Suling
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Suling is an Indonesian flute made out of bamboo used in gamelan ensembles.
Depending on the regional genre, suling can be tuned into different scales. Suling can be found in the following regionals:
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Sundanese Suling
In Sundanese region, suling is used as:
- one of the main instruments in Kacapi Suling
- accompanying instrument in Gamelan Degung, Tembang Sunda
Suling Parts
Sundanese Suling is similar to that of Javanese.
- Suling's body is made of 'tamiang' bamboo, long tube bamboo which has a very thin surface.
- Sumber, is made of rattan/rotan, is circled around sulings head to produce air vibration.
Tuning
There are two types: with 4 or 6 holes. 6 holed Sundanese suling can play at least three different scales.
- Pelog Degung: da mi na ti la da [1 2 3 4 5 1],
nearly corresponds to do ti so fa mi do [1' 7 5 4 3 1] in westerns diatonic scale. - Madenda or Sorog: da mi na ti la da [1 2 3 4 5 1],
nearly similar to fa mi do ti la fa [4 3 1 7 6 4] in westerns diatonic scale. - Salendro: da mi na ti la da [1 2 3 4 5 1],
nnearly similar to re do la so fa re [2 1 6 5 4 2] in westerns diatonic scale.
One other scale, Mandalungan, is rarely used.
How to Play
There are two factors that affect a fine suling's tone:
- Fingering position.
- Airflow speed blown by the mouth.
Following picture shows the fingering for 6 holes suling.
Missing image
Fingering_suling.png
Image:Fingering_suling.png
And below is the example of 'more realistic' view of finger positioning for pelog degung scale.
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Fingering_suling.jpg
Image:Fingering_suling.jpg
Special Effects
- Slur
Slur is effect of changing from one tone position to one other position without stopping the airflow. For example changing from 5 to 4, 4 to 5, 2 to 1 etc.
- Puruluk
Puruluk is an effect produced by a-repeatedly-fast opening-and-closing of one or more fingers. It is similar to voice of a pigeon. The easiest puruluk can be produced by opening and closing mid-finger as shown by the following picture:
Missing image
Puruluk.png
Image:Puruluk.png
- Other known effects are: wiwiw, keleter, lelol, gebos, petit, jengkat, and betrik.
Famous sundanese suling players
- Endang Sukandar1, 1996 2nd Winner of International Festival of Wind Instruments in Seoul, South Korea
- Burhan Sukarma,
- Uking Sukri
1http://www.pikiran-rakyat.com/cetak/0504/16/khazanah/galeriseni01.htmru:сулинг