SYMPHONIC
GIFTS
Esplanade
Concert Hall
Friday (24 July 2015 )
This review was published in The Straits Times on 27 July 2015 with the title "Youth orchestras make history and music together".
This will go down in history as a first
ever collaboration between the Singapore National Youth Orchestra (SNYO) and
the Singapore Youth Chinese Orchestra (SYCO), both National Projects of
Excellent now under the umbrella of the Ministry of Culture, Community and
Youth. Its respective conductors Leonard Tan and Quek Ling Kiong (below) took turns to
lead and play chatty and convivial hosts for the concert.
Western instruments conducted by Tan
opened with Leong Yoon Pin's Dayong
Sampan Overture, not merely an arrangement of the popular Malay song but a
symphonic fantasy. Amid the obligatory dissonances and busy counterpoint
emerged that catchy tune on solo oboe, accompanied by violin glissandi. The
SNYO gave an assured account of what must be Singapore
SYCO then followed, conductor-less, to
perform works of two popular genres: Jiangnan
Shizhu and Chuida, representing a
culture of strings with winds, and winds with percussion respectively. Happy Times was a showpiece of huqin prowess that progressed from slow
to very fast. Li Min Xiong's A
Well-Matched Fight featured a raucous duel between solo drummer Lim Rei
centrestage (above) and seven of her percussionist partners against the entire band,
with both groups coming out first among equals.
Guest violinist Siow Lee Chin was the
glamourous soloist in Kam Kee Yong's Kuang
Xiang Qu (Chinese Rhapsody) for
symphony orchestra, performing its fiendish free-wheeling part with the
swashbuckling verve as if it were Ravel's Tzigane.
The orchestration was not particularly Chinese, veering more towards the music
for biblical epics by Bloch and Rozsa, and the end result brought out the
cheers.
All ears were pricked for the second
half's music, specially orchestrated for both ensembles combined. At this
point, it could be said this was an exercise symbolic of solidarity between
instrumentalists across the cultural divide rather than something truly
practicable. But only time will tell.
Eric Watson's Tapestries – Time Dances now resembled a concerto grosso, with a
core group of three Chinese instruments (ruan,
dizi and guzheng) and four Western
instruments (violin, cello, French horn and harp) backed by the
over-hundred-strong mega-orchestra. One outcome was that Chinese instruments
stood out in the solo parts because of their penetrating timbres, while
violins, violas and cellos overwhelmed the huqins
when massed strings sang. At parts, Watson's creation began to sound like those
of his compatriot, Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Wang Chenwei's The Sisters' Islands took on a distinctly Nanyang slant, with its
use of Indo-Malay melodies, and the symphonic poem had a particularly effective
spell depicting an attack by pirates of the Singapore Straits. One only wonders
which orchestra does a blown conch shell belong to. Both pieces were led by
conductor Quek.
The concert ended with Jeremiah Li's arrangement
of Kelly Tang's Symphonic Suite On A Set
Of Local Tunes, helmed by conductor Tan. This medley mixed the Malay song Chan Mali Chan with Dick Lee's Home and Bunga Sayang and NDP favourite Singapore
Heartbeat, with a Hollywood-like vibe. Home was accounted by solo erhu accompanied by yangqin, which lent a tender touch, and Tang's trademark in-joke
was to throw in the fanfare from The
Magnificent Seven, not once but twice.
As an encore, the audience was given
permission to whip out their handphones and wave their built-in torches (above) to the
strains of Home. After which they
gamely rode off into the sunset.
 |
| Guest violinist Siow Lee Chin with Guest-of-Honour Sim Ann, conductors Quek Ling Kiong & Leonard Tan, with board members of the SSO & SCO. |
Addendum
I am grateful to Professor Lim Seh Chun for offering this most interesting piece of history:
The SYO and SYCO has collaborated before, but way back in 1971. The two orchestras performed in several joint concerts in Singapore and in Lausanne, Switzerland at the International Festival of Youth Orchestras. The concerts were led by the legendary Goh Soon Tioe and two younger conductors Goh Say Meng and Lee Suat Lin.
Members of the SYO then included Prof Lim himself, conductor Lim Soon Lee, violinist Tan Peng Tow (who was the soloist in Mozart's Violin Concerto No.5), her brother Tan Peng Chin and neurologist Prof Benjamin Ong.
The SYCO reads like a Who's Who of Chinese orchestra music today, including the composer Phoon Yew Tien, conductors Lum Yan Sin, Yeo Siew Wee and Lee Hoon Piek, recording-meister Goh Aik Yew, high fidelity reviewer Tham Chaik Kong and SCO veteran Sim Boon Yew.
No comments:
Post a Comment