JOHN WILLIAMS - ESSAY & FLUTE CONCERTO / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

 

JOHN WILLIAMS - 

ESSAY AND FLUTE CONCERTO 

Singapore Symphony Orchestra 

Victoria Concert Hall 

Friday (29 March 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 1 April 2024 with the title "SSO explores film composer John Williams' serious side".

People who attended this Singapore Symphony concert of John Williams’ music might have gotten a shock to find out that the composer of such iconic Hollywood scores as Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Harry Potter movies has a totally serious and academic side at odds with what they have been accustomed to.

The John Williams
most people are familiar with.

Williams’ Essay for Strings (1965) and Flute Concerto (1969), composed while he was busy scoring for forgettable B and C-grade movies, received belated Asian premieres, directed by young German conductor Gabriel Venzago. 

A much younger John Williams.

Essay, on first hearing, came across as the more approachable work, its dark hues and chromaticism stirring a sense of foreboding not unlike Bernard Herrmann’s famous music for Psycho (1960). There were many unison passages, brought out very evenly by the orchestra, adding to the starkness being conveyed. And when harmonies arose, these were highly dissonant, indication that Williams had learnt much from the aesthetics of the Second Viennese School and Bela Bartok. 

Heavy pizzicatos rained, and then came fast slithering figures, which the ensemble more than coped, bringing its eventful 11 minutes to an abrupt close. While not as memorable as Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, the disquieting music has the same ability to get under one’s skin. 

Photo: Aloysius Lim

The Flute Concerto was more forbidding in its idiom. Pointillist shards of sound shot around before SSO principal flautist Jin Ta opened accounts in his highly virtuosic part. His flute stood out above the strings, which punctuated with percussive pizzicatos, and there were many moments resembling the Japanese shakuhachi’s poignant voice. The concerto’s second half was accompanied by pitched percussion - marimba, vibraphone, piano – and any hint of lyricism was at a premium before tutti forces announced the concerto’s violent and troubled conclusion. 

As if to atone for the earlier discordance, Jin’s accompanied encore was his very tuneful and Chinese-influenced Wind Chimes, receiving its world premiere. Its cinematic quality suggests that Jin himself could be a very fine film composer. 

The concert’s second half was devoted to Beethoven Second Symphony in D major (Op.36), which received a taut and cogently thought-out account under Venzago’s baton. The emphatic opening unison note was delivered with devastating unity, which informed the rest of the work. The slow introduction, with tension building up for the Allegro proper, was handled so well that the eventual outcome was a joyous release. 

One could not blame the audience’s premature applause between movements given the orchestra’s conviction extending through all four movements. The slow movement was taken at a broad and leisurely pace which could have done with some tenderness, but the Scherzo and its contrasting Trio section was as lively as it could possibly be. 

With the exciting finale, Beethoven would soon shed his mentor Joseph Haydn’s mould with his next symphony, the mighty Eroica Symphony, to come. However, this performance which closed on an elated high, revealed a quality both composers shared: an unflappable sense of humour.

A CELEBRATION OF DREAMS: JOHN WILLIAMS. THE MUSIC MAKERS / Orchestra of the Music Makers / Review

Front cover of programme booklet

A CELEBRATION OF DREAMS

JOHN WILLIAMS. THE MUSIC MAKERS

Orchestra of the Music Makers

Esplanade Concert Hall

Saturday (12 August 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 14 August 2017 with the title "Music makers carry on dreaming their dreams".

“We are the music-makers / And we are the dreamers of dreams,” are the first and final two lines of Arthur O'Shaughnessy's Ode (1873), which became the inspiration of the Orchestra of the Music Makers (OMM). Founded nine years ago, the orchestra of youths and students led by conductor and university don Chan Tze Law have become the “movers and shakers” of Singapore's orchestral scene.

The phrase itself, which is synonymous with the cutting edge of progress and revolution, made its first appearance in that poem. It was thus appropriate that The Music Makers, its 1912 musical setting by Edward Elgar was given the Singapore premiere by OMM. Joined by 200 singers from the International Festival Chorus, Taipei Philharmonic Chorus and Ahmad Ibrahim Secondary School Chorus, it was another extravaganza that one has come to expect from this group.

