Strange Brew presents
Will Guthrie's Ensemble Nist-Nah
+ special guests
Monday 17 November
7pm - 10:30pm

Ensemble Nist-Nah was formed in 2019 as a hybrid Gamelan / percussion ensemble, led by Nantes-based Australian drummer and percussionist Will Guthrie. The music of Ensemble Nist-Nah is informed, influenced and inspired by various traditional musics from Indonesia and gong based musics from South east Asia, however the music aims to distances itself from dry academic discourse or questionable exoticism. Rather, sonic and interactive issues are at the forefront, and the band since it’s inception, has aimed to produce music that is continually evolving, relevant, respectful and adapting to the current members and their current interests. Ensemble Nist-Nah develops out of Guthrie’s extensive work with pitched percussion and resonant metals over the years, using gongs, singing bowls and bells as melodic and harmonic material, alongside polyrhythmic / poly-metric rhythmic possibilities.

The music presented is grounded in Guthrie’s travels in Indonesia and appreciation of various forms of Gamelan music, from the stately suspended temporality of the courtly Javanese Gamelan Sekatan, to the delirious, thuggish repetition that accompanies the Javanese trance ritual Jathilan, to the shimmering acoustic glitch of contemporary Balinese composer Dewa Alit and his Gamelan Salukat. Though Guthrie is broadening his palette to explore Gamelan instrumentation and pay tribute to his love of this sophisticated yet elemental percussion music, the influences are rich and varied, taking into account Roscoe Mitchell’s percussion works, Henry Threadgill’s multi-directional improvisatory music, as well as cross cultural adventures from the likes of Trevor Watts, Michael Ranta and Mike Cooper.

Bringing together 8 musicians coming from eclectic and mixed backgrounds, Nist-Nah hosts a wealth of experience and expertise, and also regularly invites guests such as Jennifer Torrence, Sarah Hennies, Toma Gouband and Jessika Kenney. In 2024 the group enters into it’s second phase, bringing together younger Nantes based musicians, a new group and new music to go with it. In parallel to Nist-Nah’s artistic endeavours, various members of the group regularly organise workshops and teach Gamelan, using these incredible instruments and teaching possibilities, as a way to bring people together, old and young, beginner and advanced., and have taught in Universities, Prisons, Squats, Schools and community centres.

Their second album "Spilla" on Black Truffle Records presents 48 minutes of music for Gamelan, drum kits, wood and metal percussion instruments, and plucked strings that will surely count as one of the most electrifying records you hear this year. Founded by the Australian drummer/percussionist Will Guthrie in 2019, continuing the explorations begun in solo form on Nist-Nah (Black Truffle, 2020), the ensemble (eight or nine core members with occasional guests) has been consistently active in the half-decade since: composing, rehearsing, recording and touring Europe (with a mass of equipment in tow) to great acclaim. Spilla tracks the continuing evolution of the project since the recording of their first album, Elders (Black Truffle, 2022). The two sides of this record document two different iterations of the group, and the members’ compositional input has increased: each side contains one piece by a member other than Guthrie. It has become clearer than ever that Ensemble Nist-Nah is not an attempt at a European Gamelan ensemble but rather a hybrid percussion ensemble that uses instruments from a Javanese Gamelan alongside other percussion to perform original music informed by a variety of South East Asian music but also by everything from free jazz to contemporary hip-hop

Entry requirements: 14+, any under 18s accompanied by 21+ adult 1:1 ratio — Read more — Read less