tonebase in Indonesia! (ft. Sabrina Vlaskalic)
Our good friend and tonebase artist Sabrina Vlaskalic recently visited Indonesia to do charity work for underprivileged children and the local guitar community. Her trip ended up turning into a tour across the country, and an opportunity to share tonebase with talented Indonesian guitarists. Hear all about her trip below!
Days 1–10: Yogyakarta
Valerio International Guitar Festival is the biggest festival in the country — it was perfectly organized and provided us a great opportunity to meet many guitar youngsters from all over the country. Some of them drove up to 17 hours to get to Valerio Festival. RESPECT!
Epic concert time at Valerio International Guitar Festival. Jorrit played solo, we played duo, then I played solo, then I played with Indonesian Sewing String Quartet (violist was so passionate he broke a string!) and at the end, with Asep Hidayat on cello.
We had a blast in Borobudur (Buddhist temple) and Prambanan (Hindu temple), both on the UNESCO World Heritage list. We managed to find evidence of the first guitar civilizations in Borobudur, dating from the 8th century AD. YAS!!!
What do 4 guitarists do in Yogyakarta when left unattended? Rent a jeep and climb Mount Merapi — Indonesia’s most active volcano. Jogja Guitar Society representatives Yohan and Robi are quite an adventurous crew!
Food: it appears that exotic tastes have significant influence on nails. We are still uncertain if it was fermented duck eggs, stinky durian fruit or the incredibly spicy sambal that makes them grow faster. As we continue our examination, we kindly request all good-hearted guitarists to send us some nail papers! ;) Please, 2500 3Ms only! ❤
Public transportation is kinda not being used over here. We’ve never seen more cars and scooters on the street and as two “eco-friendly Dutchies,” we found pollution and endless traffic jams quite difficult to handle. Yohan though, had a very optimistic T-shirt to combat the long times we spent in the car! :-)
Pius is a guitar maker (Valerio Guitars) and he shared incredible story with us. He told us that one day two young Indonesian guitarists that got a scholarship to study in Europe came to visit him at his home... and basically didn’t want to leave.
They stayed there the entire day, speaking about guitars, and he eventually realized that they needed guitars to go to study in Europe but did not have the money to buy professional guitars!! He decided to generously gift two guitars to them, the last two ones he had in his workshop.
He told us that young guitarists were beyond belief happy and that he sold seven more guitars after this event. Generous Pius was rewarded by karma, so cool!
On one of the last days in “Jogja” (nickname for Yogjakarta), we met Birul, one of the two kids who received guitars from Pius.
Birul studied with amazing Aniello Desiderio and he’s now teaching at Jogja University!!
He still plays Pius’ Valerio guitar and lives in a village in the jungle with his wife Fitri. She cooks the most amazing food ever and really knows well how to guide inexperienced Europeans through the jungle!
Days 11–20: Jakarta
Sekolah Gitar Jakarta, the amazing organizing combo of David & Iwan, presented us with a bag of goodies from diverse Indonesian Islands upon arrival. We loved the cookies from Sumatra and Lombok and traditional sesame and durian dodol candy! We’re saving the coffee bag for when back home though! 🤫
For the next two days we judged a school competition in Sekolah Gitar Jakarta and did many masterclasses. Amazing guitar kids!
Doing charity projects with Suzuki Association Indonesia was deeply touching. We performed in two primary schools for children in a very poor district of Jakarta and the kids were thrilled to hear us play popular classics and Indonesian children songs. Btw, Indonesian children songs have super groovy rhythms!
The next day, Jorrit fell incredibly sick and I did an evening concert by myself… my first time performing in a skyscraper though! 🙃
Day 21: Karawang
Our day in Karawang was one of the most touching experiences of the entire Indonesian trip.
We were warm-heartedly welcomed by the people of Street Music School (Taman Musik Karawang) and we received a super jumbo krupuk as a welcome gift. That was so so so epic!
Then we had a performance on the street, together with street musicians! It was a truly fulfilling experience, we loved it and everyone there loved it, too.
We’ve been given awesome sketches of us playing as gifts and I burst into tears after being presented with them… One can do so little and yet it can mean so much!
We are incredibly thankful to good people of Karawang for this amazing experience and meaningful memory.
Days 22–24: Bandung
After spending a week in very air polluted Jakarta and Jorrit falling very sick, we were the happiest people ever to reach the mountain city of Bandung and immediately go for a tour of a botanical garden.
NATURE, people, it’s so IMPORTANT!!!
We performed a concert at the French Institute of Indonesia and did masterclasses in a local guitar store, which was all quite an awesome experience.
Jorrit ate his first “white” burger in Indonesia… followed by a second one immediately after. He also stole food from my plate, but that was instantly forgiven cause it looked like the Dutchman was feeling a little bit better and I could even see a smile on his face — a good way to end our trip!
Love, peace and A-M-I scales from Indonesia!
— Sabrina
