Program 2008

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  The University of Pittsburgh

Department of Music

 

presents 

 

 

featuring

Nano S., composer

Rita Tila, singer

Ening Rumbini, dancer 

Dangdut Cowboys and

the University Gamelan

   

 

 

Bellefield Hall Auditorium

April 11 and 12, 2008

8pm

 


          It is an honor to introduce the 10th anniversary concert of the University Gamelan under my direction. The gamelan group is made up of students from Pitt and CMU who meet for an hour and a half two times per week as part of the gamelan class (Music 0690). This year’s group includes students majoring in Biological Sciences, English/Film Studies, Neuroscience, Philosophy, Chemistry, History of Art and Architecture, and, yes, even music! The purpose of the class, as well as other performance ensembles at Pitt, is to give students an opportunity to learn and perform music from other cultures. The ensemble plays the music of the Sundanese people, an ethnic group that inhabits roughly the western third of the island of Java. The approximately 30 million Sundanese make up the second largest ethnic group in Indonesia. By embodying the movements used to produce sound on the instruments, and by learning to listen to the other members of the ensemble, students experience the music in a unique and personal way. It is my hope that some of these students will be interested enough to travel to Indonesia, as I did as an undergraduate music student more than 20 years ago.         


          On March 28, three guest artist/teachers arrived in Pittsburgh from West Java: Nano S., West Java’s most famous composer of contemporary gamelan and Sundanese popular music (pop Sunda); Rita Tila, a rising star singer in traditional and contemporary gamelan scenes of West Java; and Ening Rumbini, a prominent dancer of modern Sundanese dance (jaipongan).  These artists have been teaching, performing public concerts, and presenting outreach programs for K-12 students in the Pittsburgh community. Together with the Dangdut Cowboys, they also performed at a benefit concert at the Indonesian Embassy in Washington, DC.

 

 

Program

 

I. Angklung

 

          A set of shaken bamboo rattles used in agricultural rituals in rural West Java.

 

II. Gamelan Salendro

 

          The University of Pittsburgh owns two gamelan sets. The first set, which arrived from central Java in October, 1995, is named “Kyai Tirta Rukmi,” or “Venerable Rivers of Gold.” This gamelan is tuned to laras salendro (a five-tone tuning system made up of approximately equidistant intervals). Songs accompanied by gamelan salendro, called kawih (song), are sung in performances of puppet theater (wayang) and listening music (kliningan). 

 

1. Sampak

2. Es Lilin

3. Cikeruhan

4. Kulu-kulu Barang

5. Kreasi Anyar 

 

III. Jaipongan

 

          A music and dance form created in Bandung, West Java, during the 1970s. The genre is rooted in Sundanese village performing arts, particularly the instrumentation, repertoire, and drumming style of ketuk tilu. Jaipongan’s most influential creative figure is Gugum Gumbira, the founder and director of the group Jugala.   

 

IV. Degung

 

          The second set of gamelan instruments, which arrived from west Java in March, 2005, is named “Ligar Pasundan” (“Fragrance of Pasundan”). This gamelan is tuned to laras degung (a five-tone tuning system made up of large and small intervals). Gamelan degung was created for local Sundanese regents (bupati) of West Java during the early 20th century. Regents promoted the performing arts for the entertainment of their families and other aristocrats of the Dutch colonial state. In its classic pre-independence form, gamelan degung is entirely instrumental and features the melodic improvisations of the suling. Modern post-independence compositions emphasize the vocal part, sung exclusively by female singers.  Song texts center around male-female relationships and the beauty of the natural environment.  

 

1. Catrik                                               

2. Gelatik Mangut3. Lalayaran     

4. Kunang-kunang

5. Palsiun

6. Bingung Milih

7. Tilil Kombinasi

 

Intermission

 

 

V. Dangdut

 

          A genre of mass-mediated popular music that developed in the Indonesian capital city of Jakarta during the late 1960s. Indonesia’s most popular music is arguably its most hybrid, blending Melayu, Arabic, and Indian musical elements with American, Latin, and European popular forms.  Dance! (Goyang!) 

 

1. Kubawa

2. Mandi Madu 

 

VI. Pop Sunda

 

          Sundanese popular music performed with a mixed ensemble of western and Indonesian instruments.

