KENT RIDGE FINE MUSIC & STEAK APPRECIATION CLUB (NO VEGANS ADMITTED) RECONVENES

The Kent Ridge Fine Music & Steak Appreciation Club (No Vegans Admitted) reconvened on Sunday lunchtime (13 September 2026) at its usual hideout, St.Martin's in Clementi Fields or Marriner's Corner. The idea was to re-sample its famous N.Z. Roast Beef Prime Rib, which previously had left the quintet longing for more. The only problem: the four Professors and one Physician got the timing wrong. Marriner's Prime Rib is served only in the evening.

Undeterred, they settled for the Ribeye Set Meal instead. One meat is better than none, one supposes. True to the establishment's well-heeled service, the dishes came swiftly, first the garden salad, soup de jour (which had minced meat in cream) and garlic toast. This was quickly dispatched, and before long came the main course. Only Winston Seah Kar Heng opted for the Sirloin and found his portion smaller than the others'.  

As this was being consumed, discussions about last weekend's Wagner's Siegfried by the OMM came up, as did future plans for the fine orchestras of Kent Ridge. About steak, promises were made by individual members to have pilgrimages to Sweetheart Garden Restaurant (any of the seven outlets) in Hong Kong. It was agreed that the Mongkok outlet in Bank Centre (2nd floor) was the most accessible and had the highest turnover.

After accounting for the tiny slice of cake, coffee or tea, the quartet sans Winston (who had a birthday party to catch) made their way to their favourite creamery - Burnt Cones - which was around the corner. So here are the incriminating pics of Professors and Doctors enjoying their ice-creams.

This CTL had the Pistachio flavour.

The other CTL had Stracciatella
(whatever that was) while 
HCK had Moon Cake Salted Egg.

PP chose Moon Cake salted egg too. 

The newly created official logo
of KRFMSAC (NVA) or
Kent Ridge Fine Music & Steak
Appreciation Club (No Vegans Admitted).
Even Sir Lion whole-heartedly agrees.

SUKA MAKAN: PICOLINO @ SHAW CENTRE

This place is totally new to me. Thanks to my classmate from medical school, Teoh Mei Lin, who organised a mini class reunion of sorts for a casual late weekend lunch. Six of the NUS Class of 89 turned up, three guys and three gals, almost like triple-date! All who came were also at Ipoh in July too, so we are the gregarious ones.

Picolino is a nice little Italian bistro which has a fusion twist in its dishes, which explains why some of the items resemble local food. No harm to that as long it tastes good, and that was exactly what was delivered. We had pizza, pasta and a pulled pork bun which was shared communally.

Pizza Diavola, with salami

Granchio linguine,
with crab meat, spicy cream and caviar.

Does it look like Hokkien mee?

Pad Kra Pao Pizza

This Harissa Pulled Pork
looks like Kong Bak Pao!

Shaw Centre is busy for a Saturday lunchtime, catering to the shopping crowd and does a flowing turnover business, which is what local food outlets need. Too many have been closing of late, to replaced by empty lots and that is a disturbing trend. If you have cash to spare, why not support local food business? It's too late to miss them when they're gone.

Who attended (from L):
Lee Cheng Chuan, "Datuk" Leong Seng Keen,
Pianomaniac, Lee Siew Khim,
Teoh Mei Lin & Lim Woan Huah

This Tiramisu cube with birthday candle
was lit for three August babies,
and shared by six.

"Datuk" Leong & Pianomaniac
Photo: Teoh Mei Lin

PICOLINO

1 Scotts Road #03-23/24

Shaw Centre

Singapore 228208

Picolino

DUOS / More Than Music / Review

 

DUOS

More Than Music

Esplanade Recital Studio

Friday (11 September 2026)

This More Than Music concert was special because it united four of Singapore’s most prodigious musical talents born in the 1980s and early 1990s. Founding members violinist Loh Jun Hong and pianist Abigail Sin were joined for the first time by violinist Min Lee (Lee Huei Min) and composer-pianist Jonathan Shin. Min Lee, now a highly sought-after pedagogue will be remembered as a student of Erick Friedman (Jascha Heifetz’s student) and having performed under the batons of Vladimir Ashkenazy, Charles Dutoit and Benjamin Zander.

