Lyrichord's latest two discs highlight Javanese gamelan music's diversity. On Puspa Warna, musicians from central Java perform some of the classic repertoire. This album is all about the singing, and very fine it is too, with male choral and female solo vocals soaring over a dense instrumental web, with zither and two-string fiddle particularly prominent. Indeed, on some tracks you barely notice the bronze percussion that's usually seen as gamelan's defining feature.

This is deep, immersive music. The mood can be trance-like, stately, skittish and sensuous, sometimes all at once. The disc's five tracks feature three pieces – two are duplicated, as if the alternate takes are being put before the album – with the first version of the title-track being the highlight. The piece that isn't duplicated, adhung Mlati’, is magical music – perhaps literally so, as it is said to come from the submarine court of the Goddess of the South Sea. But the balance on the recording seems off, so that the melody comes through but the rest of the gamelan is lost, and along with it the blissful disorientation that the piece produces live.

Volume 5 features gamelan from Cirebon in north Java. Some of this music is nearly extinct in its natural habitat, but an American scholar and player, Richard North, is keeping the tradition alive, directing groups from Seattle and Santa Barbara. Unlike on Puspa Warna, bronze metallophones and gongs are to the fore. The music is simpler and more spacious than central Javanese gamelan, and there's no singing. The risk is that things will get samey, but skilful programming, showcasing different forms, tunings and contexts, avoids this, with the gamelan conjuring up atmospheres ranging from a childlike prettiness to something that Ennio Morricone might have cooked up for a sinister music box.