BEETHOVEN HEROIC YEARS / Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series / Review

BEETHOVEN HEROIC YEARS

Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (28 May 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 30 May 2017 with the title "Beethoven in an informal and intimate setting".

Singaporean violinist Tang Tee Khoon is a one-woman chamber music festival. The series of  concerts which bear her name has reached its 10^th edition, its curatorship distinguished by astute thematic programming and the involvement of classy international soloists.

This year's first programme was headlined by Beethoven, highlighting his later “Middle period” compositions marking a maturity definitively influenced by his deafness. There were two parts to the programme. The first was an hour-long “Sharing Recital”, where about 75 listeners crammed the stage of Victoria Concert Hall to hear Italian pianist Luca Buratto and Taiwan-born violist Huang Hsin-Yun speak and perform.

The Sharing Recital in progress, as
Tang Tee Khoon (extreme right) looks on.

The session was informal and intimate, opening with the fiery Appassionata Sonata from Buratto's capable hands. It closed with the viola version of the D major Cello Sonata (Op.102 No.2), which was relative brief and finished with a fugue. Huang's viola had a deep sonorous tone but sometimes got submerged by the piano.

Beethoven, Ligeti, and Beatles, why not?

In between, both musicians mused about 20^th century Hungarian composer Gyorgy Ligeti's free-spirited nature as a parallel to Beethoven's own trail-blazing streak. Huang played a movement of Ligeti's Viola Sonata, using natural rather than tempered scales for an earthy folk-inflected sound. Buratto delivered the complete Book 3 of Ligeti's finger-twisting Etudes with unnerving ease.

The Evening Concert showcased three great Beethoven works dating from 1810 to 1811, performed in order of publication. The String Quartet in F minor (Op.95), carrying the title “Serioso”, was an epitome of clarity and tautness. The parts of Kim Min-Young (1^st violin), Tang (2^nd violin), Huang (viola) and Adrian Brendel (cello) were clearly discerned whether in the unison, as in the arresting opening, or in the counterpoint of the slow movement's fugue.

Instrumental balance was excellent as was interplay, and this spirit prevailed in the urgent and moody Scherzo before relaxing in the Finale, where the fast-flowing narrative gave way to outright jollity in the comedic buffo-like coda, something which Mozart was also wont to do.

Tang was joined by Buratto in Beethoven's tenth and last Violin Sonata in G major (Op.96). Contrasted with the tension-laden string quartet, the sonata was more congenial with its four movements radiating mostly sunshine. The mood was maintained through Tang's lively interpretation and Buratto's crisply minted fingerwork, culminating in the finale's playful set of variations.

Duo became trio when Brendel joined in for the great “Archduke” Piano Trio in B flat major (Op.97), named after Beethoven's patron Archduke Rudolf of the Habsburg dynasty. This was a performance of nobility, the broad 1^st movement theme striding aristocratically with Brendel's generous cello tone being a key factor.

There were pizzicatos and smiles in the Scherzo, where lightness reigned before a hymn-like theme introduced by piano was subjected to sublime variations in the 3^rd movement. Within a bar's notice, the reverie turned into the Hungarian-flavoured finale, the infectious humour of which brought the evening's fare to a satisfying close. 

BEETHOVEN LAST YEARS / Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series / Review

BEETHOVEN LAST YEARS

Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series

Esplanade Recital Studio

Saturday (12 March 2016)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 14 March 2016  with the title "Unveiling Beethoven's secrets".

Other than the regular airing of his Choral Symphony, Ludwig van Beethoven's late works are hardly ever performed in Singapore. His visionary musical ideas and profundity of thought make these utterances demanding for both performers and audiences alike. But trust Singaporean violinist Tang Tee Khoon to bring together musical colleagues from around the world and devote two concerts for this just cause.

Despite steep ticket prices, a full-house was achieved on the second night, which opened with Beethoven two Cello Sonatas Op.102. These are comparatively compact works which encompassed a wealth of emotion within economical time spans, and British cellist Colin Carr and American pianist Thomas Sauer were in the same wavelength throughout.

From the opening solo in the C major Sonata, the singing voice of Carr's cello shone out like an illuminating source. Never forced or strained, his warmth of tone was a distinguishing feature, and together with Sauer's steadfast and never overpowering partnership, the music soared through Allegro Vivace sections of both movements like a sabre through butter.

After the abrupt and dramatic start to the D major Sonata, the Adagio slow movement breathed with the long, heavy air of an elegy, which like most good things passed all too soon. The busy finale was balanced on a knife-edge with its fugue of scalic runs from both instruments. Like in his late piano sonatas, Beethoven's penchant for counterpoint was a conscious salute to Bach, and it was with this glorious fugal flourish that the first half concluded. 

