Menyinggi – the metal base material is melted to be printed into a blade or round shape. There are three forms of gamelan produced at this stage, namely the long form (dawan), the long semicircle and the cebongan form. To maintain holiness, floral water is usually used at this stage to soak the printed gamelan. Menempa – the gamelan that has been printed then moves to the forging or casting phase to create a perfect shape. The forging phase is the most complex phase of the gamelan manufacturing process. At this stage, the process is carried out by people who really understand the peculiarities of gamelan, given that the forging process is not carried out carelessly, but uses different striking techniques with different types of hammers. A Dalang (puppeteer), Sindhen (singer) and Wiyaga (gamelan musician) with a Javanese gamelan at Keraton Yogyakarta The sultan`s palace in Yogyakarta – Around 1885 In Lamongan, East Java, there is an old gamelan from the 15th century called Gamelan Singo Mengkok. This gamelan is a legacy of the Sunan Drajat (one of the Wali Sanga), which was used for the transmission of the Islamic religion in Paciran, Lamongan. Defeated by Sunan Drajat`s friends to accompany the Tembang Pangkur (Panguri isine Quran) created by Sunan Drajat himself. This set of gamelan is an acculturation of Hindu-Buddhist and Islamic culture, since the surrounding community is Hindu, so it is easily accepted by the community. The Gamelan Singo Mengkok is now kept at the Sunan Drajat Museum in Lamongan.
[23] Gamelan Kaduk Manis Rengga (Sacred Gamelan) by Kraton Surakarta, Java, 2003. Colin McPhee, a Canadian composer who spent a lot of time in Bali, noted, “The discrepancies in what is considered the same scale are so large that one could legitimately argue that there are as many scales as there are gamelans.” However, this view is disputed by some gamelan teachers, and there have been efforts to combine several sets and mood structures into a single gamelan to facilitate transportation at festival time. One such ensemble is Gamelan Manikasanti, which can play the repertoire of many different ensembles. Gamelan is used to accompany various traditional ceremonies in Indonesia, Kodhok Ngorek gamelan, Monggang gamelan, Carabalen gamelan and Ageng gamelan are used for important ceremonies related to kings in Yogyakarta and Surakarta palaces, such as the king`s coronation ceremony, the king`s birthday ceremony, coronation day, the reception of royal guests, the birth of the baby, marriage, death and so on. Outside the palace of Java, gamelan is used for wedding receptions, birth ceremonies, circumcision ceremonies, rice harvesting, Ruwatan ceremonies and death ceremonies (dhukitan). The musical performance of the Dhukitan ceremony in public is different from that of the palace. Dhuktan ceremonies in the palace use the gamelan instrument Kodhok Ngorek, which is intended only for the death of the king and his family and is only used when the body goes to the cemetery. Meanwhile, Gendhing offerings during duhkitan ceremonies in public (outside the palace vicinity) are usually served at the time of death by musical artists of dance, musical puppetry, wayang orang, cultural observers, and theater with the Gamelan Gadhon ensemble. A gamelan in an exhibition at the museum of the Royal Batavian Society of Arts and Sciences (now the National Museum of Indonesia), Batavia, circa 1896. In Bali, gamelan instruments are all held together in a balé, a large open space with a roof above and several open sides. Gambelans (Balinese term) belong to a banjar, nobility or temples and are kept in their respective enclosures. In the case of the Banjar property, the instruments are all kept together because people believe that all the instruments belong to the community as a whole and that no one owns an instrument.
Not only the instruments are stored here, but also the practice room for the sekaha (gamelan orchestra group). Open walls allow music to circulate in the community where the rest of the people can enjoy it. Balinese gamelan cannot be heard indoors as it easily crosses the threshold of pain. This does not apply to small ensembles such as a gamelan genderer. No two gamelans are the same; Rather, each instrument is tuned to fit the set for which it is intended, rather than an external height standard. A gamelan can be tuned to the Slendro scale (in which the octave is divided into five tones that are approximately equidistant from each other) or to Pelog (a scale consisting of seven notes with different intervals, five of which receive the main accent). The so-called Java double gamelans consist of both a slendro and a pelog instrumentation, which usually share one or two common heights. The modes (patet) of Javanese gamelan music are determined in part by the relative placement on the two scales of the base note (dong) and their fifth above and fifth below. (A fifth is an interval more or less as large as that formed by five adjacent white keys on a piano.) Almost all dances originating from the island of Java and Bali are accompanied by gamelan music. Gamelan adds spirit and beauty to live dance performances. The beautiful sound of gamelan music brings the dance to life and is graceful to see.
The main function of gamelan as a dance accompaniment is to give a rhythm or rhythm or tempo. Thus, the choice of accompanying music must be adapted to the rhythm and theme of the dance.