INTIMATE INTRICACIES
Ding Yi Music Company
Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre
Saturday (10 June 2023), 3.30pm
FOR OUR DREAMS:
WANG CHENWEI’S
COMPOSITIONAL SHOWCASE
Singapore Chinese Orchestra
Saturday (10 June 2023), 7.30pm
This review was published in The Straits Times on 15 June 2023 with the title "Ding Yi and Singapore Chinese Orchestra highlight homegrown composers in two concerts".
Two concerts featured three young Singaporean composers within the short space of a single day. It appears that Chinese instrumental ensembles are doing the heavy lifting when it comes to promoting local compositional talent.
The first concert conducted by Quek Ling Kiong was a project commissioned by Ding Yi Music Company, part of its “Disappearing...” series of programmes documenting the plight of Chinese cultural heritage at risk of being lost forever. In an hour-long film scripted by Jesvin Yeo and directed by Eric Wong, the subjects of giant joss stick making and Teochew embroidery were sensitively handled in the orchestral scores Scent Of Reminiscence by Liong Kit Yeng and Iridescent Threads by Ding Yi composer-in-residence Jon Lin Chua respectively.
The preludes, Liong’s Handicrafts and Chua’s Heartcrafts, were easily relatable and created the right mood for recounting poignant personal stories of third generation artisans Albert Tay and Jeffrey Eng. In the case of Tay’s family business (Tay Guan Heng), this narrative has come too late as secularism, anti-pollution laws and family bereavement have contrived to make his giant joss sticks craft obsolete. A rebirth is however represented by the incense recycled as incense-infused pottery by artist Oh Chai Hoo.
More fortunate were Eng’s embroidery endeavours, the comforting clatter of his trusty Singer sewing machine being skilfully dovetailed into Chua’s music with Yvonne Tay’s guzheng providing a mirror-like counterpoint. Moments like this and the optimistic end-credits titled Friendship provide hope that when people choose to remember, not all is lost.
The second concert, led by conductor emeritus Yeh Tsung, featured four local premieres by Singapore Chinese Orchestra composer-in-residence Wang Chenwei. The mind boggled at how these very accessible works have never previously been heard here. For Our Dreams (2021) made for a rousing opener with a big central melody that resembled a cross between Scottish folksong O Waly, Waly and some National Day Parade crowd pleaser.
Wang is credited to have composed music’s first-ever virtuoso concerto for the diyin sheng, possibly the mouth organ with the world’s largest pipes. Taoyuan Wonderland (2020) featured soloist Lim Kiong Pin, who produced a deep bellowing sonority capable of an astonishing degree of agility. Its four short movements depicted picturesque scenes in Taiwan, with a recurring melody redolent of I Saw Mummy Kissing Santa Claus.
Postcards From Macao (2019) was a prime example of how to effectively write a musical travelogue. Its movements A-Ma Temple, Mount Fortress and Senado Square incorporated both Chinese idioms and Portuguese influences from the territory’s colonial history. The Portuguese term saudade, connoting nostalgic sadness and yearning, was eloquently expressed in a musical language common to both Eastern and Western viewpoints.
The evening’s most impressive work was Wang’s Concerto for Chinese Percussion (2019), also titled Bronze Age Of Shang, with Benjamin Boo clearly relishing his virtuoso solo role. The three bronze objects referred to – a battle axe, wine vessel and ritual cauldron – represented the forging of a definitive Chinese identity in its first dynasty, circa 2000 BC. Boo’s mastery of a sprawling array of drums, cymbals, bells, gongs and bamboo clappers, a daunting feat of multi-tasking, brought out the longest and loudest plaudits.
As the complete opposite of unfamiliarity, the upbeat encore Dauntless is likely - thanks to school competitions - the most-played Chinese orchestral work in the land. And for good reason too, as Wang’s craft of fashioning tunes and rhythms is totally infectious.
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