Sunday Synth Jam: Synthesist José Luis Amores shared this suite of 6 ambient tracks, inspired by Gamelan music from Java and Bali.

Here’s what he has to say about the compositions:

“This month I begun to read a book synced with a friend. Every week we read a new chapter and we commented and shared thoughts and recordings during the next week. It’s being a great experience. The book is Ocean of Sound by David Toop.

I was inspired by the first chapter that talked about gamelan music from the islands of Bali and Java and also the music from Brian Eno and his album Neroli, where he tried to recreate the scent of orange blossom and its relaxing and inspiring qualities. Music being able to adjust to several levels of auditive attention, being ignored and interesting at the same time.

I don’t have the knowledge nor the instruments to play gamelan music, but I was heavily influenced to try to make my own fragances, full of pentatonic scales, traditional percussion, ethnic instruments, kalimba, gongs and electronic modulation, random clouds and ethereal scripts.”

Tracks:

00:00? 1.-Modular + Felt Piano
03:54? 2.-Modular + Gongs
09:33? 3.-Modular synth
13:47? 4.-Modular + Piano
20:03? 5.-Modular synth
24:58? 6.-Modular + Kalimba + Monome Norns

Technical Details:

Upright Kawai piano was recorded in mono/stereo with Behringer ECM8000 omni mics. Valhalla VintageVerb was used for reverb. Monome Norns was running the Cheat Codes 2 script by Dan Derks, a wonderful sample playground I am still learning to play with.

Mastered with Logic X. Filmed with a Lumix TZ-80 and a Xiaomi Pocophone F1. Edited with Magix Vegas 16.