MUSICAL VOYAGE II
Singapore National Youth
Chinese Orchestra
Singapore Conference Hall
Saturday (22 March 2025)
WHERE WORLDS CONVERGE:
A NIGHT AT THE CROSSROADS
National University of Singapore
Symphony Orchestra
Conservatory Concert Hall
Sunday (23 March 2025)
This review was published in The Straits Times on 25 March 2025 with the review "Young orchestras SNYCO and NUSSO prove mettle in weekend concerts".
Just a fortnight after the Singapore National Youth Orchestra’s sterling performance under Singapore Symphony music director Hans Graf comes another weekend with two youth orchestras making their mark on the music scene.
The Singapore National Youth Chinese Orchestra (SNYCO) led by Lien Boon Hua mastered a demanding programme which included works by three young Singaporean composers. First was the world premiere of Chok Kerong’s Bird’s-Eye View. Better known as a jazz pianist and arranger, Chok’s single-movement symphonic poem displayed range by resourceful use of tonal colours and unusual harmonies. Depicting the buoyancy of flight, the music soared with unfettered wings.
Quite different yet engaging was Sulwyn Lok’s With a Little Bit of Love and Imagination, with excerpts that possessed the easy accessibility of pop-inspired movie music. In Phang Kok Jun’s Storytellers on Ann Siang Road, a musical duel ensued between erhus played by brothers Zeng Canran and Zeng Haoran, accompanied by just six players. By reflecting and merging disparate cultures of Chinese and Malay music, this was Nanyang music at its most intimate.
This was contrasted by the well-established Nanyang classic that is Law Wai Lun’s Prince Sang Nila Utama and Singa. This saga on the founding of early Singapore was a musical voyage skillfully using gamelan scales to be found in Indonesian music.
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| Photo: Singapore Chinese Orchestra |
There were two works inspired by the culture and scenery of Tibet. Wen Zhanli’s The Encounter and the Forgotten Valley, a single-movement tone poem, relived the pomp of Tibet’s religious processions and relished in exuberant dances, closing with an impressive suona solo and implausibly long-held final note.
Kuan Nai-chung’s four-movement symphony A Trip to Lhasa was the perfect picture-postcard travelogue, distinguished by playing of sensitivity and relentless vigour. There can be no more vivid music than its final two movements, depicting the blood-curdling ritual of a Celestial Burial and a raucous dance for Vanquishing Demons.
Part of the National University of Singapore Arts Festival, the NUS Symphony Orchestra (NUSSO) led by Thai conductor Pamornpan Komolpamorn, resident conductor of the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra, showcased its prowess and potential in two contrasted works.
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| Photo: Asher Tan |
The first was the world premiere of Singapore Symphony Orchestra principal flautist Jin Ta’s Life of a Rice. This pleasing 15-minute tone poem for solo flute and orchestra with projected animations depicted the journey of a rice grain from padi field to dinner table through a series of variations. The pentatonic melodies reflected its Chinese inspiration while extended cadenzas stamped Jin’s virtuoso credentials.
Which young orchestra does not aspire to playing a symphony by Gustav Mahler? NUSSO’s first ever performance of the Austrian composer’s First Symphony was a dream come true, a reading that lacked nothing in guts and determination.
Although it had a shaky opening in the depiction of dawn with brass yet to fully warm up, the orchestra soon gained confidence and composure, and never looked back. There was much vigour in the second movement’s Landler dance, the main impetus being its striding pace.
The third movement’s funeral march was a droll canon on the Frere Jacques theme, led by solo double bass but with Klezmer elements coming on full flow, rusticity was turned on its head. Most impressive, however, was the finale’s primal scream, literally the “cry of a wounded heart” which showed that the musicians knew exactly what this music was about.
The symphony’s titanic journey from death to life, with the entire French horn section up on its feet for a grandstanding end, raised the goosebumps and provided moments to remember and cherish.
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A reunion of the Kent Ridge
Fine Music and Steak Appreciation Club
(No vegetarians accepted). |
