During your stay in one of our villas, you might hear faintly the sweet voice of a trained Javanese traditional singer (pesinden)--accompanied by the gamelan music in Pendhapa Sasangka.

Nur Handayani, pesinden (singer)

On January 12, 1900, a Javanese noblewoman and a pioneer in the area of women's rights for native Indonesians, RA Kartini, inscribed a letter on how the sound of gamelan ‘brings’ her to places. Upon hearing the sound, she relayed her experience of astonishment towards the Dutch correspondent, followed with melancholy, and finally grasping moment where her soul “shivers and trembles within me with anguish and pain and sorrow” in the time she was writing the letter. 

Learning how gamelan has such a strong impact to the Indonesian heroine, a singer from Solo, Nur Handayani translates the letter into a musical composition called ‘Gamelan Bercerita’ during her routine rehearsals at AJAVI. On Saturday, July 20, 2019, the art piece was presented at Pendhapa Sasangka, where it was created.