BOUNDARIES / YAO XIAO YUN Piano Recital / Review

BOUNDARIES

YAO XIAO YUN Piano Recital

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (16 July 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 18 July 2017

“No Boundaries” or “Beyond Boundaries” was probably what Shanghai-born Singaporean pianist Yao Xiao Yun had in mind for the title of her piano recital, which covered the classical, Romantic and 20^th century eras of musical history as well as Chinese music.

Smart or fancy titles are just means for marketing, but what matters most is the playing. The 2005 1st prize-winner of the National Piano & Violin Competition (Artist Piano Category) still has what it takes, and if anything else, has also matured during the intervening years.

An iron-clad technique was called for in Scriabin's Sonata-Fantasie No.2 which opened the concert. Perhaps she began a tad too deliberately, which made the first couple of minutes drag a little. However that was to contrast with a more passionate later section, in which she brought out a wealth of sonority. Amid the fine filigree, the melodic interest was never lost. In the tempestuous 2^nd movement, she went for the jugular and the result was close to spectacular.

Similarly in Beethoven's “Les Adieux” Sonata (Op.81a), she made it a point to emphasise the first three sets of notes, which was a heartfelt farewell to his patron Archduke Rudolf who had fled Vienna from Napoleon's invading army. By omitting the repeats, the opportunity to hold steadfast to this statement had been lost. 

This was made up by a slow movement, representing the patron's absence, which could not have sounded more pained or forlorn. A joyous finale, expressing the ecstasy of a long-awaited return, capped another fine performance.

Yao's 13-year-old student Lin Chuanyin was offered a few minutes under the spotlight, and she acquitted herself well with a scintillating reading of Wang Jianzhong's famous transcription of Liu Yang River, which simulates the guzheng in the sound of cascading falls and rippling water. Yao returned with Wang's equally famous Bai Niao Chao Feng (Hundred Birds Paying Respect To The Pheonix), a brilliant mimicry of myriad birdsongs.

This evening was marred by the most unruly audience ever to step into a concert hall here. Excessive coughing, dropping of objects, children fidgeting, inappropriate applause, eating, drinking and a brazen videotaping via cellphone were among the repertoire of indignities witnessed. In short, this is the kind of audience regularly encountered in mainland China.

Undeterred, Yao made the best of her Chopin selection, bringing true cantabile to the D flat major Nocturne (Op.27 No.2) and the Andante Spianato before letting rip in the ensuing Grande Polonaise Brilliante (Op.22) and E flat major Waltz (Op.42). To close was Debussy's L'Isle Joyeuse (The Joyous Island), a collaboration with the pianist's father artist-calligrapher Yao Hai Cheng whose 11-metre long scroll painting on the same subject (displayed in the foyer) being the visual component.

A detail and several vignettes from
Yao Hai Cheng's 11-metre long scroll painting,
with a visual and literary dimension added
to Debussy's L'Isle Joyeuse.
That's what they mean by "Beyond Boundaries".

Yao's performance of the Debussy showpiece was both attentive to detail and colourful. The obligatory encore was shared with Lin, as both pianists polished off Brahms' Fifth Hungarian Dance with no little panache.

TCHAIKOVSKY & ARENSKY PIANO TRIOS / Incursion Trio / Review

TCHAIKOVSKY & ARENSKY PIANO TRIOS

Incursion Trio

Esplanade Recital Studio

Tuesday (11 July 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 13 July 2017 with the title "Thrills from a trio".

Some chamber groups have been established as local leaders of the chamber music genres which they perform. Already well-known are T'ang Quartet (string quartet) and Take Five (piano quintet), and more recently EDQ (wind quintet) has made its name.

Now meet Incursion Trio, comprising the husband-and-wife pair of Siew Yi Li (violin) and Beatrice Lin (piano), and its newest member Lin Juan (cello). On this concert's strength, one will expect it to become a force to reckon with, that is if the threesome gets to performs regularly enough.

The coupling of piano trios by Romantic Russian composers Piotr Tchaikovsky and Anton Arensky is not uncommon on CD recordings. In concert, however, this is a mountain to overcome for the musicians. The pianist never stops for a moment to rest. On this count, Beatrice Lin was a pillar of strength. Besides being spot-on technically, she had both power and projection, fueled by seemingly limitless reserves.

