CHAMBER MUSIC OF LEONG
YOON PIN
Lee Foundation Theatre
Thursday (16 October 2014 )
This review was published in The Straits Times on 18 October 2014 with the title "Composer's understated genius".
It
is said that a composer’s reputation suffers the most a few years posthumously,
after the eulogies have quietened down and memories dimmed. It is a credit to
the faculty, alumni and students of the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts that they
have not allowed the legacy of Leong Yoon Pin (1931-2011), Singapore ’s pioneering composer, to slip away.
His
extensive library of scores, writings and memorabilia had been donated to NAFA,
and this concert revived chamber music that had not been performed for decades.
It revealed an individual voice that reflected Leong’s Asian heritage, Western
formal training and eclectic influences. He was not a showy or flashy composer,
but an introverted personality who bared his soul in a profound mastery of
technique.
An
extended procession of soft piano chords opens the work before unleashing a
heaven-storming duel of piano and percussion that relives the Monkey God’s
battle with deities inspired by Chapter 5 from the Journey to the West. Pianists Shane Thio and Nicholas Loh with
percussionists Ng Sok Wah and Sng Yiang Shan coped with the score’s thorny yet
intricate passagework admirably for an invigorating performance.
Sketches for oboe and piano (1985) were performed
by the same artists who gave its world premiere, Joost Flach and Thio. The
three movements were based on scenes captured by the composer in New Zealand .
The Beach was a reflective
and serene pastorale, almost impressionist in colour, contrasted with the
violent and abrupt shifts of dynamics in Mineral
Spring, which depicted bubbling volcanic mud pools. The closing Goats on a Slope was a playful country
dance that further tested the technical prowess of the able duo.
A
more lyrical side of the composer was displayed in a selection of six songs
settings of local poetry from the 1960s and early 1980s, sung by soprano Cherie
Tse and mezzo-soprano Shireen Sanbhnani accompanied by pianist Loh. Awaiting had a dark, contemplative edge
which was well-captured by Tse, while Sanbhnani impressed with her command of
Chinese in the more light-hearted Marine
Parade and The Firefly.
The
best work was left for last, Interfusion
for piano quintet (1989), performed by pianist Thio, violinist Ng Wei Ping,
violist Lim Chun, cellist Li Jingli, bassist Wang Xu, and conducted by
Zechariah Goh Toh Chai. This is the same group of instruments used in
Schubert’s Trout Quintet, but Leong
was to express joy in a totally different way. In an unusual mix of atonalism
and minimalism, he was to find a genuine coherence and resonance.
In
its Adagio, each instrument was
assigned an individual refrain of its own. Heard in isolation, they would have
sounded fragmented, but put them together, here was literally the voice of a
symphony. The closing fugue and interwoven counterpoint provided an
indescribable high that could only be an expression of unbridled happiness. It
behoves this and the next generation of musicians to rediscover and share in
the quiet and understated genius that was Leong Yoon Pin.
Photographs by the kind permission of NAFA.
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