The evening opened with Jean-Chin Non-Saens’s The Other Swan for violin and piano, performed by Jun Hong and Jonathan. This miniature essentially presents an inversion of the melody of Saint-Saens’ Le Cygne from Carnival of the Animals. According to the composer, the Coriolis effect in Singapore means the swan swims in the opposite direction as it would in France. With the harmonies in the accompaniment also altered, the music begins to sound like something by Ravel. Well, there is news for Non-Saens that is not nonsense: Singapore is in the same northern hemisphere as France. He might have mistaken Tasmania for Singapore. A lovely and elegant work, nonetheless.

Next came Sergei Prokofiev’s marvelous Sonata for two violins (Op.56) in four movements. Jun Hong and Min fitted like hand and glove in the music’s intertwined parts and tightly woven counterpoint. Typical of the Russian composer, dissonance was established in the opening movement, which gradually gave way to a sinuous lyricism. Strong rhythmic impulses dominated the second movement which blazed with swift strokes and rapier-like thrusts. Another slow movement, with the melodic charm of his ballets (Romeo and Juliet / Cinderella come to mind) ushered in a rondo finale which displayed a more playful side for a close. One will scarcely find a better performance than this.

Both pianists, Abigail and Jon, were united in Maurice Ravel’s La Valse, a heady reminiscence of 1850s Viennese ballrooms but with apocalyptic visions of the looming Great War decades ahead. The fatal end to an era was well captured by the duo, whose technical security was never in doubt. Sometimes one wishes for a sense of danger, like the risk of faltering or ensemble coming apart at the seams, for the sheer heck of it, but that never came, which also spoke volumes.

Pablo Sarasate’s Navarra for two violins and piano (Abigail) reveled in vigorous Spanish rhythms and catchy melodies, including those to be found in Chabrier’s Espana. Short but virtuosic summed up both work and performance.

More song and dance rhythms came in Leonard Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side Story arranged for two pianos by John Musto. This is familiar music brought to life by Abigail and Jon’s acute awareness of razor-sharp rhythmic quirks, sly syncopations, multitudes of notes and the requisite executions. Finger snaps were included but not the police whistle or shouts of mambo! (probably not written in the score anyway), all making for an eventful cycle of movements before culminating quietly with Somewhere, the musical’s most moving music.

The evening concluded with the world premiere of Jonathan Shin’s Some Telemetry of Love (2026) for two violins and two pianos, possibly the first ever work with this quartet scoring, essentially a double violin and piano duo (or duo duo). Hearing for the first and only time, it resonated like a virile dance with sparks flying galore, a Singaporean cousin to Astor Piazzolla’s La Muerte del Angel, a tango on Ann Siang Hill perhaps? A repeat performance will be highly anticipated.

PRE-CONCERT EATS: ENCIK TAN @ MARINA SQUARE

Marina Square is so humongous that it takes almost an age to walk through it, but its near enough to Esplanade to consider going there for a meal before attending a concert. That was exactly what I did yesterday. One of my old favourites, Sarawak Kolo Mee, had moved out so I had to look elsewhere. Luckily I found that exact dish being served at Encik Tan just a few doors away.

Encik Tan is a chain food stall with multiple locations in Singapore, but its Marina Square site is well-placed and easy to find. Its open cafeteria concept allows one to find a place to sit, and ordering food is like going to a school tuckshop. 

I found a version of Sarawak kolo mee, with its mix of char siew, minced pork and wanton, and had a casual meal, with still a lot of time to spare before the concert. Unfortunately, Marina Square will be closing for a major renovation after March next year, so this meal will soon be a memory.

ENCIK TAN

Marina Square #02-275/276

6 Raffles Boulevard

Singapore 039594

(Encik Tan shares the same premises as Popeyes Lousiana Fried Chicken and you are free to patronise both franchises within the same meal.)

