10AM - Gamelan Music

Television (Excerpts) – 1990

Gamelan music has been taught and played at Victoria University (and later the NZ School of Music) since the mid 70s, when lecturer Allan Thomas purchased a set of gamelan instruments on the Indonesian island of Java. This magazine piece from arts show 10AM showcases Victoria’s gamelan orchestra in action. Thomas and fellow lecturer Jack Body provide eloquent testimony to the popularity of this age-old music, and the access point it offers into Asian culture for New Zealanders. Body also provides his own spin on a gamelan composition.

It's hundreds of years old and yet here we are newly listening to it. And wherever we play and we tour around the country, there are people who are hearing it for the first time.
– Victoria University music lecturer Allan Thomas