Freesound - Latent Sonorities Sample Pack by memeshift

What might the latent sonorities of ‘traditional’ instruments sound like if their tunings were unlocked for different modernities? Where might the diasporas of trans-Asian sonics intersect and rematriate?

Thanks to cooperation with Haus der Indonesichen Kulturen - Rumah Budaya Indonesia – Berlin (RBI) and Morphine Raum select instruments from RBI's Javanese gamelan ensemble were sampled to create Berlin’s first publicly accessible sonic archive of Indonesian instruments and temperaments for electronic musicians.

This dynamic sonic archive has already provoked and stimulated public discourse around the complexities and nuances of musical rematriation, trans-Asian identity, and its political expression through non-Western temperament and tonality.

Following the creation of the sample pack and tuning files, a short residency, open studio, and final performance series of new work using the materials was produced in collaboration with Morphine Raum.

An accompanying live album was recorded on September 15th and 16th, 2023 featuring new compositions and semi-improvised work from 8 trans-asian artists exploring southeast Asian tonalities using traditional instruments, digitized tunings, and the sampled recordings found in this pack.

The sample pack and tuning files - alongside the concert recordings, an Ableton Live Pack, Native Instruments Kontact Library, and a booklet of the project were also created and are freely accessible at https://www.latentsonorities.org

Latent Sonorities aims to create a blueprint for developing transcultural tools that rematriate musical knowledge. Through careful and transparent curation, collaboration, and documentation, the project builds a solid foundation for further collaborations with local and international artists, researchers, labels, and public institutions.

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HOW THIS PACK IS ORGANIZED
Within the sample pack, you will find 7 instruments, selected by Morgan Sully and Bilawa Ade Respati:

gong ageng
kethuk & kempyang (slendro)
saron (pelog)
slenthem (pelog)
slenthem (slendro)
bonang barung (slendro)
kempul gongs (pelog)

These instruments were chosen for their percussive, tonal qualities, resonance/dissonances and ‘timbral potential’ in computer/electronic music contexts.

All samples were meticulously recorded by Bilawa over the course of 5 days with Rabih Beaini at the Morphine Studio in Berlin, using multiple microphones positioned at different angles to capture 24bit, 48.0kHz stereo samples of each instrument.

To approximate the analog samples into digital contexts (velocity mapping for example), the samples are named as such:

[Index number of file]-[Instrument name]-[Laras]-[MalletType]-[Pitch name/number]-[Intensity of Strike]

Translates to:

01-Saron-Pélog-PekingMallet-1-Softest

JAVANESE GAMELAN TUNING

Analogous to the Javanese gamelan ensembles in practice, the sample pack comprises two common laras (tuning systems) - the five-tone sléndro and seven-tone pélog. Most gamelan instruments are tuned to definite pitches corresponding to these, so a complete gamelan (sometimes up to forty to sixty instruments) is actually a double set, made of both sléndro and pélog instruments, though they are never played simultaneously.

Within these two laras, individual gamelan ensembles are tuned to particular intervallic patterns relative to the other instruments in an ensemble, thus no two gamelan ensembles are the same - there is no standard tuning.

COOL TO KNOW

while slendro and pelog are different scales, the tumbuk of the two scales in RBI’s Javanese ensemble is 6. This means note 6 is a note that matches in both the pelog and slendro scales - it plays the role of the 'synchronizer' in frequencies and jangkah (intervals) between pitches, the coordinator of pitch in the tuning system.

If you go and listen to these files:

028 (saron pelog)
076 (kempyang)
099 (slenthem, pelog)
142 (slenthem, slendro)
181 (bonang barung, slendro)

You will find that they are all roughly the same pitch, ~235Hz/~A#

Bilawa’s note regarding note register and naming:

To my knowledge, the naming of the note and its register is something relative. The tradition only differentiate 3 registers: low, middle, and high, relative to one’s instrument. It does not have the standardization to a particular frequency value (e.g. A4 = 440Hz). So if in a Saron slendro exists a “1h” (note 1, high register), it might not have the same pitch height as a “1h” in a Peking slendro, which is tuned an octave higher. However, both fall to the same pitch chroma.

Here is an example, with increasing pitch of the 12-note bonang barung (slendro). Note that ‘4’ is omitted:

1L - 2L - 3L - 5L – 6L - 1 - 2 - 3- 5 - 6 - 1H - 2H

One of the slenthems in the pack - also in slendro - has this as it’s pitches:

6L - 1 - 2 - 3 - 5 - 6 - 1H

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Sample pack credits:

Performer: Bilawa Ade Respati
Recordist: Rabih Beaini
Recording Assistant: Marcel
Recording Consultation: Rashad Becker
Producer: Morgan Sully, Taïca Replansky and Jan Thedja

Interviews, Ableton Live Packs/Instruments, Native Instrument Kontakt Library and Scala tuning files can be found at: https://www.latentsonorities.org

If you would be interested in collaborating, please get in touch info at latent sonorities dot org.

Co-funded by Musikfonds e.V., Die Beauftragte der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien/The Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media and supported by the National Arts Council of Singapore.