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Javanese Gamelan Practice

A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings. Vocalists may also be included.

The term refers more to the set of instruments than to the players of those instruments. A gamelan is a set of instruments as a distinct entity, built and tuned to stay together — instruments from different gamelan are generally not interchangeable.

The word “gamelan” comes from the Javanese word “gamels”, meaning to strike or hammer, and the suffix “an”, which makes the root a collective noun. Real hammers are not used to play these instruments as heavy iron hammers would break the delicate instruments.

There are several interesting places to be found in Central Java. Semarang itself has lots of old picturesque buildings: Puri Maerokoco and Indonesian Record Museum are located in this city.

Borobudur, which is one of the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage sites of Indonesia is also located in this province, in the Magelang regency. Candi Mendut and Candi Pawon can also be found near the Borobudur temple complex.

Candi Prambanan at the border of Klaten regency and Yogyakarta is the biggest complex of Hindu temples. It is also a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage SIte. In the region around the Dieng Plateau, one could find several temples. These are built before the era of the ancient Mataram.

Two interesting palaces, the Palace of the Sunan (Keraton Kasunanan) and Pura Mangkunegaran, are located in Surakarta, which is considered one of the centers of Javanese culture. The Grojogan Sewu waterfall is located in Karanganyar Regency, which has a beautiful scenery. Several Majapahit temples and Sangiran museum are also located in Central Java

Central Java is connected to the interprovincial national way on the northern coast (Jalur Pantai Utara or Jalur Pantura) which runs from Anyer in Banten to Banyuwangi, East Java on the opposite of Bali. Losari, the Central Javanese gate at the western border on the northern coast, could be reached from Jakarta in 4 hours drive. On the southern coast, there is also a national way which run from Kroya at the Sundanese-Javanese border, through Yogyakarta to Surakarta and then to Surabaya via Kertosono in East Java. There is furthermore a direct connection from Tegal to Purwokerto. In addition to that there is a toll road from Semarang to Ungaran which runs for 14 kilometer.

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As the overwhelming majority of the population of Central Java are Javanese, the most dominant language is Javanese. There are several dialects which are spoken in Central Java, the two main dialects are western Javanese (also called Basa Ngapak which includes the “Banyumasan dialect” and the dialect of Brebes-Tegal-Pekalongan[17]) and central Javanese.

Sundanese is also spoken in some pockets near the border with West Java, especially in Brebes and Cilacap regencies. However, according to some sources, Sundanese used to be spoken as far away as in Dieng Plateau.[18] This former boundary of Sundanese coincides more or less with the isogloss dividing Central Javanese with Western Javanese.

In urban centers Indonesian is widely spoken.