pianomania

Monday, 3 August 2026

RANDOM HEARTLAND EATS: HONG KONG STREET CHUN KEE @ ALEXANDRA VILLAGE

It's been years since we visited Alexandra Village. Not much has changed, and Hong Kong Street Chun Kee is still here and it looks like thriving on a Sunday evening. This franchisee was originally at Block 117 Commonwealth Crescent, before it moved here. All the old serving staff and familiar faces are still here, but most importantly, the kitchen still serves up fine dishes.

We relived some of our old favourites, chief of which was the fish noodles in soup (Yu pian mifen tang). For once, we skipped the har cheong gai (prawn paste chicken) and opted for something healthier - a tofu dish with mushroom and eggplant that was more delicious than we remembered. Topping it off was stir-fried beef with spring onion, which is a good as before. All in all, it was a walk back in memory and we will come back again.

Fish soup with noodles.

Braised tofu with mushrooms,
eggplant and vegetables.

Stir-fried beef
with spring onion.

HONG KONG STREET CHUN KEE

Block 125 Bukit Merah Lane 1 #01-190

Singapore 150125

Hong Kong Street Chun Kee 香港街珍記 (Bukit Merah) | Burpple - 42 Reviews - Queenstown, Singapore

Sunday, 2 August 2026

SSO'S FORGOTTEN RECORDINGS: RIMSKY-KORSAKOV'S SCHEHERAZADE

That's Alexander Souptel's autograph
on the cover of my CD sleeve.

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Scheherazade

GLINKA Ruslan and Ludmilla Overture

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Lan Shui

Sometime in 2001, this self-produced SSO recording came out of nowhere. Neither recorded by Donald Wong nor BIS, but by Paul Zinman for Sound Byte Productions, it sounded very good. Was this the SSO, which had not made a recording since that unauthorised Richard Strauss Alpine Symphony of 1993? Since when has the SSO recorded mainstream repertoire? And since when has the orchestra sounded this polished in ruinously familiar music?

A new broom sweeps clean, so they say. Lan Shui, who succeeded Choo Hoey in 1997 as music director, had main sweeping changes in personnel. He retired several older and past sell-by-date musicians, and recruited new and younger professionals, mostly from USA (where he had conducted in Boston, Baltimore, New York and Detroit) and the SSO was beginning to sound fresh and revitalised.

Russia-born concertmaster Alexander Souptel, who arrived in 1993 during the Choo Hoey tenure, was retained and was the superb solo violinist for this Scheherazade. Sasha (as he is affectionately known) had played for decades in professional orchestras in the bygone Soviet Union, including being Gennady Rozhdestvensky’s concertmaster in the USSR Ministry of Culture Symphony Orchestra in all those Melodiya recordings. The effortless manner in which he handled the storytelling that begins The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship and the final Festival at Baghdad sounds totally natural. The harpist is unfortunately uncredited.

The orchestra performs this familiar favourite with gusto and verve, and the performance survives repeated listening, which was saying a lot. SSO was really this good, and the strings shine particularly well in the filler, Glinka’s Ruslan and Ludmilla Overture. This became the orchestra’s calling card, and little wonder that SSO used this showpiece to open its BBC Proms debut in 2014. By this time, Souptel had retired and the concertmaster position handed to his younger compatriot, the Russian-American Igor Yuzefovich.

Saturday, 1 August 2026

SUKA MAKAN: GO-ANG PRATUNAM CHICKEN RICE @ ANCHORPOINT

It seems that Hainanese cooks go everywhere. Go-Ang Pratunam Chicken Rice, founded in Bangkok in 1960, is Thailand's premier Hainanese chicken rice. Being chicken rice junkies, we decided to give this a try, with the nearest location being in Anchorpoint. Despite its "humble" status, chicken rice has a special cachet with Singaporeans. Everything must work, from the tenderness of the specially-timed boiled chicken, to the chilli sauces and soup, to make this dish a success for the palate.

We are glad to report that this Thai-styled Hainanese chicken rice was a success. The half-chicken we ordered was completely de-boned, the rice was fragrant and not too oily. The main difference was the sauces. The chilli was not too acidic while the brown sauce that complemented it was tangy and slightly sweet. Janet thinks this is some variation of Hoisin sauce, and it works wonders too.

Besides the chicken rice, we had garlic kailan with mushrooms, and the black pepper prawn with tunghoon (glass vermicelli), and both dishes were also very tasty.

Kailan and mushroom with garlic.

Black pepper prawn in tunghoon.

We'll definitely return sometime, but we'll also need to find the OG Go-Ang in Bangkok itself. Found it! It's on Petchaburi Road, just behind the Pratunam klong boat stop, accessible by a foot-bridge.

It's Michelin-starred too!

The history of Go-Ang (Hong Da Ge)

Here's the original shop in
Bangkok's Petchaburi Road.