Marina Square

WAGNER'S SIEGFRIED / Orchestra of the Music Makers / Review

 

WAGNER’S SIEGFRIED

Orchestra of the Music Makers

Esplanade Concert Hall

Saturday (5 September 2026)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 6 September 2026 with the title "OMM's ambitious semi-staged Siegfried proves Singapore is ready for Wagner".

After artistic triumphs of the first two operas from Richard Wagner’s The Ring of the Nibelung, Das Rheingold (2023) and Die Walkure (in 2020), it was a matter of time and principle that the Orchestra of the Music Makers (OMM) brought out its third instalment Siegfried. Conducted by Taiwanese maestro Lu Shao-Chia and stage-directed by Tan Shou Chen, this semi-staged production was an unqualified progression.

Photo: Yong Junyi

Players and management of OMM have matured over the years, and undimmed is its vision to bring in top class musical acts, opera and otherwise, which would otherwise not be witnessed here. These Singapore premieres of each Ring cycle opera had boldly advanced into terra incognita, where even national arts organisations feared to tread.

Photo: Yong Junyi

For OMM, music came first. Semi-staged meant the full orchestra of over 110 players performed on stage, not in a pit, thus fully visible to the audience. The sound was of concert hall quality and with no compromises. All the action took place on a lower stage placed in front and raised paths behind the orchestra. There were no sets and props were limited to tendrils of side glow fibreoptic cable lights, an anvil resembling a glowing lectern, Siegfried’s Nothung sword and a chair for the slumbering Brunnhilde.

Siegfried (Vincent Wolfsteiner)
with Mime (Dan Karlstrom)
Photo: Yong Junyi

The international cast of singers was very well-balanced. German tenor Vincent Wolfsteiner as Siegfried, a man-child who knew neither fear nor his birth origins, was close to perfect except he looked older than Finnish tenor Dan Karlstrom who played his evil guardian Mime. Their Oedipal relationship, with hate bristling in every exchange, was portrayed to the hilt.

The Wanderer (Michael Volle)
with Anna Harvey (Erda)
photo: Yong Junyi

Veteran German baritone Michael Volle sang The Wanderer, once-mighty chief god Wotan but now stripped of his agency. Three singers from OMM’s 2023 Rheingold reprised their roles. German baritone Joachim Goltz returned as the avaricious Alberich, albeit a far smaller part than in Rheingold. So did Polish bass Lukasz Konieczny, as fratricidal giant Fafner, now transformed into a dragon and deliriously dressed in drag.

Siegfried slays the dragon
aka Fafner (Lukasz Konieczny)
Photo: Yong Junyi

The Wood Bird (Victoria Songwei Li)
helps Siegfried find his dream woman.
Photo: Yong Junyi

Male voices dominated for most part, until late in Act 2 for the Forest Murmurs episode with Singaporean soprano Victoria Songwei Li as the Woodbird, who came like a breath of fresh air. British mezzo-soprano Anna Harvey returning as earth goddess Erda and Swiss soprano Stephanie Muther as former Valkyrie and Siegfried’s ultimate prize Brunnhilde, both appearing in the final act to complete the memorable ensemble cast.

Siegfried is united with Brunnhilde
(Stephanie Muther)
Photo: Yong Junyi

Despite the serious subject matter, there was lightness and ironic humour about, not least in the fractious Siegfried-Mime angle. After tasting dragon blood, Siegfried could read Mime’s every ill intent in a typical tragicomic episode, putting him to the sword to complete the kills.

The full glory of Wagner’s orchestral music was fuel for drama, and OMM delivered with dividends, whether accompanying singers or in gripping interludes. Singapore Symphony principal Austin Larson guesting in the French horn solo that woke up the dragon provided the best solo instrumental highlight. 

The long and vociferous reception accorded all on stage meant that Singapore is more than ready for more Wagner, and the concluding opera Gotterdammerung (Twilight of the Gods) from OMM cannot come soon enough.

Let's see who attended 

Wagner's Siegfried by OMM:

pianomania: PEOPLE-WATCHING AT OMM'S WAGNER SIEGFRIED