A FOLKLORIC JOURNEY: MELODIES OF THE HOMELAND / Donald Law, Gabriel Lee & Zoi Yeh / Review

 

A FOLKLORIC JOURNEY: 

MELODIES OF THE HOMELAND 

Gabriel Lee (Violin) 

Zoi Yeh (Cello) & 

Donald Law (Piano) 

Esplanade Recital Studio 

Thursday (31 October 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 4 November 2024 with the title "Chamber concert an enjoyable study of musical nationalism".

The idea of home and homesickness in music mostly came about during the Romantic era, largely due to composers traveling away from their lands of birth and the rise of nationalism. This chamber concert was an enjoyable study of musical nationalism and how composers poured their hearts out when reminded of their origins. 

The evening opened with pianist Donald Law performing Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Dumka (Op.59) for solo piano. While he was considered too Western in style and taste by the “Mighty Handful” of Russian nationalist composers, Tchaikovsky nevertheless carved out a virtuoso showpiece from its brooding subject (Dumka comes from the Ukrainian word duma, which is a “lament”). 

Law coped well with its series of short variations and mastered its dizzying cadenza with aplomb, with its brusque concluding C minor chords echoed in the next work, Taiwanese composer Tyzen Hsiao’s Capriccio In Hakka Melody. Taiwanese cellist Zoi Tzu-Jou Yeh, who is Hakka herself, recalled hearing this tune being sung in market places during her youth. Like the earlier Tchaikovsky, its heart-rending melody, performed with much warmth and feeling, evoked genuine nostalgia. 

For solo cello was young London-based Singaporean composer Toh Yen Ee’s Ode To The Sun (2022), inspired by a painting (of the same title) and violin work (Kuang Xiang Qu) by Cultural Medallion recipient Kam Kee Yong. Its all-too-short depiction of sunrise, midday and sunset received a luminous reading from Yeh. 

Violinist Gabriel Lee accounted for two popular violin works, opening with the second piece from Bohemian composer Bedrich Smetana’s From The Homeland. Alternating between G minor and major keys, its Slavonic dance rhythms found sympathetic advocates in Lee and Law, who completed the concert’s first half with Hungarian composer Bela Bartok’s Romanian Folkdances. In the third dance (Pe Loc or On The Spot), Lee eschewed its stratospheric harmonics for an earthier sound more closely resembling Romanian gypsy fiddling. 

The concert’s major work was Smetana’s Piano Trio in G minor (Op.15), which occupied the whole second half. If one found the first half a tad polite and restrained, all three musicians went for broke in this passionate work which hit the evening’s highest points. Huge fortissimo chords on the piano were balanced by the cello’s rich expressiveness and violin’s virtuosic turns of phrase. 

The central movement delighted in syncopations and the quaint folksiness found in ethnic dances, while the finale’s rapid fire was guaranteed to send pulses racing. Smetana still had one big tune up his sleeve, which was first lovingly heard on cello, and finally milked for all its worth for a spectacular close. 

As an encore, the trio performed what could now be considered a Singaporean folksong - Dick Lee’s Home. Arranged in G major by Sulwyn Lok, any fuzzy and warm feelings engendered should not be considered embarrassing. It just means one is a dyed-in-the-wool local!

SSO NATIONAL DAY CONCERT / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

SSO NATIONAL DAY CONCERT

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Esplanade Concert Hall

Saturday (11 August 2018)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 14 August 2018 with the title "Something for everyone in concert of Singaporean music".

What is Singaporean music? That question was partially answered in a first-ever National Day Concert by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, led by Singaporean conductor Darrell Ang. In premiering new works and reliving popular tunes, there seemed to be something for everyone this evening. 

Cultural Medallion recipient Kelly Tang's two suites on popular local melodies began each half of the concert. The Symphonic Suite On A Set Of Local Tunes had Home, Chan Mali Chan, Bunga Sayang and Singapore Heartbeat as main themes, with Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Elmer Bernstein's Magnificent Seven as clever cameos. His Sketches Of Singapore did service to Stand Up For Singapore, Rasa Sayang, Where I Belong and Di Tanjong Katong in the flag-waving Americanised style of John Williams.