Here the piano becomes de facto leader, and it was easy for the Steinway grand to have totally dominated her string partners. Thankfully this was not the case, as both Siew and Lin Juan were just as resolute, possessed big tones and threw in their lot without reserve.

The opening to Arensky's First Piano Trio in D minor was delivered with such vividness and clarity that it was hard to mistake its nostalgia and melancholy. The skittish Scherzo proved more of a struggle; its tricky rhythms dogged the players and not all the jokes came off as slickly as planned.  

This was forgotten in the elegiac slow movement, achingly beautiful as it unabashedly bared its brooding Russian soul. The finale was a show of passion, its surge of adrenaline only stemmed by a return of the 1^st movement's haunting theme. This sense of deja vu literally stops one's thoughts in its tracks, a highly effective plot device that was to be repeated in the Tchaikovsky.

Tchaikovsky's Piano Trio in A minor, which plays for over 45 minutes, is one of the monuments of the trio repertoire. Composed in memory of piano virtuoso friend Nikolai Rubinstein, who had previously rejected his First Piano Concerto, Tchaikovsky was to ironically craft a work longer and even more taxing for the pianist.

The trio more than coped with its longeurs, especially the repetitious 1^st movement which was delivered with seriousness, tinged with typically Tchaikovskyan sentimentality. Lin's opening cello plaint could not have been better rendered.

The 2^nd movement's inventive Theme & Variations, another long movement, was so imaginatively coloured that time just flew past. There were variations in a style of a music box, a waltz, an elegy within an elegy, a mazurka, and culminating in an ever-busy fugue. The breathless last variation served as a long finale, and the 1^st movement's theme returned, now as a plodding funeral march.

Surely performances of Rachmaninov's two piano trios cannot be far off from this excellent trio.

Two violinists: Siew Yi Li with his former teacher
Alexander Souptel, former Concertmaster
of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra.

Author's note: Interestingly, the first time I heard a live performance of Tchaikovsky's Piano Trio was in 1992 at the Scriabin House-Museum in Moscow. The violinist on that occasion was none other than Alexander Souptel, before he joined the SSO in 1993. What goes around comes around.

CD Review (The Straits Times, July 2017)

KAPUSTIN Works for Cello

CHRISTINE RAUH, Cello et al

SWR Music 19002 / *****

The jazz-influenced music of Ukrainian composer Nikolai Kapustin (born 1937) is no longer a stranger in concert halls, especially his highly virtuosic piano works.  His small output of cello works has finally received their due in the very capable hands of young German cellist Christine Rauh. 

The two major works in this collection are his Second Cello Concerto (Op.103) and Second Cello Sonata (Op.84). The Concerto, premiered by Rauh in 2014, leans more to film music rather than strict jazz, with an achingly beautiful slow movement that sounds like a tribute to classic Hollywood romances. She is accompanied by the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrucken Kaiserslautern conducted by Nicholas Collon.

The Sonata, as well as shorter pieces like Elegy (Op.96), Burlesque (Op.97) and Nearly Waltz (Op.98), are partnered by Benyamin Nuss on piano. These musings sound like jazz improvisations even if the parts were meticulously scored by the composer. The cello turns accompanist in Duett for alto sax and cello (Op.99) where an irrepressible saxophonist Peter Lehel holds court. 

Two of Kapustin's Piano Etudes (Op.40) have been transcribed for cello and vibraphone, with percussionist Ni Fan in support. As an encore, Rauh and Nuss' Hommage A Kapustin is a brief and touching tribute. Here are nearly 80 minutes of highly enjoyable listening.

PREMIERE / Asian Cultural Symphony Orchestra / Review

PREMIERE

Asian Cultural Symphony Orchestra

Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Concert Hall

Saturday (8 July 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 10 July 2017 with the title "Rousing blend of music".

The Asian Cultural Symphony Orchestra was inaugurated in 2016 to perform Asian symphonic works, with the mission of “celebrating them with equal regard as their Western counterparts”. Its third concert got off to an excellent start with young Singaporean composer Wang Chenwei's Confluence.

