Goin' To Chicago

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 7:02 am

No, it's not a line out of the Willie Dixon/Robert Plant songbook...just an announcement of our gamelan's upcoming gig in the windy city. Well, not right in the city, but at the Crowne Plaza Hotel at O'Hare. It's a benefit for an Indonesian performing arts organization there.

The website: http://www.ipac-tari.org/iHome.html

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 7:09 am

Here's an autocad rendering of the gear we're taking:

...and how it fits in a sixteen foot rental truck:

Shades of Pink Floyd at Pompeii..now I have to figure out how to fit it all onto a 24'X28' stage and leave enough room for the dancers...

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 7:24 am

Some photos of our recent gig at the Dragon Boat races in Denver can be seen at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dpanther/954618982/in/set-72157601103396196/

(One might spot a familiar freaky face in the band...)

longhouse · Post by **longhouse** » Thu Aug 09, 2007 5:30 pm

Wow... and I lament the lighting truss, PA, and amplifiers!

Good luck in Chicago -America's greatest big city in my opinion.

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 5:37 am

Thanks, Noel...we're looking forward to it. It is a really great town...

atomic_punk · Post by **atomic_punk** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 7:45 am

Damn, what IS all that stuff?

elysrand · Post by **elysrand** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 8:07 am

Drums? Cymbals? And one heck of a lot of xylophones???????

red_rob · Post by **red_rob** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 9:26 am

Dane, where is all the silver Tolex going to fit...?

byu · Post by **byu** » Sat Aug 11, 2007 5:16 am

Looks like it'll be a fun gig. It's only about 20 minutes from where I live so I'll try to check it out. Perhaps some other Chicago area Forumites will want to go as well. Only draw back is it's Labor Day weekend and I may have a family event but I'd love to see it.

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Sun Aug 12, 2007 11:55 am

It's two Balinese gamelans, plus some packing cases for mallets, some of the smaller gongs and miscellaneous stuff...the objects at the front of the left row are kendang, double-headed drums, each one carved from a solid tree trunk. The middle row is a gamelan angklung, a four-note ceremonial village orchestra used mostly for cremations; the right row is a gamelan semaradana, a new style of performing orchestra with several tuning modes incorporated in one set of instruments. At the back are the big gongs, and they and the keys of the metallophones in each set are made of bronze, which is smelted in open pit furnaces. The 'box' of each metallophone is hand-carved jackfruit wood. You can see some photos of the actual rigs on our website (www.tunasmekar.org)...here's an example:

It's a lot of weight... no silver tolex, just a lot of padding and blankets.

(Bill...not only is it Labor Day weekend, but the tickets are $100...as I said, it's a benefit...we'll just be getting our travel and expenses paid (we're a non-profit community group, so we don't make money as individuals). Anyway...I don't expect you to shell out for it, but if you come down to the hotel on Saturday afternoon, you might be able to sneak in for the dress rehearsal.)

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 8:50 am

Sooo...two days away, and we're all feeling a little nervous and overworked, which means it's a typical 'big gig'. The tunes are sounding great...we have to makes some edits to cooperate with the dancers which will be finalized at the Saturday rehearsal: not a big deal, unless you're dealing with two hours of complex memorized music...then it becomes what our teacher refers to as "challenging".

Here's the (finally finalized) stage set-up (dimensions changed to 24'x40'):

The word from the consulate in Chicago is that the show is sold out, which is great...if anyone here's interested in seeing it, it's supposed to be filmed and posted to the web. I'll let you know how to view it when it becomes available.

I gotta get going now...we're picking up the truck and loading up 1.5 tons of bronze and wood...wish us good "karmapala"...

brammy · Post by **brammy** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 9:04 am

Hi Dane: Just a (serious) question borne out of ignorance...

Is this a guy dressed as woman? Or is that just man's gamelan garb that looks feminine to my western eyes?

(I suppose it could be a flat-chested woman with 5-o'clock shadow, but I discounted that possibility)

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 9:17 am

She's all woman, I assure you, Kent...and not that it's anyone's business, but she is absolutely not flat-chested. The costume involves one long piece of fabric, which is wrapped tightly from chest to waist. She is depicting the cendrawasih bird, found in Irian Jaya and called by us 'the Bird of Paradise'.

Other than that, when she's in jeans and a t-shirt, she makes Britney and Lindsay look like a pair of mud fences...

brammy · Post by **brammy** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 10:10 am

hmmm... whats up with the beard shadow? It looks somewhat Nixonian. I've gotten a couple of "second opinions" and they think it looks like a guy too.

Oh well, I guess its just a trick of the lighting.

(ps: Britney and Lindsay ARE a pair of mud fences)

teeder · Post by **teeder** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 3:13 am

At first, I thought the original pictures were of the inside of a radio.