It was feel good all the way in the original works, beginning with Syafiqah 'Adha Sallehin's Bidasari, a short work based on the pan-Malayan legend of Syair Bidasari. An orchestration of the main theme from her 2016 choreographed work Ikan Girl, atmospheric piccolo and flute solos backed by lush orchestration suggested this to be the Prelude To The Afternoon Of The Fish.

The Malay and marine setting also dominated Wang Chen Wei The Sisters' Islands, based on another legend. This work sounded even more Indo-Malay with the use of the pelog scale, and had solos from a blown conch shell and ocarina as part of its storytelling. The Vienna-trained Wang's Wagnerian orchestration brought echoes of the Rhine to the Straits of Singapore. 

The longest work was Chen Zhangyi 17-minute-long Violin Concerto entitled Vanda, a tribute to the national flower (Vanda Miss Joachim) and our Garden City. The soloist was London-based Kam Ning who mastered its three movements with her usual easy-going aplomb. The first two botanically-inspired movements were slow, and the fast finale, titled A Renaissance, included a virtuosic jazz-inflected cadenza by Kam herself. Her encore relived the raucous sounds of Chinatown, a Paganinian movement from her father Kam Kee Yong's 1976 sonata Huai Ku.

Xinyao (1980s Singaporean mandarin pop) had a look in with Liang Wern Fook's This Is Singapore Medley orchestrated by Samuel Tan, Its big band arrangement that found an apotheosis in his best-known song Xi Shui Chang Liu. The legacy of Sing Singapore and NDP was revived in Phoon Yew Tien's arrangements of Zubir Said's Semoga Bahagia (May You Achieve Happiness, better known as The Children's Day Song) and S.Jesudassan's Tamil favourite Munnaeru Vaalibaa (Come Forward, Youths!), now joined by the 100-strong combined choirs of the Singapore Symphony group.

It would not be a National Day Concert without Dick Lee's ubiquitous Home, arranged by Tang, and the audience stood up for the national anthem Majulah Singapura by Zubir Said. One senses that this concert has merely scratched the surface of Singaporean music. It is imperative that there will be many more National Day Concerts by the SSO to come in the future. 

EVOLUTION / GABRIEL LEE Violin Recital / Review

EVOLUTION

GABRIEL LEE Violin Recital

Yong Siew Toh Conservatory 

Orchestral Hall

Saturday (31 March 2018)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 2 April 2018 with the title "Enjoyable ride through violin's history".

In his 75-minute recital, Singaporean violinist Gabriel Lee gave a treatise on the history of the violin, performing on both baroque and modern violins. The first half belonged to the baroque. Both Arcangelo Corelli and Johann Paul von Westhoff pre-dated the giants J.S.Bach and Handel, and their sonatas he played did not conform to the usual four-movement form.

A sense of spontaneity pervaded Corelli's E major Sonata (Op.5 No.11), well expressed in the alternating slow and fast movements. As with period performance practice, very little vibrato was used by Lee and partner cellist Leslie Tan, with Mervyn Lee accompanying on harpsichord. Befitting one of the era's great violin virtuosos, a fast Gavotte completed the work, as if tacked on like an showy encore.

Westhoff's Sonata No.2 in A minor, also in 5 movements, sounded surprisingly modern for its time. The opening was marked by pointillist fragments from both violin and cello, before coalescing into busy counterpoint in the 2^nd movement. The 3^rd movement titled “Imitatione del liuto” saw Lee putting aside his bow and strumming the strings as if it were a lute. A similar timbre produced on the harpsichord (with mechanically plucked strings) gave the impression of a serenade for duet.

What are these people looking at?