Implied in its title, the work cleverly fused themes based on Indian and Indonesian scales with Western compositional techniques. The flavour was unmistakeable Asian, down to raucous rhythms and slurring of melodies, before thematic material developed into a Bachian fugue. Originally composed for Chinese instruments, the World Premiere of its Western orchestration made for a rousing opener. 

Another World Premiere was Taiwanese composer Wang Yi-Lu's The Blue Planet: Earth, an erhu concerto featuring soloist Wong Qin Kai. Alternating between violence and serenity, the work pondered about the planet's origins and future, with the virtuosic erhu being its muse. Melodic interest included a theme reminiscent of Edelweiss (The Sound Of Music) while the often lively orchestral parts reminded this listener of works by Revueltas and Bernstein.

Xin Huguang's Gada Meiren (Ga Da Mei Lin) of 1956 is an established Chinese repertoire classic. The symphonic poem used a well-known Mongolian melody inspired by the eponymous warrior and national hero, first heard on solo oboe and developed into a full-blown rhapsody. Conducted by Dedric Wong, the music ambled from a pastoral opening into battle mode, the sort now often regarded as epic film music, before settling to an elegiac denouement. 

The young orchestra members coped well in the two-hour long concert, playing with much effervescent energy and in many occasions, no little refinement. Their Asian adventure continued with late Indian sitar master Ravi Shankar's 40-minute-long Symphony (realised by David Murphy), conducted by Adrian Chiang.

Composed in 2010 while in his nineties, the work was closer in spirit to the 1960-70s when he found worldwide fame in his association with the Beatles and Yehudi Menuhin. Each of its four movements is based on a raga, with the orchestra introducing the themes before brothers Krsna Tan (sitar) and Govin Tan (tabla) entering the fray.

Actual raga performances can last the best part of a morning or evening, but confined by the symphonic form, their scope for improvisation was limited to the score's dictates. Such is the “conflict” between Asian music and Western concert genres, stereotypes we often label as symphonies, concertos, suites and the like.

Nonetheless, this did little to curb the enjoyment of both soloists, with the finale (Banjara) culminating in Govin's extended tabla improvisation, Krsna's sitar spiel, an apparent duel and with the orchestra, an ecstatic romp to the finish.

Jeffrey Tan's exuberant Train To Euston, featuring the 6-man fusion band Flame Of The Forest (violin, sitar, tabla, percussion, keyboard, electric guitar and electric bass) served as an enjoyable encore. With cheers aplenty, the evening which started like a serious gig closed like a rock concert.    

GIL SHAHAM. BRAHMS SYMPHONIES / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

GIL SHAHAM. BRAHMS SYMPHONIES

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Esplanade Concert Hall

Friday (7 July 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 10 July 2017 with the title "A night of lovely fantasies".

The Singapore Symphony Orchestra's new season opened with the music of a Singaporean composer. Soir, Reves, Fantaisie (Evening, Dreams, Fantasy) is the slow central movement of Tan Chan Boon's Second Symphony. Beginning with a French horn solo from Marc-Antoine Robillard and accompanied by gentle pizzicato strings, it conjured vistas of a bucolic Alpine scene. This and a second theme from the strings formed the meat of the movement, which unfolded with a quiet majesty and aural lusciousness before closing in total tranquillity.

Composer Tan Chan Boon
with SSO Music Director Shui Lan.

Tan is a 21^st century composer with a 19^th century soul. Mining a rich vein ploughed by the Wagner-Bruckner-Richard Strauss axis, he has already completed five symphonies. On the form of this sensitive reading, surely the SSO and Music Director Lan Shui has it in them to explore more of Tan's rewarding music.

American violinist Gil Shaham, a regular visitor to these parts, was the commanding soloist in Prokofiev's First Violin Concerto. The enfant terrible of Russian music, Prokofiev was to painfully pique ears with his brand of lashing dissonance, one which Shaham delivered in shovels. Crafting a vitriolic tone that was wholly appropriate for the work's grotesqueries, this performance came into its own in the lacerating Scherzo.

Shaham's use of sul ponticello (bowing near the violin's bridge) to create a wiry metallic timbre made the hair stand, soothed only by the finale's fairy-tale soundscape which was beautifully rendered with a balance close to perfect. Like Tan's work before, there was a pleasing symmetry to its fantasy-filled dream-like ending.

