Gamelan for schools
Single workshops and 10-week courses available
Gamelan workshops
Gloucestershire Academy of Music can provide either one-off, single workshops for schools or a 10-week course of gamelan-inspired percussion.
Gamelan Workshops for schools take place at Barbican House, Gloucester. We can accommodate class sizes of up to 30 children. Workshops last 90 minutes and are delivered by a gamelan specialist tutor. We start our sessions with an introduction to the gamelan, a look at our huge world map to find Indonesia and a discussion about the importance of the gamelan in Indonesian culture. With large classes, we split the group into two. Half of the group have a practical session on the gamelan while the other half watch/listen/carry out gamelan related tasks and drawing of the amazing instruments. Then the groups swap over.
GAMELAN WORKSHOPS
One-off workshops cost £80. We are able to provide some discounts in particular circumstances - please contact Karin to discuss if needed.
We welcome visits from special schools and from secondary schools.
A gamelan workshop is particularly relevant to the KS3 music curriculum.
For several years, we have been delivering a very successful 10-week tuned percussion course that is inspired by the gamelan. The first session of the course takes place at Barbican House. Children visit the building for a 90-minute workshop led by one of our specialist tutors. This session introduces them to the instruments of the gamelan and the place of music in Indonesian culture.
For the following 8 weeks, the tutor visits your school to deliver a 1-hour session in the classroom. Using tuned percussion, the pupils explore the musical conventions of the gamelan, compose their own gamelan-inspired music and learn percussion skills. We use the school's own tuned percussion, but we can supplement this if needed.
The tenth and final week of the course is held back at Barbican House on the real gamelan instruments. Here, the children rehearse and perform the music they have created back in school. We encourage schools to invite parents to come along to Barbican House to listen to the performance or record the performance to share with the parents digitally.
This course costs £399. For more details please contact Karin using the link on the left.
