MIT's Gamelan Galak Tika, Boston's premier ensemble of Balinese music, ends its sixth season on a high-tech note this week: a performance of Associate Professor Evan Ziporyn's Amok! -- the first since its premiere in 1997.
Performed with guest artist Robert Black, bass player for the performing duo Basso Bongo, Amok! uses sampling technology to create an innovative musical landscape: real and virtual gamelans side-by-side. Electronic pyrotechnics and amplified bass are used to create larger-than life-sounds, "treading the fine line between chaos and control," said Professor Ziporyn.
The concert on Friday, May 14, at 8pm in Kresge Auditorium also features the traditional music and choreography with special guests Lynn Kremer of the College of the Holy Cross in a performance of a sacred topeng masked dance and Cynthia Laksawana in the kebyar classic Taruna Jaya.
Professor Ziporyn, who also directs the ensemble, is a composer and wind player whose work is informed by nearly 20 years of work with the Balinese gamelan. Amok! is the latest of his five works combining Balinese gamelan with Western instruments.
Admission is $7, $3 for students, and free for children under 12 or those with an MIT ID. For more information, contact x3-2826 or e-mail dfan@harmonixmusic.com.
A version of this article appeared in the May 12, 1999 issue of MIT Tech Talk (Volume 43, Number 30).
