Kyai Raras Arum

(Click the text to play a recording of the gong, made by A. Tobias Tenney in March of 2010. Note: on ordinary computer speakers, you won’t hear much. The fundamental note of this gong is at or below 50 Hz.)

The Raras Arum Foundation promotes Indonesian Arts and Culture, primarily the music and dance of Central Java.

Gamelan Raras Arum, currently owned by the Foundation, comprises both Slendro and Pelog tunings. The tuning of our set was designed by Widiyanto S. Putro; the set was originally built for Keith Rollinson by Tentrem Sarwanto and his studio, in Surakarta, Indonesia.

Just after the beginning of May, 2006, we had our instruments retuned. We would have waited another year, but we have been asked to lend the gamelan for a Wayang Kulit performance by Ki Purbo Asmoro at the Freer Gallery on July 6th, 2006, and it was clear that this was a good time for retuning. Mas Widiyanto was, fortunately, available, and he did a beautiful job of readjusting things.

If you want to get a sense of what our tuning was like before the retuning, try this page of examples. We hope to post a post-tuning examples page soon.

We are currently highlighting the decorations by adding a black background to the decorated areas, as suggested by Mas Widiyanto. Here are a saron that has not been altered yet, and a peking that has:

Here is a detail of one of our kendhang:

Here is a gambang, partly done:

(I must apologize for the color rendering of those last two. The camera’s balance was set incorrectly.)

Email, Jon: a@b.com, where you can replace the a with my first name (note, only 3 letters) and the b with joss.

Phone, Jon: +1 240 604 4495.

Last modified: Tue Apr 17 15:34:02 EDT 2007