American Gamelan

American gamelan is the body of instruments and music created in the United States in dialogue with the gamelan traditions of Java and Bali: American builders constructed their own metallophone orchestras from bronze, iron, aluminium and found materials, and American composers wrote new repertory for them rather than reproducing Indonesian practice. *Dennis Murphy* built the first American gamelan around 1960, *Barbara Benary* founded New York's *Gamelan Son of Lion* in 1976 as a composers' collective, and *Lou Harrison*, building instruments with *William Colvig*, made gamelan central to his work. The movement links ethnomusicology, instrument building and experimental composition.