Southbank Gamelan Players, Ensemble in Residence at Southbank Centre, was founded by Alec Roth in 1987. Most of the musicians have undertaken extensive study in Java and a number are tutors for the Royal Festival Hall Gamelan Programme. Working closely with dancers, puppeteers and composers from Indonesia, Europe and the USA, the group has established an international reputation both for its performances of traditional Javanese music and for its championing of new music for gamelan.

In 2007 Southbank Gamelan Players started a three-year collaboration with composer and Guest Artistic Director Dr Rahayu Supanggah, Associate Artist at Southbank.

Some notable performances:

• Javanese music and dance - regular collaborations with dancers, choreographers, composers and musicians from Central Java, including: BBC Prom concert with artists from STSI (Academy of Indonesian Performing Arts) Surakarta (1998); Performance in the Settembre Musica Festival, Turin with Yogyakarta-based dance company Wahyuning Kuswala (2001); British tour with Wahyuning Kuswala (2002); performance at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (2004) and Ramayana dance-drama trilogy with the Sunarno Dance Company (2003-05) in UK (Queen Elizabeth Hall, Manchester, Aldeburgh Festival) and Italy.



• Wayang kulit (shadow-puppet plays) - accompanying many renowned master-puppeteers with performances in both Javanese and English including at WOMAD - a contemporary Javanese Wayang Kulit with CIPA (Contemporary Indonesian Performing Artists, 1997)



• Contemporary dance - collaborations with contemporary choreographers and dancers including Mark Morris Dance Group, Edinburgh Festival (1996); Wayne McGregor, Encoder (part of Shobana Jeyasingh's Away Game1997); Kenneth Tharp, Songs and Dances from the Tempest with music by Alec Roth (1998 & 2001); Filip van Hufel, Triggered installation with composer Duncan Chapman (2001).



• New music for gamelan - performances of contemporary gamelan music written or arranged by composers from the UK, Europe and America: Premiere of the music-theatre work The Knight with the Lion commissioned by SbGP from composer Adrian Lee and librettist Matthew Sweeney with the help of the Arts Council of England (1995); MTV Unplugged with Bjo rk - an arrangement of the song One Day, for gamelan, tuba and tabla (1996); ISCM World Music Days, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester including the first performance of Salvatore Sciarrino's Waiting for the Wind, specially commissioned by SbGP (1998); French tour of new compositions for gamelan by  Jean-Yves Bosseur and Symon Clarke (2002); collaboration and performances with the BBC Symphony Orchestra of Geoffrey Poole's Swans Reflecting Elephants for gamelan and orchestra (2004).  Their most recent collaboration with Plaid was premiered at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in April 2009.