GO-ANG PRATUNAM

CHICKEN RICE

370 Alexandra Road #01-07/08

Anchorpoint
Singapore 159953

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CHASING LIGHT: DING YI X DICK LEE 70 / Ding Yi Music Company / Review

CHASING LIGHT

DING YI X DICK LEE 70

Ding Yi Music Company

Esplanade Concert Hall

Saturday (26 July 2026)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 28 July 2026 with the title "Ding Yi celebrates Dick Lee's wide-ranging musical legacy in birthday tribute".

National Day is around the corner, and one is guaranteed to hear more than a few performances of Home (1998) in its various versions. However, did one know that its composer singer-songwriter Dick Lee wrote far more than that, besides his iconic musicals in English, Beauty World (1988), Fried Rice Paradise (1991) and Forbidden City (2002)?

This special concert by Ding Yi Music Company conducted by Dedric Wong celebrated Lee’s 70th birthday with a programme wholly dedicated to his songs in Cantonese and Mandarin. Many of these do not even have English titles. Arrangements for Chinese instrumental ensemble by eight composers from Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and China were songs “reimagined”, and have never been previously heard by Lee himself.

Photo: Ding Yi Music Company

Concert director Jet Ho’s conception of the evening was a chronological one, built around a sequence of filmed interviews with Lee, detailing a life story when he began writing songs in Chinese. His 1990 relocation to Japan was pivotal, as he was soon ushered into the world of Hong Kong Cantopop by Sandy Lam. He was introduced to the “Four Heavenly Kings” - Jacky Cheung, Andy Lau, Aaron Kwok and Leon Lai – and he composed songs for all of them.

Dick Lee with Sandy Lam, 1991

Attended by a full-house of mostly the boomer demographic, this was more than an evening of nostalgia. It was a journey through the “Golden Age of Cantopop”, before the British colony’s handover to mainland China, and viewing the genre through new lenses.

Jessie Yeong & Skye Sirena
Photo: Ding Yi Music Company

The concert was fronted by four singers, Jessie Yeong (from Malaysia), Lennerd Lim (Malaysia), Skye Sirena (Singapore), Wysom Wong (Singapore), each bringing their own style to the songs. Yeong exuded sensuality in songs sang by Sandy Lam, Dawn and Ye Hua (Night Flower). Skye shined in Anita Mui’s slow ballad Ru Yue (Like Night) and Kit Chan’s Den Le You Den (Still Waiting).

Lennerd Lim & Wysom Wong
Photo: Ding Yi Music Company

Lim exuded “pretty boy” vibes as he roused the audience in Jeff Chang’s Mandopop Duo Xiang (Longing). It was Wong’s crooning and more leisurely manner in Andy Lau’s Jue Dui Zhai Hu Ni (Absolutely Care For You), however, that gained the most traction. Together, the two men courted and rocked the house in Love Is Cha Cha Cha.

Photo: Ding Yi Music Company

Besides accompanying, there were ample opportunities for Ding Yi’s musicians to shine as soloists. In Tracy Huang’s Everything I Know, Koh Yu Jie (erhu) and Yvonne Tay (guzheng) stole the show with purely instrumentals, while Lyu Sih-Ying’s dizi was always on hand to lend soloistic colour to the songs.

Photo: Ding Yi Music Company

After the Snow.Wolf.Lake Medley, it was the man of the hour Dick Lee himself who came forward to sing and tickle the ivories, In Jacky Cheung’s Love Is Eternal and Leslie Cheung’s Zhui (Chase), he exhibited a voice still in full fettle and an irrepressible presence. An encore of the ubiquitous Home, sung by all the singers and the audience, closed the evening on a nationalistic high.

Dick Lee is Singapore’s Paul McCartney, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Elton John all rolled into one.

Photos: Ding Yi Music Company

Happy Three Score and Ten,
Dick Lee!

Friday, 31 July 2026

SUKA MAKAN: LES BOUCHONS @ ROCHESTER PARK

Can anyone be tired of a good steak? Short of being vegetarian or vegan, a big juicy steak represents a pinnacle of dining Western style. And there are few places that can match the luxury of sinking one's teeth into meat than Les Bouchons, the French steakhouse. Rochester Park, just opposite Star Vista, is where this posh eating place is located, a single restaurant occupying an entire bungalow house.

The word bouchon is French for a "cork", a stopper for wine bottles, which explains the restaurant's extensive wine-list and the many bottles that line its walls.

Escargots, best eaten on a bread roll.

Parma ham salad

Truffle fries and salad

I was honoured to be a guest of the Tan family, who ordered some of their favourite steak treats, on this occasion the Butcher's Selection, which consists of two heartily tender steaks and two lamb chops. Add on a few sides, such as escargots, salad, fries and French onion soup, a full French feast was served. Here is the photographic evidence. Vegans should look away.