Rather, it’s both a reflection and a reinforcement of the social relations and mutual aid central to the agrarian societies of Java (and elsewhere in the archipelago.) In his article, “ From the Rice Harvest to “Bohemian Rhapsody”: Diachronic Modernity in Angklung Performance ,” the ever-brilliant ethnomusicologist Henry Spiller puts it beautifully: Many artists and researchers have argued that this interlocking, the inter-reliance between multiple individuals and their instruments, is not just a neat musical trick. The real magic, and the whole point of angklung, in my view, is what happens when multiple angklung (and multiple people) come together, melodies and rhythms arising out of the interlocking hocketing that is central to so much traditional Indonesian music. A lone angklung is a funny thing - a simple bamboo frame contains two, sometimes three, tuned tubes of bamboo all tuned an octave apart when shaken, the instrument essentially sounds out a single note. There’s a lot here that we can deconstruct (the co-opting of the instrument to symbolize the prestige of the state is a particular irony, as we’ll see), but what strikes me is the way a single instrument is cast alone, decontextualized and isolated from its ensemble. Take out a 1,000 rupiah coin and flip it over, and you’ll see a single angklung, embossed and floating in a void in front of the mirage-like facade of the Gedung Sate (literally “Satay Building”), the seat of the West Java government. Sound: Angklung buncis (often called simply buncis)

Style keyboard angklung