Thanks to the awesome playing of Fabian Fabro, I've been learning more about different Filipino musical traditions. One Filipino instrument, kulintang, bears a strong resemblance to (and probably common ancestry with) the Sundanese and Javanese tradition of Gong Renteng, a music form that flourishes both in Cirebon, West Java and Santa Barbara, California. Having recently played a lot of Gong Renteng music locally in Gamelan Sinar Surya, I thought it would be neat to incorporate Fabian's kulintang playing with some Sundanese instruments that I play, the suling and kecrek. I also included some guitar parts to add a drone effect under the playing and to give a nod to tarling klasik, a guitar tradition in Java. It's my hope that the instruments here will help evoke a similar feeling to that which originally inspired Hiroki Kikuta, Balinese gamelan gong kebyar and kecak.

Appears on Heart of the Forest (Music from “Secret of Mana”)