The problem with throwing parties is getting people to leave. This was the dilemma I faced nearly a decade and a half ago when I was living on the two hundred block of Cherry Street in Oregon Hill. The party I had been throwing had gone on for hours and at 3 in morning, I was ready for everybody to leave. Problem was the 25 or so people still in attendance didn’t. They were still having a grand old time. I had to figure out a way to bring those good times to an end.

And I figured the best way to accomplish that would be through music.

I couldn’t put on metal because that would have only fueled the drunken chaos. The old room clearing standby, “Subhuman” by Throbbing Gristle was also out of the question because I knew more than half of the lingering heard loved the kings of industrial noise as much as I did. What would have worked like a charm would have been to throw on some Grateful Dead, but, seeing as I didn’t have any, it wasn’t an option. As I scanned my collection, I looked for that special musical something that would bring the party to a grinding halt. It was then that I came across, “Music From The Outskirts Of Jakarta: Gambang Kromong”. Oh yes, I thought to myself, this little baby was certain to do the trick.

Within seconds of putting it on, people started whining. And once the whining starts, the party is over. Mission accomplished.

I love that record. It is completely divorced from Western notions of rhythm and melody. Even after listening to it numerous times, I couldn’t for the life of me figure out its internal logic. It seemed to live in a world outside my realm of comprehension. I guess that is why I listened to it so much. I couldn’t figure it out.

Gambang Kromong is the Chinese- originated Indonesian music born in the suburbs of Jakarta. It is one of Indonesia’s most vivid and, to the uninitiated, most bizarre musical styles whose name is derived from the instruments that define it; the gambang (xylophone) and the kromong (gong) played together with various flutes, percussions and rebab (violin). On top of this, the distinctive interchange between male and female voices gives the music its idiosyncratic resonance. The CD is broken up into two different sets. The first set consists of a body of old pieces that blend Chinese and Indonesian musical elements; and the second features the popular modern repertoire, which sounds like gamelan music crossed with small-group jazz of the 1920s and 1930s. There is simply no other music on earth quite like it.

I bring this up because on Sunday August 31, you can not only hear but can actively participate in a free, open Gamelan workshop from 3 to 5pm at the University of Richmond that will be held in room BB117, in the basement of Booker Music Hall. The workshop will be led by members of the local Gamelan Raga Kusuma (whose members range in age from 6 to 60) and Dr. Andrew McGraw, ethnomusicologist and Assistant Professor at UR. This enormous orchestra (that meets every Thursday from 7 to 9PM at UR if you are interested in joining the group) is made up of gongs, cymbals, flutes, fiddles, drums and xylophones that the average Westerner rarely hears let alone gets to play in a traditional setting. For more information, contact Andrew McGraw at 804-287-1807 or e-mail him at .

This is one party I most certainly am not going to miss.