Nafas Urban

Using gamelan music as their "weapon," Nafas Urban tries to accomplish their goal to showcase the gamelan instruments as the main melody for their repertoire by integrating gamelan with other kinds of music worldwide. It consists of eight youngsters from the Music Education Department at Yogyakarta State University who experiment with instruments such as saron, demung, and bonang as the main instruments of gamelan. They combine them with modern instruments, such as acoustic guitar, double bass, some woodwind instruments, and percussion. The music produced by this ethnic group, formed in March 2012, is quite simple and easy to listen to, although gamelan music naturally has high complexity in its composition, as it is a product of high civilization in the past. The amazing thing about gamelan is its flexibility to combine with other instruments, even Western instruments. The decision not to use vocals and to tend to be instrumental music is to support their mission, "Let The Gamelan Sing.