Pasadena
Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district.
...
,
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
, April 23, 1953) is an Americancomposer, performer, writer, publisher, editor, and educator. She specializes in traditional and new music for Indonesian
gamelan
Gamelan () ( jv, ꦒꦩꦼꦭꦤ꧀, su, ᮌᮙᮨᮜᮔ᮪, ban, ᬕᬫᭂᬮᬦ᭄) is the traditional ensemble music of the Javanese, Sundanese, and Balinese peoples of Indonesia, made up predominantly of percussive instruments. T ...
and is active internationally as a scholar, performer, and publisher.
Biography
She received a B.A. from the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
in 1977, and an M.A. from
San Francisco State University
San Francisco State University (commonly referred to as San Francisco State, SF State and SFSU) is a public research university in San Francisco. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers 118 different ...
in 1979, pursuing interdisciplinary studies in music, anthropology, and education.
Diamond founded (in 1981) and directs the American Gamelan Institute and edits its journal, Balungan '. She is also a co-founder and co-director, with Larry Polansky, of Frog Peak Music (a composers' collective).
She received a Fulbright Senior Scholar Regional Research Fellowship to survey contemporary music in Indonesia (1988–89), as well as two
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
Fellowships for work on Indonesian composers (1991), and for work on the gamelan music of
Lou Harrison
Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer, music critic, music theorist, painter, and creator of unique musical instruments. Harrison initially wrote in a dissonant, ultramodernist style similar to his for ...
(2007).
She has created numerous works for gamelan, some based on songs from various traditions. Her works have been performed internationally. She is often a guest composer/performer with Gamelan Son of Lion, notably for their participation in the Yogyakarta Gamelan Festival in 1996. She performed her own work in 1997 with Sapto Raharjo and Ben Pasaribu, and wrote an article for the Leonardo Music Journal with an epilogue by Sutanto on th "Yogyakarta Gamelan Festival 1997." A CD of her compositions for Javanese gamelan, "In That Bright World" on New World Records, was recorded by musicians of ISI Surakarta in 2001.
Diamond was an Artist in Residence in the Music Department of
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
(2007–2017), using the instruments of Gamelan Si Betty, built by Lou Harrison and Wiliam Colvig, for collaborative projects and an open performance grou Gamelan SiBetty and the Viewpoint Composers' Gamelan At
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...
in Hanover NH, she was a Senior Lecturer in AMES (Asian and Middle Eastern Studies) and Indonesian Gamelan Ensemble Director, (1990– 2016) with Lipur Sih ("Comforting Your Loved Ones") a Javanese gadon built by Tentrem Sarwanto of Surakarta in Central Java, as well as the Balinese Gamelan Angklun Sleeping Fox She has also taught at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
,
Mills College
Mills College at Northeastern University is a private college in Oakland, California and part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it was ...
,
Goddard College
Goddard College is a progressive education private liberal arts low-residency college with three locations in the United States: Plainfield, Vermont; Port Townsend, Washington; and Seattle, Washington. The college offers undergraduate and gra ...
,
Bates College
Bates College () is a private liberal arts college in Lewiston, Maine. Anchored by the Historic Quad, the campus of Bates totals with a small urban campus which includes 33 Victorian Houses as some of the dormitories. It maintains of nature p ...
,
Franklin Pierce College
Franklin Pierce University is a private university in Rindge, New Hampshire. It was founded as Franklin Pierce College in 1962, combining a liberal arts foundation with coursework for professional preparation.
The school gained university statu ...
, and
Monash University
Monash University () is a public research university based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Named for prominent World War I general Sir John Monash, it was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the state. The university h ...
in Australia. In 2017, Diamond was an Affiliated Artist at MIT, where she collaborated with Evan Ziporyn on concerts for Lou Harrison's centennial year.
Diamond was the gamelan teacher and arranger for the American composer Lou Harrison from 1976 until his death in 2003. His largest Javanese-style gamelan, Gamelan Si Betty, was bequeathed to Diamond by Harrison and his partner William Colvig. She is also the owner of the Harrison/Colvig ensemble Old Granddad #4, the fourth set of instruments called the American Gamelan.
Selected works
*1981 ''In that Bright World'', voice, gamelan (based on Appalachian folk song)
*1982 ''Sabbath Bride'', gamelan, 1982 (based on Hebrew melody)
*1984 ''Hard Times'', chorus, violin, mandocello, gamelan (based on a Stephen Foster song)
*1990 ''Kenong'', for Javanese kenong and 5–10 players. This piece has also been adapted for other instruments, including ''Bonang'', and the ''Alto Bells'' (2018) of the Harrison/Colvig American gamelan Old Granddad#4.
Writings
Diamond, Jody
1998 "Out of Indonesia: Global Gamelan," ''Ethnomusicology'' Vol. 42, No. 1, Winter 1998, pp. 174–183. Reviews of a large number of recording by gamelan groups outside of Indonesia.
1992 "Interaction: New Music for Gamelan." Notes to accompany CD of same title, in ''Leonardo Music Journal'', V. 2.
1990 "There Is No They There." ''Musicworks'', no. 47, pp. 12–23.
1987 "'In the Beginning Was the Melody': the gamelan music of Lou Harrison." in ''A Lou Harrison Reader'', Santa Fe:Soundings Press, pp. 100–103.
1979 "Modes of Consciousness and the Learning Process: an Alternative Model for Music Education." M.A. Thesis, San Francisco State.
Recordings
*''In That Bright World: Music for Javanese Gamelan.'' Compositions by Diamond performed by the musicians of the Indonesian National Arts Institute in Surakarta, Central Java, calle ISI Solo Liner notes by Judith Becker can be downloaded a "In That Bright World" Produced by