Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Epitaph (2025)
Sandikala Ensemble
Epitaph is a continuation of an investigation into a compositional method in which the tempo progressively decelerates. This method is inspired by the concept of rhythm in Javanese gamelan, where as the tempo of a gending slows down, the spacing between the balungan (core melody) tones widens, while instruments like the gendèr, gambang, and peking become increasingly dense: there is a paradoxical sense of time.
In Javanese gamelan, this process is often likened to the image of a blossoming flower: a gending begins like a closed bud, and as the rhythmic level rises, as the ornamental density increases, the flower blooms. However, I am not interested in a blooming flower—I am interested in a flower that withers and rots. This is why, in my works including Epitaph, the tempo continuously slows down.
The rotten flower is a symbol of critique. I have no desire to align myself with the glorification of tradition—to hell with the sublime. Rather than glorification, this work pays attention to the wounds of history that risk being forgotten. In the middle section of the piece, there is an electronic sound intervention resembling a broken radio: it is a collage of the voices of Wiji Thukul, Mahmoud Darwish (the Palestinian poet), and Frantz Fanon (the anti-colonial thinker and revolutionary from Martinique). Wiji Thukul sings his poem Apa Guna, Mahmoud Darwish reads a poem about his longing for the land of Palestine, and Frantz Fanon speaks on anti-racism and national liberation. But these voices appear unclearly, like traumatic memories arriving beyond our will.
These fragments are sandwiched between quotations from the traditional gending Lalermengeng, a piece often associated with death. Its presence, too, resembles trauma: a history that returns without control. The reference to Lalermengeng also reframes the three voices mentioned earlier; the broken-radio-like sound is also reminiscent of a swarm of flies, hovering around a rotting memory of the past.
At the end of the piece, there is an intervention in the form of noise. This moment is the only one in the work that uses noise, creating a stark contrast. Poetically, noise plays the role of a Ratu Adil—a messianic figure who halts the unstoppable flow of history toward apocalypse. In an irrational world, the hope for redemption is the only rational thing. But redemption can never clearly articulate itself—thus noise arrives. Noise is the future that refuses clear articulation. --Dion Nataraja
Art by Fleur Tesseraud
Epitaph (2025)
Sandikala Ensemble
Epitaph is a continuation of an investigation into a compositional method in which the tempo progressively decelerates. This method is inspired by the concept of rhythm in Javanese gamelan, where as the tempo of a gending slows down, the spacing between the balungan (core melody) tones widens, while instruments like the gendèr, gambang, and peking become increasingly dense: there is a paradoxical sense of time.
In Javanese gamelan, this process is often likened to the image of a blossoming flower: a gending begins like a closed bud, and as the rhythmic level rises, as the ornamental density increases, the flower blooms. However, I am not interested in a blooming flower—I am interested in a flower that withers and rots. This is why, in my works including Epitaph, the tempo continuously slows down.
The rotten flower is a symbol of critique. I have no desire to align myself with the glorification of tradition—to hell with the sublime. Rather than glorification, this work pays attention to the wounds of history that risk being forgotten. In the middle section of the piece, there is an electronic sound intervention resembling a broken radio: it is a collage of the voices of Wiji Thukul, Mahmoud Darwish (the Palestinian poet), and Frantz Fanon (the anti-colonial thinker and revolutionary from Martinique). Wiji Thukul sings his poem Apa Guna, Mahmoud Darwish reads a poem about his longing for the land of Palestine, and Frantz Fanon speaks on anti-racism and national liberation. But these voices appear unclearly, like traumatic memories arriving beyond our will.
These fragments are sandwiched between quotations from the traditional gending Lalermengeng, a piece often associated with death. Its presence, too, resembles trauma: a history that returns without control. The reference to Lalermengeng also reframes the three voices mentioned earlier; the broken-radio-like sound is also reminiscent of a swarm of flies, hovering around a rotting memory of the past.
At the end of the piece, there is an intervention in the form of noise. This moment is the only one in the work that uses noise, creating a stark contrast. Poetically, noise plays the role of a Ratu Adil—a messianic figure who halts the unstoppable flow of history toward apocalypse. In an irrational world, the hope for redemption is the only rational thing. But redemption can never clearly articulate itself—thus noise arrives. Noise is the future that refuses clear articulation. --Dion Nataraja
Art by Fleur Tesseraud
