Selamatan
with Gamelan York

TORONTO, March 15, 2000 -- Spend a magical Sunday afternoon at a Selamatan celebration listening to the sounds of one of the world's richest musical traditions - Javanese gamelan. York University's Gamelan York, directed by Andrew Timar, gives its debut performance on Sunday, March 26.

This concert celebrates the launch of York University's Department of Music performance studio in Javanese gamelan. Music students examine both the instrumental and vocal traditions found in the court and theatre music of Java plus have the opportunity to explore gamelan for contemporary music making.

York musicians study this ancient musical culture of central Java's court on instruments loaned from the Indonesian Consulate General in Toronto. This particular gamelan, named Nyai Mirah Kencana (Lady Brilliant Vermilion) was made in the cities of Surakarta, Yogyakarta and Bandung on the island of Java. It is comprised of gongs, gong-chimes, metallophones, drums, a xylophone, flute, spiked-fiddle and zither. They are all tuned in laras slendro, one of two traditional Javenese scales. Gamelan is not based on Western notation and students learn the Javenese musical system using notasi kepatihan or Javenese cipher notation, along with oral transmission. The concert will feature both traditional and contemporary music composed for the gamelan.

Several York University music department professors have close ties to gamelan music. James Tenney recently had his composition "The Road to Ubud" - for gamelan and piano - performed and recorded by Toronto's Evergreen Club contemporary gamelan, Canada's first performing gamelan. Another York music professor, South Indian master drummer Trichy Sankaran, has composed for and performed with the Evergreen Club.

Andrew Timar is a founding member and past artistic director of the Evergreen Club. He has composed more than a dozen works for the gamelan alone and gamelan combined with other instruments. Special guests, instrumentalist Nur Intan Murtadza, vocalist Sandra Phillips and English horn soloist Karen Ages will join York University music department students in this performance.

Gamelan York performs on Sunday, March 26 at 3 p.m. at McLaughlin Performance Hall, 050 McLaughlin College, York University, 4700 Keele St. Admission is free. Info: 736-5186.

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For further information, please contact:

Carol Bishop
Communications, Faculty of Fine Arts
York University
(416) 736-2100 ext. 20421
email: cbishop@yorku.ca