Music Intro    Songs/Players    Scenario

Gan Gan Garmana Kacapi Suling Music
Javasounds Indonesian Music Series, Vol. 7
1. Untitled #1
2. Untitled #2
3. Untitled #3
4. Untitled #4   *(hear when you donate)
5. Untitled #5
6. Untitled #6   *(hear when you donate)
Recorded at Aru Studio in Bandung Java, Indonesia

Performers
Vocal: Euis Komariah
Vocal: Ros
Kacapi Indung: Gangan Garmana (more info below)
Kacapi Ricink: RukRuk Rukmana
Suling: Iwan

Euis Komariah & Gangan Garmana
(by Andrew Weintraub)

     Euis Komariah is recognized as one of West Java’s most talented, knowledgeable, and versatile musicans. She has received critical acclaim as a vocalist in several Sundanese music genres ranging from popular to classical. Her specialty is the highly ornamented and technically virtuosic vocal style of tembang Sunda, an aristocratic musical genre of West Java. You may know about Euis Komariah from Sean Williams’ book “The Sound of the Ancestral Ship” (which has a picture of her and Gangan Garmana on the cover). She is also a star singer in the gamelan salendro and degung music scenes in Bandung, west Java. Unlike other female vocalists of her generation, Euis Komariah also plays and performs musical instruments, which is typically the domain of male musicians. She is the main artist on over 50 recordings, including some that are readily available in the US (for example, Pan Records’ “Gamelan Degung, Classical Music of Sunda, West Java,” Ace Records’ “The Sound of Sunda,” and Globe Style’s “Jaipongan Java”). In a career spanning over 40 years, Euis Komariah has performed throughout the world

     Gangan Garmana (b. 1969) is the leading kacapi player of his generation. As a young boy, he studied kacapi technique and repertoire with the legendary kacapi master Uking Sukri in Bandung, West Java. As he came of age in the 1990s, Gangan sought out other teachers and styles throughout West Java. He fused these styles to create a unique personal style characterized by rapid flourishes, rhythmically complex patterns, and a crisp, clean tone. Gangan received first place in the kacapi category of the annual West Java tembang Sunda competition in 1994.