MOJOLABAN LEGEND DRUM CRAFTSMAN

Mojolaban apparently still has treasures other than alcohol and beach cloths. I returned there a week later after stopping at the two centers. Armed with map images, the motorbike was driven from Jebres to Laban. Shortly after entering his village road, he saw a house with dozens of wood and a middle-aged man complete with an ax in his hand. Instinct tells me I've come to the right place.

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Dozens of pieces of wood are placed on the terrace of the house. The man looked serious cutting them off one by one. The weight of the ax and the thick wood made his sweat dripping even though the weather was a little cloudy. He kept going, until the wood was moved to the other side a few minutes later.

 

This is Maman, one of the drummers in Laban Village, Sukoharjo. His house became a place of work as well as a small gallery. It all started eight years ago, when the man who used to be a reog artist decided to engage in drum production. The steps start in a manual way, until now he has had a lathe to speed up work.

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I applaud his tenacity in processing the dozens of raw wood into drums, because it is a long process. The wood must be cut, turned, carved and leather finished. He said, sometimes it takes a whole day to make just one drum. Regarding the price, he sets the price for his drums from 450 thousand to 8 million rupiah, depending on the wood used, the complexity of the carving, and the size of the drum. He used to wear jackfruit, mahogany, and trembesi wood. The cow and buffalo skins are still the best for wasps.

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His persistence in studying drums was combined with his efforts to build social networks with the help of technology. With facebook and e-mail, his steps slowly paid off and his drums began to go global. This man with two children was specially invited to be a drum instructor and tuner in Malaysia, Japan and England.