Hear American gamelan music on tonight’s New Sounds. There’s music from the San Francisco Bay Area by the Lightbulb Ensemble, a composers collective that builds their own instruments, including contemporary gamelan. They only perform new repertoire and are influenced by both Balinese and Western traditions. Hear some of the hour-long suite of pieces called "Mikrokosma," created by Wayne Vitale of Gamelan Sekar Jaya and Brian Baumbusch of the Lightbulb Ensemble.
Then hear music for guitar and gamelan by the American composer, Bill Alves. His work is inspired by the late Lou Harrison, one of the first American composers to write Western-style music for Indonesian gamelan instruments. Alves leads the Harvey Mudd College (HMC) American Gamelan in his Concerto for Guitar and Gamelan, featuring the California guitarist John Schneider who plays a retuned guitar in the system known as just intonation. Also, there’s music by Lou Harrison – his Concerto for Piano with Javanese Gamelan. Plus, music from Gamelan Pacifica which incorporates Suling flute, and Gamelan Son of Lion, an NYC-based new music collective, playing a work by their co-founder, the ethnomusicologist-turned-composer Barbara Benary.
PROGRAM #3791 American Gamelan Music (First Aired 10-28-2015)
ARTIST: Gamelan Pacifica, cond. By Jarrad Powell; Adrienne Varner, piano
WORK: Lou Harrison: Concerto for Piano and Gamelan, excerpt (middle movement) [1:00]
RECORDING: Scenes from Cavafy
SOURCE: New World 80710
INFO: newworldrecords.org
ARTIST: Bill Alves with John Schneider, just intonation guitar | HMC American Gamelan |Bill Alves, director
WORK: Concerto for Guitar and Gamelan 2 [6:27]
RECORDING: Guitars & Gamelan
SOURCE: Microfest Records MF 8
INFO: microfestrecords.com or available via Amazon.com, iTunes, or CDBaby
ARTIST: Lightbulb Ensemble
WORK: Mikrokosma – Pomp and Grace [7:14]
RECORDING: Private recording
SOURCE/INFO: lightbulbensemble.com
ARTIST: Gamelan Pacifica, cond. By Jarrad Powell; Adrienne Varner, piano
WORK: Lou Harrison : Concerto for Piano and Javanese Gamelan : mvmt 2 [8:54]
RECORDING: Scenes from Cavafy
SOURCE: New World 80710
INFO: newworldrecords.org
ARTIST: Bill Alves with John Schneider, just intonation guitar | HMC American Gamelan |Bill Alves, director
WORK: Bill Alves: Concerto for Guitar and Gamelan 4 [5:53]
RECORDING: Guitars & Gamelan
SOURCE: Microfest Records MF 8
INFO: microfestrecords.com or available via Amazon.com, iTunes, or CDBaby
ARTIST: Gamelan Pacifica
WORK: Signy Jakobsdottir, Jon Keliehor, Tom Fallat, Jarrad Powell: Small of My Back [10:54]
RECORDING: Trance Gong
SOURCE: What Next #0016
INFO: Nonsequitur Foundation oodiscs.com
ARTIST: Gamelan Son of Lion with Joseph Kubera, pf.
WORK: Barbara Benary: Aural Shoehorning, 1. Plainsong [7:32]
RECORDING: Sun On Snow
SOURCE: New World #80646
INFO: newworldrecords.org
