Selected exhibitions, conferences and concerts in 2018
8 February
Making Connections
On Thursday 8 February 2018, Monash University hosted ‘Making Connections with the Music of Wonosobo in Java’s Dieng Plateau: Interdisciplinary Insights around the Bundengan, a Duck-herd’s Zither’, a one-day international Symposium, exhibition of rare Indonesian musical instruments, and concert of music and dance. The symposium explored the unique characteristics of the little-known culture of the Dieng Plateau in Central Java, Indonesia. The Exhibition ‘A Duck Herder’s Zither on Java’s Dieng Plateau and other Rare Indonesian Musical Instruments’, was launched by Mr Iwan Freddy Hari Susanto, Minister Counsellor from the Embassy of Indonesia in Canberra.
Bundengan as weather shelter dance
Bundengan as a musical instrument
6 July
Women's Contributions to Music
This Exhibition was presented by the Music Archive of Monash University (MAMU) and held in conjunction with the Gender Diversity Conference at the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music. It was launched on 6 July 2018 as part of the opening of the Conference and displayed items that reflect the title of the Exhibition: ‘Women's Contributions to Music in the Australian and Korean Contexts’.
A display case at the Exhibition
One of the images on display: Merry Melody Maidens, Adelaide, 1931
20 September
Chinese Music: Continuity from Antiquity to the Present
Thursday 20 September saw the launch of our Exhibition, ‘Chinese Musical Instruments and Artefacts: Musical Continuity from Antiquity to the Present’. The event was opened by Ms Zou Bin, Cultural Consul of the Consulate-General of the P.R China in Melbourne and featured a traditional performance by Xin Zhang. MAMU’s display represented the eight groups of Chinese instruments linked to cosmological thought, the seasons, the winds, the abundance of grain, human welfare, wealth and political power. They ranged from models of antique Chinese bell chimes and drums to the plucked silk-string lute (pipa) and the bamboo flutes (dizi) and mouth organs (sheng), as well as modern variants of the bowed string family including the traditional 2-string spike fiddle (erhu), and the modern high-pitched gaohu and low-pitched zonghu.