Tang, who plays on the National Arts Council's 1750 J.B.Guadagnini violin, appeared in the second half with Yuki Kasai (2^nd violin, Japan), Jessica Thompson (viola, USA) and Olivia Jeremias (cello, Germany) for Beethoven's String Quartet in E flat major Op. 127. Like his others works in the same key, the opening chord was robust and purposeful, and the chemistry between the four ladies in the stirring music became immediately palpable.

A fine balance was achieved between the foursome, and the quiet beginning of the sublime 2^nd movement was a case in point. Each individual voice came in clearly and without clamour for limelight; cello, followed by viola, 2^nd violin and 1^st violin in that order. In the ensuing variations, it was Tang's exquisite solos and leadership that lit the way. Yet hers was an intimately wielded authority, to which the group responded with seeming telepathy and utmost musicality.

The light-hearted scherzo jaunted with the sprightliest of pizzicatos, before giving way to an even more animated central section. The finale which began in an unhurried pace again exhibited all the qualities that make great chamber music-making, with all four listening intently, reacting and gelling as one. As the tempo quickened towards its final pages, the more acutely these factors came into being.

The secrets of late Beethoven were laid bare and lapped up by the most attentive and receptive of audiences. The Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series returns in 2 and 4 December with the works of the young Beethoven, which should not be missed on the strength of this latest showing,

   

Cellist Colin Carr suggests what he would
play for Beethoven should he be living today.

All the musicians returned
for a lively post-concert chat.

TRANSCENDING THE ORDINARY / Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series / Review

TRANSCENDING THE ORDINARY

Tang Tee Khoon, Violin et al

Esplanade Recital Studio

Thursday (28 May 2015)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 30 May 2015 with the title "Welcome a new string quartet of maidens".

When the National Arts Council's prized 1750 J.B.Guadagnini violin was loaned to young Singaporean violinist Tang Tee Khoon some six years ago, one of the conditions was that she performed it regularly here in concert. She has more than fulfilled that role of violin ambassador and now has her own line of recitals called the Tang Tee Khoon Grand Series, featuring guest musicians from around the world.

The first pair of concerts in this series was Transcending The Ordinary, focusing on the late chamber works of the Austrian composer Franz Schubert (1797-1828). The Viennese composer had lived in the looming shadow of Beethoven and was better known for his songs or lieder. Much of his later and more ambitious works where discovered and published after his premature death.

The works performed on the first evening date from 1824 to 1827, beginning with Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata in A minor, composed originally for the obsolete guitar-like instrument with frets called the arpeggione. Today's cellists claim it as their own, including the Briton Colin Carr who brought out all the singing qualities on his Goffriller cello. His tone was warm and sumptuous, seamlessly gliding between passages of absolute cantabile and blissful elation in its three movements.

Never producing a harsh tone too was pianist Sam Haywood whose support was close to perfection, and the stakes were upped in the Fantasy in C major for violin and piano. This is undoubtedly Schubert's most virtuosic work for these two instruments, from its hushed dreamy opening with pianissimo tremolos to soaring highs filled with octaves and running scales. Tang and her Guadagnini made their entrance, not so much as boldly but sensitively, fully aware of the music's innate poetry.

Playing for almost half an hour, the work traversed peaks and valleys, best exemplified in the central variations on the Schubert's lied Sei mir gegrusst (I Greet You) which had all the nuances one could hope for, before a reprise of the opening's reverie. The work closed on an exuberant high with the big strides of one of Schubert's most happy melodies.

For the second half, Tang was joined by violinist Yuki Kasai, violist Mariko Hara and cellist Olivia Jeremias, musicians all based in Germany, for Schubert's String Quartet in D minor, also known as “Death And The Maiden”. All the ladies are experienced chamber musicians, and one could tell by their immediacy in the way they launched into its dramatic first movement.       

A common sense of purpose united the foursome through the music's heightened tension, and this electricity never flagged in the work's 40 minutes. Even in the slow movement's variations on the chordal piano theme from the lied Der Tod Und Das Mädchen, the accompaniment provided for Kasai's pleading solos was sprightly and alert.

The brief and prickly Scherzo served as a prelude to the finale's furious tarantella rhythm. Here the unision playing in high tempos, far more tricky than it sounds, was delivered with stunning accuracy. There was to be no tiring as the quartet raced to a breathless finish, that was greeted by a near-capacity audience with loud acclaim. It was after the fact that this reviewer learnt that the four virtuosas were playing together in concert for the very first time.

A question remains: what should this very talented new string quartet be called? The name Tang Quartet has already been taken, so what about Schubert's Death And The Maidens?