Music of Java

The Music of Java embraces a wide variety of styles, both traditional and contemporary, reflecting the diversity of the island and its lengthy history.

The gamelan orchestra, based on metallic idiophones and drums, is perhaps the form which is most readily identified as being distinctly "Javanese" by outsiders.

In Java, the full gamelan also adds a bowed string instrument (the rebab, a name illustrative of Islamic influence), plucked siter, vertical flute suling and voices.

[1] The rebab is one of the main melodic instruments of the ensemble, together with the metallophone gendér; these and the kendang drums are often played by the most experienced musicians.

Voices usually consist of a male chorus gerong, together with a female soloist pesindhen; however, the voices are not usually featured in court gamelan (as opposed to wayang kulit, shadow puppet theatre) and are supposed to be heard discreetly in the middle of the orchestral sound.