As an encore with orchestra, the brief and barbed Scherzo was reprised to no less stunning effect. On his own, Shaham offered the Gavotte from J.S.Bach's Partita No.3, which elicited even more cheers from the audience.

The concert closed with the First Symphony of Johannes Brahms. Like Beethoven before him, there can simply be no exhaustion from listening to Brahms' symphonies. Conducting completely from memory, conductor Shui took a more measured approach compared with his more mercurial stance on Beethoven's symphonies.

The sombre opening, full of foreboding and portending tragedy, was taken at a broad tempo. But this was not one of indolence or lack of volition, but one that gradually built up to a crushing climactic high. Like a skilled storyteller, the clarity and final aim of narration was never in doubt. The atmosphere was more relaxed in the slow movement, where Concertmaster Igor Yuzefovich's lovely violin solo capped a fine showing near its close.

Woodwinds had their turn to shine in the light and spirited 3^rd movement, paving the way for the dark clouds ushered in by the finale. How sternness and brooding in a minor key is transformed into major key sunshine, culminating in the finale's Beethovenian hymn-like melody was the miracle of this masterpiece. The opportunity offered to the orchestra was joyfully reciprocated as Shui led his charges to a glorious end, which was greeted by the applause it richly deserved. 

Conductor Shui Lan and violinist Gil Shaham
at the post-concert Symphony Chat.

THE RED VIOLIN with KAM NING / re:Sound / Review

THE RED VIOLIN

WITH KAM NING

re:Sound

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (2 July 2017)

When it comes to string music, Singapore’s first professional chamber ensemble re:Sound are the people to go to. Its fourth concert, which featured only strings and led by London-based Singaporean ace violinist Kam Ning, showed exactly what the fuss was all about.

Benjamin Britten’s Simple Symphony, comprising four neo-baroque movements crafted from his childhood compositions, opened the evening. From its outset, one is struck by the tautness of ensemble and homogeneity of its sound. Whether in the faster outer movements (Boisterous Bourée and Frolicsome Finale) or the nimble Playful Pizzicato, there was this togetherness that impressed. However it was in the Sentimental Sarabande with its more sustained lines where the richness of sonority became even more apparent.

The ensemble played standing throughout with Kam Ning in the lead violinist’s role. She took centrestage in the titular The Red Violin Suite, an extended “chaconne” crafted from the Oscar-winning score of the movie The Red Violin by John Corigliano. Her solo part was frighteningly virtuosic, requiring a Paganinian technique to surmount its myriad variations. This she accomplished with much poise, maintaining a nervous edge throughout the 25-minute-long piece.

Behind her, the backing strings were no mere accompanists, but equal partners in the mostly darkly-coloured and brooding endeavour. The opening was chilling, with strings capable of sounding both ethereal and eerie at the same time. There was also a battery of percussion which provided the desired startling effect to break the silences or as the tension mounted. 

The highly effective music, which accompanied the story of a centuries-old violin (painted red with the blood of the luthier’s late wife) through its turbulent history, was given the immediacy and violence it needed. In that respect, a “live” performance such as this one readily scores higher than any recording.

The second half had far more cheerful music, in the form of Richard Tognetti’s arrangement of Edvard Grieg’s First String Quartet in G minor. Again, Kam’s livewire and ebullient personality translated into a performance of energy and vigour. Playing for almost 35 minutes, it is filled with much of the folk and dance music associated with Grieg’s Norway. If the bounding second theme in the 1^st movement sounded familiar, that is because it also appears in his better-known Piano Concerto.

A “quartet within a quartet” featured in the delightfully rustic central movements, with Kam joined by violinist Loh Jun Hong, violist Jonathan Lee and cellist Robert Choi. Their folksy and playful repartee added much colour and charm to the proceedings. The finale was a fast saltarello, an Italian dance not too dissimilar with a tarantella, taken at a devil-may-care speed. The right impulse was to surge ahead, yet there was never a doubt that Kam and her charges were fully in control.

The exhilarating finish was capped by a sublime encore, The Last Spring from Grieg’s Two Elegiac Melodies, played with tenderness and poignancy. re:Sound’s next concert on 18 October (with Melvyn Tan) will be keenly awaited.    

