![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/files\/2018\/03\/171129_Gamelan_Concert_0133.jpg\")
<\/a>Darsono, a visiting artist in residence in the music department, is a prominent Javanese gamelan musician and master puppeteer. He’s shown performing last December with the Bates Gamelan Orchestra. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n
So what we have here is an instance of value meeting value. Heir to an esteemed family tradition of music and puppetry in the Central Javanese city of Surakarta, Darsono is one of the most prominent musicians from a region that\u2019s a major hub for performing arts.<\/p>\n
“He is one of the most highly ranked musicians of his generation,” says Associate Professor of Music Gina Fatone, director of Bates\u2019 gamelan program.<\/p>\n
A Connecticut resident currently teaching at Tufts, Smith, and Yale as well as Bates, Darsono has also taught and performed in the Netherlands, Japan, and Singapore. Since he arrived at Bates last fall, he has spent four or five days per month at the college \u2014 a typical schedule for artists-in-residence in music here.<\/p>\n
He has lectured in music and Asian studies classes and has worked with the Bates Gamelan Orchestra, prepping the ensemble for performances that include upcoming gigs on April 4<\/a> and May 18<\/a>.<\/p>\n Maho Ishiguro, an expert in Indonesian dance and a doctoral candidate in ethnomusicology at Yale, performs with Darsono and the Bates gamelan last December. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n On the latter date, after two weeks of daily rehearsal in the context of the Short Term unit \u201cPerforming Musical Art of Indonesia,\u201d Darsono will direct and perform a Javanese \u201cshadow play\u201d with musical support from the gamelan orchestra.<\/p>\n Darsono even wrote a piece of music in traditional style that the gamelan performed in December. It’s a theme song of sorts: It incorporates Javanese lyrics, and the first letters of every line add up to spell \u201cBates.\u201d<\/p>\n In addition, through the course \u201cVisiting Artist in Music Ensemble,\u201d Darsono has coached individual students in Javanese gamelan and puppetry.<\/p>\n “He really loves to teach,” says Fatone. “So despite the fact that he’s of the very upper echelon of classical Javanese gamelan performers, he enjoys teaching absolute beginners. There\u2019s been a very warm interaction. He\u2019s very patient. And the students really enjoy him.”<\/p>\n Darsono (left front) brings his chamber ensemble Ngudi Raras to Bates on April 4.<\/p><\/div>\n Kinsey Moser, a senior from Burke, Va., who has played with the Bates gamelan for almost three years, is one of those students. \u201cHe never seems to get frustrated even if we are struggling with a simple pattern or rhythm,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cOne particular instance when his teaching really made a difference for me was when I was learning a particularly difficult part on the \u2018bonang panerus\u2019\u201d \u2014 a sort of xylophone that uses tuned gongs instead of bars \u2014 \u201cand I was unable to play it.<\/p>\n \u201cHe picked up two mallets and started playing it for me on the other side of the bonang, facing me, so ultimately he was playing the bonang upside down for my benefit. It was amazing to see him playing the bonang upside down, while conducting the rest of the orchestra, and singing the vocal part to the piece at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n The April 4 program will include a substantial set by Ngudi Raras, a six-member gamelan chamber ensemble that features Darsono and is currently on a U.S. tour. \u201cFor the small group, we just meet and play together without arranging it before,\u201d Darsono says.<\/p>\n \u201cEverything is spontaneous\u201d \u2014 but making it work requires close attention to the other players and a profound knowledge of the musical vocabulary.<\/p>\n It’s like jazz in that regard. But that resemblance may be as close to Western music as traditional gamelan gets. Much about the genre \u2014 musical structures, cultural uses, performance practice, instrumentation \u2014 sets it apart from music familiar to Americans.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a>