Come January, Harvey Mudd College Gamelan founder and music Professor Bill Alves may be headed for the 56th Annual Grammy Awards. His piece, \u201cConcerto for Violin and Gamelan\u201d has been nominated for \u201cBest Contemporary Classical Composition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m not breaking out the tux yet, but I\u2019m happy to be on the list,\u201d said Alves, chair of the Department of Humanities, Social Sciences and the Arts. \u201cI\u2019m also excited that the Harvey Mudd American Gamelan and its talented student members are getting recognition, too.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Formed by Alves in 2000, the Harvey Mudd American Gamelan is an ensemble that uses traditional Javanese instruments to play Western music. Instruments include those found in a traditional Indonesian orchestra, or gamelan, such as gongs and metallophones, which are similar to the xylophone and are struck with a mallet. The gamelan performs regularly at MicroFest, a concert series devoted to non-standard tunings and held in venues throughout Southern California.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MicroFest Records submitted Alves\u2019 composition to the Grammy committee shortly after the April 25, 2013 release of his album Mystic Canyon<\/i>. The album and its nominated piece feature violinist Susan Jensen and the Harvey Mudd American Gamelan, which includes Alves, Sun Hwi Bang \u201914, John Choi \u201912, Anne Clark \u201913, Mark Ellis \u201912, Andrew Ho \u201912, John Robinson \u201911, Julie Simon SCR \u201976 , political science and environmental policy Professor Paul Steinberg, Carling Sugarman \u201914, Jonathan Williams \u201914 and math Professor Darryl Yong \u201996.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s all very beautiful stuff, and well-recorded so that the richness of Susan\u2019s tone and the various resonating percussion instruments generate some very intense and varied tone colors throughout the spectrum of human hearing,\u201d wrote musician and music blogger Andrew Meronek in his Sept. 24, 2013\u00a0review of\u00a0Mystic Canyon<\/i><\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alves joined the Harvey Mudd faculty in 1995. A composer, writer and video artist, he has written extensively for conventional acoustic instruments, non-Western instruments\u2014especially Indonesian gamelan\u2014and electronic media, often integrating his compositions with abstract video animations. His audio works include Mystic Canyon<\/i>, The Terrain of Possibilities<\/i> and Imbal-Imbalan<\/i>. His book Music of the Peoples of the World<\/i> was published by Cengage\/Schirmer in 2006, and his video collection, Celestial Dance<\/i>, has been released by Kinetica Video Library.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cConcerto for Violin and Gamelan\u201d now resides on the Grammy committee\u2019s long list for the classical composition category. National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences members will review and vote on the list, paring it down to the four to five nominees \u201cshort list\u201d that viewers see on television. The winner will be announced at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards, January 26, 2014 in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n