    

CD Review (The Straits Times, July 2017)

HOMAGES

BENJAMIN GROSVENOR, Piano

Decca 483 0255 / *****

There are two separate tributes in British wunderkind Benjamin Grosvenor's latest solo disc. The first is a homage to Johann Sebastian Bach's legacy, which opens with Busoni's famous transcription of the Chaconne in D minor (from Bach's Violin Partita No.2). It is a glorious performance which builds up arch-like through a series of climaxes while sensitive to many subtle nuances. 

This is followed by two of Mendelssohn's Prelude & Fugues (Op.35), Romantic updates of the contrapuntal writing celebrated in Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, and Cesar Franck's well-known neo-Bachian Prelude, Chorale and Fugue, which are no less impressively rendered.  

The second tribute features the musings of Romantic composers on the sunny climes of Italy. Chopin's Barcarolle finds Grosvenor in cantabile heaven in this Venetian gondolier's song. In Liszt's Venezia E Napoli (from Years Of Pilgrimage), the song-like thread continues for Gondoliera and Canzone, before erupting in free-wheeling coruscations for the vertiginous Tarantella. 

Liszt employs several popular Venetian and Neapolitan songs which are turned into a feast of pianism where Grosvenor obliges with obvious relish. Another highly pleasurable listen beckons. 

TEDD JOSELSON'S GOLDEN JUBILEE / Review

TEDD JOSELSON'S GOLDEN JUBILEE

with ROBERT CASTEELS, Conductor

Reuben Manasseh Meyer Concert Hall

Sunday (2 July 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 4 July 2017 with the title "Outstanding piano concertos".

The occasion was sold as the 50^th anniversary of American pianist Tedd Joselson's concert debut, but this concert was more like an offshoot of the annual piano concerto festival organised by young Singaporean pianist Leslie Theseira. Three piano concertos were performed by Joselson and two of his former students, almost constituting a concise history of the form. They were accompanied by the ADDO Chamber Orchestra conducted by Robert Casteels.

The baroque era was represented by J.S.Bach's Keyboard Concerto in A major (BWV.1055), created at the infancy of the genre. Originally conceived for harpsichord, Theseira crafted a gentle, mincing timbre, which sounded initially like part of the orchestra (strings only) but soon developed a voice of its own. Not yet a vehicle of virtuosity, the concerto sounded pretty, with simple ornamentation and general understatement as its highlights.

The World Premiere of Robert Casteels' Piano Concerto came next, impressively articulated by Nicholas Ho. Casteels explained this was based on a much earlier solo piece, orchestrated and completed within just three days. Its gestation was more like three decades, with the free use of atonality and angry dissonances more commonly encountered in the 1980s.

Playing for some 15 minutes, both piano and orchestra (strings and winds) probed and ruminated over a plethora of thematic ideas, with the ostensible aim of finding its home key of E flat major. Eventful, inventive and quasi-improvisatory, there were alternating moments of serenity and violence, several false dawns and vocalisations of that elusive E flat by orchestral members.

The end finally came with an emphatic and abrupt succession of E flat major chords, closing with the pianist plucking an E flat string in the innards of the piano. Beethoven's Emperor this is not, but a worthy addition to the small canon of Singaporean piano concertos.

Tedd Joselson, now a Singapore permanent resident, closed the concerto segment with Mozart's Piano Concerto No.23 in A major (K.488), a work he first performed as a teenager with the English Chamber Orchestra. Concerto performances by Joselson are a rarity these days, but this outing was a treat because he still possesses that wherewithal and authority to pull it off.

Confidence, fine control and sensitivity marked the first movement, culminating with Mozart's own cadenza. Although the orchestra sounded thin in parts, it supported the endeavour well. Joselson's solo sicilienne which opened the slow movement was a thing of beauty, and this continued dream-like through its entire course.

The exultant finale literally caught fire in Joselson's mercurial fingers, and the outcome was a thrilling adrenaline-filled affair. His was an unfaltering, no-holds-barred view, leaving one with no doubt of an undimmed prowess and artistry.

After the concertos, there was solo recitals by four of Joselson's students which continued into the early evening. There was a lot of music, but as posterity goes, it was Casteels' premiere and Joselson's Mozart that stood out.  

Leslie Theseira and Nicholas Ho presented a
"birthday" ditty in honour of their teacher Tedd Joselson.