FARMINGTON — Bates College’s Gamelan Degung Ensemble will perform traditional and contemporary music from western Java on Sunday, March 18, at the University of Maine at Farmington.
The ensemble will be joined by composer, cellist and UMF Professor of Music Philip Carlsen for the premiere of his “Tango Tanggung” for cello and gamelan.
Admission to the 3 p.m. performance at Emery Community Arts Center is free.
Gamelan degung is music of the Sundanese people of West Java and was created in the early 20th century for local regents who administered the colonial Dutch cultivation system for the province of West Java. These rulers promoted Sundanese music and the performing arts for their entertainment and the enjoyment of the Dutch colonial aristocrats.
Originally performed primarily by men to accompany female singers, the gamelan degung is now performed mostly by women in Indonesia. Frequently used for weddings, the ensemble consists of sets of bronze tuned gongs and xylophone-type instruments.
A member of the UMF faculty since 1982, Carlsen chairs UMF’s department of sound, performance and visual inquiry. He was the winner of a commission from the National Symphony Orchestra and the Kennedy Center in connection with the orchestra’s residency in Maine, writing a septet titled “Maine Traveler’s Advisory,” which premiered at the Kennedy Center in November 2000.
As an opener to both the 2006 and 2007 Arts Night celebrations at UMF, Carlsen composed and conducted “Car Life” and “Car Afterlife,” two auto symphonies of car horns, engines, doors, radios, poetry and sound effects, performed by “orchestras” of more than 50 cars.
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