Bard's Gamelan: A Shimmering, Musical Consensus
by Lela Chapman

Late at night, shimmering melodies float from the window of an unassuming humanities classroom and across the campus of Bard College. At once lively and oddly haunting, they speak an unearthly musical language all their own - tempting listeners to follow their ears to one of the area's best kept secrets: the Hudson Valley Gamelan, a massive Balinese bronze percussion ensemble housed in Bard's Olin Hall.

After discovering Balinese gamelan music as a student at Bard, I followed these melodies literally halfway around the world, to the island of Bali, in Indonesia. You may imagine that a trip to Bali means sun and surf against a backdrop of tropical volcanoes, and I hate to disappoint. But in fact, I spent most of my travels holed up at my teachers' houses in the smoggy capital city of Denpasar, memorizing, memorizing, memorizing melodies and rhythmic patterns that twisted my hopelessly American brain into wicked knots (and occasioned more than one bout of mallet-throwing in disgust and frustration).

What my travels lacked in scenery, however, they more than paid off in experiences: that of watching the island's best musicians face off in marathon arts festival competitions, whose jeer-hurling crowds lent the atmosphere of a raucous sporting event. Or that of playing with a neighborhood group at a temple ceremony, during which the group's dancers--who I had known during rehearsals as a giggling group of high school students obsessed with cell phones and video games--fell moaning into trance and had to be carried off. This was culture shock of the very best sort.

The Hudson Valley Gamelan (the word gamelan simply means "ensemble") is comprised of over 20 ornately carved percussion instruments from the island of Bali: xylophones, jackfruit drums, and an assortment of bronze gongs (one booming fellow is over three feet in diameter). The stately instruments began their travels in the forges of the Pande Gableran clan, in Blahbatuh, Bali. The ensemble was originally part of Gamelan Sekar Jaya, one of the first Balinese orchestras in America, and now belongs to percussionist Garry Kvistad, who also owns Woodstock Chimes & Percussion across the river.

"I play with composer Steve Reich, whose music is deeply involved in gamelan," explains Kvistad. "We were both involved with Bob Brown's Asian Music Society in Berkeley in the 1970s. That's where I fell in love with gamelan music." After a lengthy tenure in Woodstock, Kvistad brought the orchestra to Bard seven years ago, where he formed one group for students, and another open to all members of the community at large, free of charge and regardless of experience.

The student and community groups of the Hudson Valley Gamelan accompany Balinese dancers from the Consulate of Indonesia at their biannual performances in Olin Auditorium. The gamelan has also performed at the Bearsville Theater, the Fisher Center, and on Kingston's Wall Street. "We always welcome new members," says longtime player Bill Ylitalo.

Balinese gamelan music is a true community experience, and often a trial by fire for American students. Music is memorized, and there is almost no written notation. Instead, master musician Nyoman Saptanyana teaches in the traditional maguru panggul method (which literally means, "by the mallet"), seating himself across from a student and proceeding to demonstrate the music on their instrument--backward. A great cacophony goes up: mallets fly, players crane around one another to see, and gradually - like a blurred picture resolving into sharp focus - the ensemble grasps as one the delicate, lightning-quick syncopations that are the heart of Balinese music.

"One thing I love as a classical musician is that gamelan makes me think about music differently, especially the memorization process," says Manon Hutton-DeWys, a Bard senior majoring in music with a concentration in classical piano performance. "The learning process is completely different" than Western music. "You have to conceptualize it differently in order to memorize it."

"After one semester, I was intrigued; I felt like I was on the edge of understanding the music," says Maggie Carson, who also plays banjo. "Someone said it doesn't make sense until the second semester. Now I can see the patterns."

What can American students take from the experience of playing gamelan? "Not just to play, you cannot play by yourself. You must listen to those around you," says director Saptanyana. "In Bali we call this musyawarah," which means "consensus." Communality is central to Balinese culture, and the music reflects this: pairs of musicians play interlocking patterns called kotekan, which form a flowing composite pattern that would be impossible for a single musician to execute alone.

Teaching at Bard has been a challenge for Saptanyana as well. "To teach here, I must study English, to communicate with students. In Bali, the same people play together for a long time--but here I get so stressed, because students get good, and then they graduate!"

The Hudson Valley Gamelan will perform on Saturday, December 10 at 7:30 pm at Bard College's Olin Auditorium. Admission is free to the public. Open community rehearsals take place during the school year on Tuesday nights from 9 to 11 pm in Room 305 of Olin Hall at Bard College. Contact Bill Ylitalo at (845) 679-8624 for more information.