2017 International Gamelan Festival Reintroduces Gamelan in UK
11 September 2017 19:20 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The 2017 International Gamelan Festival (IGF) held at Cadogan Hall, London, featured the first black and white movie dubbed “Setan Jawa” (The Javanese Devil) by award-winning Indonesian director and producer Garin Nugroho.
The IGF, according to Education and Culture Ministry official Ahmad Mahendra, is meant to globally exhibit the existence of Indonesian traditional instrumental ensemble gamelan, which is a part of Indonesia’s cultural diplomacy strategy.
The main events that were held at the 2017 IGF included workshops featuring Indonesian traditional musical instruments such as bonang, rebab, gender, and suling (flute). The event also featured gamelan experts Prof. Rahayu Supanggih and Prof. Sumarsum at SOAS University of London.
England’s gamelan players were also featured at the event. Among them are “Siswa Sukra” led by Peter Smith and “South Bank” led by John Pawson.
Ahmad Mahendra explained that gamelan was documented by Stamford Raffles (1781-1826) who gave the earliest initial description of gamelan in The History of Java released in 1817. Raffles was the first Englishman who introduced gamelan to the British audience.
ANTARA