Melbourne Community Gamelan (Nyi Gemi Raras)

Art Center · Parkville, Victoria, Australia

About Melbourne Community Gamelan (Nyi Gemi Raras)

A Commonwealth Government grant to the University of Melbourne for promoting Asian Studies in Education led to the founding of the Melbourne Community Gamelan in 1990, with ethnomusicologist Professor Catherine Falk playing a central role in its establishment. The ensemble's instruments, a matched pair of slendro and pelog gamelan sets along with a full collection of wayang kulit shadow puppets and a performance screen, are housed at Melba Hall within the University of Melbourne's Conservatorium, at 48 Royal Parade in Parkville. The group's performing name, Nyi Gemi Raras, was chosen by its founding teacher, Ki Poedijono, and the ensemble has carried it since.

Weekly practice is organized around Central Javanese court gamelan traditions, the refined, courtly repertoire historically associated with the royal palaces of Yogyakarta and Surakarta. The main ensemble meets on Monday evenings from 6:30 to 8:30pm in the Tallis Room on Melba Hall's ground floor, under current musical director Ilona Wright, who also teaches the university's weekly undergraduate gamelan classes. A beginners' group runs earlier on the same evening, open to adults and children with no prior musical experience, and students learn by ear while rotating through the different instruments rather than being assigned a single one. On the last Monday of each month, a singing group known as gerong meets to practice the vocal line that runs alongside the instrumental music, again with no singing background required.

Beyond weekly rehearsals, the ensemble stages public concerts, wayang kulit shadow puppet performances, and Javanese dance, and has hosted visiting specialists, including a 2025 series of workshops with dancer Vi King Lim on the classical pieces Rantaya Putri and Menak Koncar. Performance recordings are posted to the group's YouTube channel, with further updates shared through Facebook and a mailing list. Anyone interested in joining or attending is asked to make contact through the ensemble's website before showing up to a rehearsal, since the main group has at times been full and kept a waitlist. The ensemble is registered as Melbourne Community Gamelan Inc. and operates under the University of Melbourne's Conservatorium.

Address

Melba Hall, University of Melbourne Conservatorium, 48 Royal Parade, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

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Indonesian Art Center in Australia

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