ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of the history of Christian presence in Indonesia, including the first attempts at creating indigenous Christianity. It presents a brief account of European and Christian influence on local music genres, including the western Christian impact on gamelan music. The European or western influence in the realm of gamelan music is less apparent than in other kinds of music. Ease of recording also affected the Christian music scene; cassettes of Christian music began to be issued and distributed through Christian publishing houses. Christian missionaries demonstrated various attitudes toward indigenous customs and arts. Cayetanus Hardjasoebrata’s contribution to the development of indigenous Christian music in Indonesia was many songs that he wrote for the church in the idiom of central-Javanese gamelan. In Yogyakarta, the legacy of Hardjasoebrata was continued by J. B. Sukodi and M. Siswanto, who since the 1960s accompanied C. Hardjasoebrata in Yogyakarta.
