Guruh Gipsy is an Indonesian band from the mid-1970s who fused American
and European progressive rock with traditional Balinese and Javanese
music.
Guruh Gipsy is basically a collaborative effort between
Guruh Soekarno Putra – the fifth child of
Indonesia’s
first President, Soekarno – and Gipsy. Guruh was born in Jakarta, 13
January 1953 and since his childhood her mother (Fatmawati) reckoned
that he had strong passion for art and strong sense of accomplishment.
Unlike his sister, Megawati, whom later became Indonesia’s President, he
pursued his dreams in art including music and choreography. He later
established his own dance and music group called “Swaramaharddika” which
was very famous in the 70s and 80s.
While Gipsy was basically a music group which its members are Nasution
brothers: Gaury, Keenan, Odink, and Deby. It was previously established
in 1966 under the name of Sabda Nada with members: Ponco Sutowo, Gaury
Nasution, Joe-Am, Eddy, Edit, Roland and Keenan Nasution. They were very
familiar with Balinese music and they ever did a gig at Bank Indonesia
combining western with Balinese music with gamelan group led by Wayan
Suparta Wijaya. In 1969 the band renamed themselves as Gipsy and the new
line-up was established: Onan, Chrisye, Gaury, Tammy, dan Atut Harahap.
They did cover for 70s groups like Procol Harum, King Crimson, ELP,
Genesis and Blood, Sweat & Tears. In 1971 the line-up changed again:
Keenan, Chrisye, Gaury, Rully Djohan, Aji Bandi, and Lulu. With this
line-up the band played a gig in New York, USA.
This collaborative effort called GURUH – GIPSY was made possible due to
Guruh strong passion for combining ethnic music of Bali based on
pentatonic notes and western music which is based on diatonic notes. The
effort took such a long time as it required sixteen (16) months of
recording time. The elapsed time was used by Guruh for various complex
activities, i.e. financing the project, scheduling with the only studio
available at that time with 16-track system (Tri Angkasa), composing the
music with Keenan Nasution (drums), Odink Nasution (guitar), Abadi
Soesman (keyboards), Roni Harahap (piano/organ), and
Chrisye (vocal). Actually, total studio days was 52 days.
The recording session was started in July 1975 and finished in November
1976. The long duration and difficulties faced during recording were due
to many personnel involved during the session. It was not just Gipsy
band members but it included violin players (Suryati Sumpilin, Suseno,
and Fauzan), cello players (Sudarmadi Bambang Purwadi), contra bass
(Amin Katamsi), flute (Suparlan), clarinet /hobo (Yudianto), and a group
of Bali musicians. In addition to these there were backing vocals:
Rugun and Bornok Hutauruk.
Music arrangement combining western music and Bali traditional gamelan
required tight precision as the two had different spectrum in terms of
notes and chords. For this purpose, Guruh spent a lot of time outside
the studio to learn the subtleties of western music as well as Bali
traditional music. He strived to find the best harmony that blended
symphonic progressive rock with Bali tradional gamelan music.
His efforts paid off because the result was a brilliant album that was
totally splendid!! It’s masterpiece of symphonic progressive rock album
with experimental music. - lastfm
if those reyog tapes i posted became a rock band, then this would be that glorious majesty.