 

1. Kalangkang

2. Portret Manehna

3. Bubuy Bulan 

 

VII. Dangdut

 

1. Kegagalan Cinta-Your Cheatin’ Heart

2. Jablai Jam3. Gadis atau Janda

4. Dangdut       

5. Wipeout-Bujangan 

 

Featured Artists

 

Nano Suratno (known as Nano S.) is one of the most famous and important Indonesian composers of the twentieth century. He studied in childhood with the renowned Sundanese composer Mang Koko Koswara, and has degrees from ASTI Bandung and STSI Surakarta. Nano S is a remarkably prolific composer who moves successfully between classical gamelan, Sundanese pop and avant-garde music. To date he has written over 400 songs; about 200 of them have been recorded and released commercially in Indonesia. In 1979, his composition "Sangkuriang" was performed at the Pekan Komponis Muda (Young Composers Festival), probably the most important national venue for new (experimental) music in Indonesia. He has won many awards for his work. Nano S. writes in both traditional styles as well as pop, and is known to invent new ensembles by creating music for previously unassociated instruments.  Nano S. had had considerable international experience. He has taught and toured in Japan, Canada and the U.S. In 1989 he was a guest teacher and composer at the University of California at Santa Cruz. In 1999, he composed Hiroshima upon request by the city's mayor. With lyrics in Japanese, the music is an amalgamation of Japanese and Sundanese music scales. In addition to music, Nano S. writes poetry and short stories, mostly in Sundanese. He has written the text and music for over 15 operettas.

 

Rita Tila is a rising star in several genres of Sundanese music. She trained as  a singer for gamelan as a child. Her repertoire is vast, encompassing gamelan, tembang Sunda (songs accompanied by zither and flute ensemble), and popular music (pop Sunda). Her stage performances have delighted audiences in Europe, Australia, Singapore, and the U.S.

 

Ening Rumbini comes from a family of artists trained in the traditional performing arts of music, dance, and puppetry. Ening is considered one of today’s leading professional dancers in a style called jaipongan, a modern popular form of dance based on village dances and martial arts movements (penca silat). Ening has performed extensively in Indonesia as well as on performance tours to the U.S., Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore.

 

Andrew Weintraub is a scholar, teacher, and performer of Sundanese music of Indonesia. He holds degrees in music from UC Santa Cruz (B.A.), University of Hawaii (M.A.), and UC Berkeley (Ph.D.). Weintraub joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh in Fall 1997. He teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in ethnomusicology and popular music. His most recent book is titled Power Plays: The Wayang Golek Puppet Theater of West Java (University of Ohio Press, 2004).

 

 

University Gamelan 

 Sachem Clark, Yuko Eguchi, Kim Frost,Margot Goldberg, Shane Hanlon, Ben Pachter,Jordan Paley, Lydia Pudzianowski, Ben Rainey,Rob Sheaff, Margarita Shulkina, Samantha Swami,Richard Winkler, Shuo Zhang

Dangdut Cowboys 

 Andrew Weintraub (vocal, guitar)
Ben Rainey (guitar)
Kavin DP (bass)
Ben Pachter (gendang)
Mathew Rosenblum (saxophone)
Rita Tila (vocal)Ening Rumbini (vocal) 

 

   

For more information about the gamelan, please visit our websites:

 

http://www.pitt.edu/~anwein/gamelan

http://www.ucis.pitt.edu/INPAC/faculty_weintraub.htm 

 

In 2007, the gamelan program was profiled by Voice of America (VOA) and featured on Indonesian national television:
http://www.voanews.com/indonesian/ACI-2007.cfm Youtube videos of the band Dangdut Cowboys can be viewed at:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM50TfMd8pAhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K11l6V9bt9I&feature=related 

 

 

Acknowledgments 

 

University of Pittsburgh Department of Music, Indo-Pacific Council, Asian Studies Program, Harris Iskandar, Sister Marie Agatha, Pitt Arts, Annabelle Clippinger, Dorothy Shallenberger, and Phil Thompson.   

 

This concert is dedicated to the memory of Yoseph Iskandar 

 

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