DREAMS OF HOMELAND / Singapore Chinese Orchestra / Review

DREAMS OF HOMELAND

Singapore Chinese Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (21 May 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 23 May 2017 with the title "Melodic dreams of home".

Many orchestral concerts are sold on the strength of guest soloists presented, but seldom has one concert been so dominated by a single figure such as this. Suzhou native Zhang Wei Liang, one of the world's great dizi masters, performed almost every minute of this two-hour long concert.

He was obviously taking a well-needed breather when the concert conducted by Yeh Tsung began with Zhao Ji Ping's Homeland Nostalgia, a movement from the orchestral suite Silk Road Melody. The impressionistic piece with Debussyan echoes dwelled on several Cantonese melodies before quietly alluding to the well-known tune Colourful Clouds Chasing The Moon. 

Then the marathon began, with Zhang performing his own Tears Of Flowers. Based on Suzhou pingtan, an intimate form of chamber music, Zhang crafted a deep and throaty timbre from the dadizi (a low-pitched flute), rich in vibrato and full of atmosphere. The rhapsodic work ambled from a slow and ruminative beginning before blazing to a spectacular fast close.

  

This form also dictated Zhou Song Ting and Cao Xing's The Spring Orchid, where Zhang's qudi held sway as a Kun Opera melody was subjected to phantasmagorical flight of fancy. While the instrument simulated nuances and inflexions of the human voice, it basked in an extended cadenza which was reminiscent of the dizzying flight of a humming bird. The technique of circular breathing ensured that streams of notes piled on in a relentless manner, and the audience could be excused for feeling breathless on his behalf.

The World Premiere of Cui Quan's Southern Wind was another excellent study in breath control, its indolent strains filled with trills and tremolos which Zhang handled with striking aplomb. This very pleasant work had a contemporary feel and is a welcome addition to the expanding dizi repertoire.

The most modern-sounding work was Chen Qigang's San Xiao (Three Laughs) which featured just four players: Zhang on shakuhachi and dizi, with Yu Jia (pipa), Xu Hui (guzheng) and Huang Gui Fang (sanxian). Each instrument had extremely difficult parts, their individual spiels being abstract rather than literal expressions on the subject on humour. The incessant pace abated with a folk-like dizi melody which had a serene and calming effect on the proceedings.

The evening's final work was Zhang's double dizi concerto entitled Dreams Of Homeland. Its four movements were a evocation of nostalgia, reflecting on childhood and youth in Jiangnan (the region south of the Yangtze). Zhang was partnered by his former student Zeng Zhi, now a SCO member, and the duo was nigh inseparable.

Interplay between both players was excellent, from the gentler and congenial opening movement, hurdling the obstacles of the rhythmic and scherzo-like Joy Of Homeland, right down to the vigourous dance of the quickfire finale Journey To Homeland. Very loud cheers yielded two encores: the lively Xiao Fang Liu (Little Cowboy) accompanied by orchestra, and the solo Liang Xiao (Beautiful Evening), which made for the perfect conclusion.  

VIRTUOSOS OF CHINESE MUSIC / Ding Yi Music Company / Review

VIRTUOSOS OF CHINESE MUSIC

Ding Yi Music Company

Esplanade Concert Hall

Sunday (24 April 2016)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 26 April 2016 with the title "Shining showmanship by Chinese soloists".

Every year in its first concert of the season, Ding Yi Music Company invites as guest soloists luminaries from the world of Chinese instrumental music. These names may not be familiar to the casual listener or outsider, but erhu virtuoso Xue Ke, guzheng exponent Zhou Wang and dizi master Zhang Wei Liang are household names for serious Chinese instrumentalists.

In this 140-minute long concert, the trio from mainland China performed a selection of chamber and concertante works with members of Singapore's premier Chinese chamber ensemble. Xue's fiery crimson gown matched the intensity of Liu Wen Jin's Fire Maiden in a Colourful Dress for two erhus, a moto perpetuo in duet with Ding Yi's Chin Yen Choong. There was no let up in its frenetic pace, but Chin ably kept up with Xue by doubling the melody, harmonising in close intervals and providing rhythmic support.

Xue's appearance in Guan Ming's Ballad of Lan Hua Hua, a rhapsodic single-movement concerto, gave voice to the extreme expressions of an erhu. From anguished plaints to the courageous sacrifice of the eponymous heroine (who resisted and fled a loveless marriage to a rich old codger), the emotive playing elicited premature applause from an excitable audience in a short pause leading to its cadenza.    

Zhou was joined by Yin Qun and Yvonne Tay in Zhou Yan Jia's Love of Qing Bei, arranged for three guzhengs. Playing completely from memory, nary a note or beat was dropped in this showpiece that gradually accelerated to a brilliant conclusion with sweeping glissandi.

Zhou's concertante pieces included the traditional Song Of Desolation from Shaanxi, a poetic portrayal of profound sadness, markedly contrasted with Huang Zhen Yu and Zhou Wang's Western Theme Capriccio, a vigorous dance that used Central Asian themes and motifs from Jiangxi, China's Far West. Her command of the strummed and plucked instrument was absolute, vividly supported by the ensemble conducted by Quek Ling Kiong.

Zhang played on a combination of dizis and xiao. The latter is a vertically-blown flute with a lower register, and its mellow timbre was well-suited for the serene melody of Song dynasty classic Plum Blossoms In The Snow, accompanied by erhu, pipa, ruan, guzheng and percussion in Zhang's  arrangement.

The dizi's rusticity was ideal in the Hebei operatic number Little Shepherd, which had mellifluous exchanges between a shepherd and his love interest. In Zhang's own Tears for Fallen Flowers, composed in memory of his beloved late father, a Suzhou pingtan melody straddled between light-hearted reminiscences and poignancy.

All three soloists gave short interviews, which included encouraging budding players in the audience to discover and embrace their artistic souls. They were united for the final work, Gu Guan Ren's arrangement of the popular Flavours Of Jiangnan, which culminated with virtuosic flourishes for each part. Closing on a spirited high, this concert ushers yet another ambitious season ahead for the intrepid and industrious Ding Yi Music Company. 

   

Photographs by courtesy of Ding Yi Music Company.