The orchestral introduction, stormy and tumultuous but subtly built up, gave a clue to the maturity and prowess of the players which sustained the cantata's 40 minutes. The choir's entry was also excellent, their words enunciated with intent and purpose. Multiple quotes from earlier works including Enigma Variations and both symphonies formed a salute to creators and artists, essentially dreamers, and their sacrifices.

  

The qualities that make Elgar's music memorable, lyrical themes filled with nobilmente (nobility and grandeur), pomp and pageantry, and spine-tingling climaxes, were vividly brought out. The contribution of Australian mezzo-soprano Fiona Campbell in “They had no vision amazing / Of the goodly house they are raising” provided that extra dimension of poignancy. Although it closed with a quiet and sublime equanimity, there was a strong sense that the players and singers were affirming their credo to “carry on dreaming”.

The concert's second half was devoted to the music of American film composer John Williams, who turned 85 this year. The choir was not done yet, shouting out the Olympic Games motto “Citius, Altius, Fortius” (Faster, Higher, Stronger) in Call of the Champions, the anthem of the 2002 Winter Games. Williams' emotionally charged and life-affirming brand of scoring continued into excerpts from the movies Hook and Close Encounters of The Third Kind.

The latter opened with a morass of atonalism before unravelling into its familiar 5-note motto theme, which musically corresponds to the word “hello”. The subject of interstellar travel dominated with seven movements from the Star Wars movie franchise. The ominous Imperial March was contrasted with the gentle Annakin's Theme, which included a motif from which the former was derived.

The choir was called again for the gripping Duel Of The Fates, and it was a eventful musical journey which closed cannily with the Elgarian strains of Throne Room & End Title. The tender encore of Luke & Leia showcased an excellent French horn solo, while Elgar had the last word in his indefatigable Pomp & Circumstance March No.1 (Land of Hope and Glory), with orchestra and choir in full blast.

Back cover of programme

Performance of Elgar's The Music Makers by OMM at the Taipei International Choral Festival on 30 July 2017, which was also the Taiwanese premiere of the work:

CD Reviews (The Straits Times, February 2016)

THE TIME TRAVELLER AND HIS MUSE

JAMES BRAWN, Piano

MSR Classics 1502 (2 CDs) / ****1/2

The British pianist James Brawn takes a break from his Beethoven sonata odyssey to bring this recital, a chronological survey of piano music from the Baroque era to the 20^th century. It is filled with short pieces which students typically play in graded examinations and piano competitions. 

For concert pianists, these form the bulk of post-recital encores (and there are some Horowitz favourites among them), after-dinner mints which satisfy and delight. He starts with a pair of Scarlatti Sonatas and a handful of Bach Preludes without the fugues, before proceeding to popular classical era fare, including Mozart's Turkish Rondo and Beethoven's Für Elise.

The Romantic era figures prominently, and the best tracks are the selections from Chopin Études and Rachmaninov Préludes, which are very polished and capture the spirit of the times. The modern age is represented by only two tracks, Prokofiev's coruscating Toccata, and I Got Rhythm from The Gershwin Songbook. 

Brawn plays sensitively and with exemplary taste, and there is nothing dislike in any of the performances. He is beautifully recorded, and one wishes all young would-be-pianists could follow his example and play like this.  

JOHN WILLIAMS CONDUCTS

MUSIC FROM STAR WARS

Boston Pops Orchestra

Decca 478 9244 (2CDs) / ****1/2

This reissue of 1980s recordings by the Boston Pops Orchestra under iconic film composer-conductor John Williams was prompted by the release of Disney's Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens. It amply displays the debt that sci-fi movie music owed to classical music, particular works from the early 20^th century. 

The first disc is devoted wholly to music by Williams, including favourite tracks from Episodes 4 to 6: Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and The Return Of The Jedi, and further music from Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and E.T. Where would such music be without Wagner, Richard Strauss, Mahler, Holst, Prokofiev and Korngold, whose compositional styles were appropriated and re-imagined by Williams? 

The second disc begins with the opening of Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra, which will always be associated with Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. The familiar strains from Alien, Battlestar Galactica, The Twilight Zone and Star Trek, both the television (Alexander Courage) and film (Jerry Goldsmith) themes have also been included. 

The main events are the seven movements of The Planets by Englishman Gustav Holst, surely the grandfather of all sci-fi and astrological music. The performances by the summertime occupation of the Boston Symphony are excellent, which might hopefully spur celluloid fans to pay closer attention to what riches the classics can offer.