develop close to traditional music models; some in conjunction
with other art forms, dance or shadow puppets, and some is just created for it’s own sake. Mixed together or separate, new or old, music can vary from highly conservative
to highly experimental; some insightful or challenging, serious or humorous.
In Scotland, composers Jon Keliehor, J. Simon van der Walt, Katherine Waumsley
and Margaret Smith, in the group Gamelan Naga Mas, are developing new music
performance, using mixtures of gamelan instruments, non-gamelan acoustic
instruments and electronic processing tools.
This site provides music samples to help describe various new approaches to
gamelan music, and to inform possibilities for collaboration with others.
Follow these links to hear samples of
