NCH Gamelan Orchestra

The National Concert Hall Gamelan Orchestra was established in 2014 when the people of Ireland were presented with a specially-built gamelan as a gift from Sultan Hamengkubuwono X of Yogyakarta in Java. After initially meeting through the UCD School of Music, the ensemble's first official concert as the NCH Gamelan Orchestra was to perform alongside the sultan's Royal Palace Gamelan Musicians who travelled to Ireland with the sultan to perform the traditional gamelan naming ceremony. 

Since then, the NCH ensemble has performed at some of Ireland's biggest music festivals, including the Electric Picnic, the Kaleidoscope Festival, Another Love Story, the Bray Jazz Festival, Hotter Than July, Beyond the Pale, and many more. 

They have performed in Indonesia at the 2014 Yogyakarta International Performing Arts Festival, and at the 2018 International Gamelan Festival in Surakarta, for which they received highly positive reviews in Indonesia's national media.

Their recitals of traditional Javanese music on YouTube have been viewed nearly 100,000 times. Their debut single, Embat, was released online in 2020.

In 2024, the NCH Gamelan Orchestra celebrated its 10th Anniversary with the release of their debut album, Kyai Jati Roso, a name bestowed on the instruments by the sultan, which translates as “The Honourable Gamelan of Pure Consciousness”. The album features a special guest, the legendary British jazz trumpeter Byron Wallen. 

The album features a broad selection of music from the ancient gamelan tradition of Central Java, with an original field recording of a gongsmith at work inside a gamelan workshop.

Byron Wallen performs on an exciting new arrangement of the composition Embat, which was written by director Peter Moran to commemorate the building of the NCH gamelan instruments in 2014. 

Kyai Jati Roso is now available for download from Bandcamp and iTunes, or streamed on Spotify  

The album can also be purchased as a special 10th Anniversary Commemorative CD, which comes in a beautiful presentation box with an elegantly-designed 48-page full-colour booklet detailing the remarkable history of these instruments and the people who have played them. 

Social Media Links

www.instagram.com/NCHGamelan 
www.facebook.com/NCHGamelan 
www.nchgamelan.bandcamp.com 
www.youtube.com/@NCHGamelan 
Spotify

Contact

For enquiries and concert bookings, email nchgamelan@gmail.com 

For more information about the NCH gamelan education and outreach programme, email education@nch.ie