Answer: the insides of a harpsichord

The classical era of Mozart and Beethoven was skipped, arriving instead at the late Romanticism of Ernest Chausson's Poéme. Here Lee played on a modern violin, luxuriating in the full flourish of vibrato which audiences are more accustomed to. After an extended piano introduction which Mervyn Lee delivered with requisite gravitas, Gabriel's solo entry was one of breathtaking intensity, grabbing listeners by the lapels without letting go.

This rhapsodic work dwelled in the deepest recesses of feeling and emotion, where Lee plumbed with a passion and concentration that was hard to surpass. Although tempered by a Franckian chorale that provided some respite, the music soared to a rapturous climax before receding gently.

The 20^th century was represented by Penang-born Singaporean composer Kam Kee Yong, now residing in Canada. His short showpiece Cicada was described by Lee as Singapore's answer to Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumble Bee. Delighting in its buzzing motifs and swooping slides, its eccentric bursts of energy provided a lively close to the recital proper.

If one wondered what a recorder placed on a chair was doing, it was part of Lee's encore act. This saw him play few bars of the violin, toot on the recorder and do a spot of beat-boxing. All these were recorded and layered by electronic means, controlled by a foot pedal and within seconds, he operated a virtual one-man-band. Here was a re-creation of a baroque passacaglia, over which he further improvised on his violin with snatches of Grieg, Tartini and more.

  

This 21^st century “back to baroque” gesture drew the loudest cheers, and one suspects Bach and company would not have minded in the least.      

SSO Concert: Unsurpassed Beauty / Review

SURPASSING BEAUTY
Singapore Symphony Orchestra
Esplanade Concert Hall
Friday (12 November 2010)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 15 November 2010.

It was eleven years ago when the Toronto-domiciled Singaporean composer Kam Kee Yong wrote a scathing letter to The Straits Times decrying the lack of support the national orchestra gave to local composers and musicians. In particular, he felt that his compositions and violinist daughter Kam Ning were being ignored.

Through the National Arts Council’s Cultural Medallion Grant, that bridge has been mended. The SSO performed an entire half-concert, about 40 minutes, of his music. No other local composer has enjoyed that honour since the performance of the late Tsao Chieh’s Singapore Suite in 2000.

The concert conducted by Darrell Ang began with Kam’s The River. No specifics were divulged, but the work bustled with urgent vitality, surging waters being the life-giver of civilisations. His idiom was accessible, gratifyingly tonal, with a scope that approximated biblical proportions and sound recalling the lush scores of Respighi. This could well be Singapore music’s version of Smetana’s Die Moldau.

Briefer was Fantasia of Insects, a furious symphonic scherzo which had a Central Asian flavour mixed in impressionist colours. Kam Ning was soloist in four concertante works, the first being Kuang Xiang Qu (Chinese Rhapsody), a virtuoso showpiece in the slow-fast format that had roots in the rhapsodies of Liszt, Bartok and Ravel’s gypsy fantasy Tzigane.

The Kams & Darrell Ang enjoy the applause.

Tang dynasty poets were the inspiration of The Surpassing Beauty (after Du Fu), A Tranquil Night (Li Bai) and The Old General (Wang Wei). The first two were lyrical nocturnes, where the violinist’s ability to sustain long seamless lines were testament to poetic sensibilities.

The latter was a symphonic poem with violin obbligato, alternating reflective moments with martial strides. Kam’s music found most sympathetic interpreters in Kam Junior and the SSO, a welcome gift for Singapore’s musical prodigal son.

The Kams were busily signing autographs during the interval.

The theme of nature continued into the second half, where Debussy’s languid Prelude to the Afternoon of the Fawn gave way to the virile vigour of Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe Suite No.2. In both works, Jin Ta’s flute was the star standout, crafting erotic sinuous lines that gave the music irresistible sensuousness. Conducting from memory, Ang allowed the Debussy to breathe, and then whipped the Ravel to a frenzied climax and tumultuous close.

Playing its first concert following a triumphant European tour, the Singaporean audience had a taste of what the fuss and rave reviews were all about.