EDQ!
A Woodwind
Quintet Recital
Esplanade
Recital Studio
Wednesday
(7 August
2013 )
This review was published in The Straits Times on 9 August 2013 with the title "Unfamiliar delights".
EDQ
is an award-winning woodwind quintet formed by young professional musicians who
were alumni of the Singapore National Youth Orchestra. Fresh from winning the
contemporary music prize at the Henri Tomasi International Competition in Marseilles , its second public concert in Singapore was greeted by a full-house and a
standing ovation.
Repertoire
for woodwind quintet often involves different composers from those of standard
chamber music programmes, usually peripheral figures unfamiliar to the public.
Bohemian composer Anton Reicha (1770-1836), the acknowledged “Father of the
woodwind quintet”, was a contemporary of Beethoven, but how many people know of
his 24 quintets?
The
members of EDQ showed that his very well-crafted Quintet in D major (Op.91 No.3) was worth listening to because of
its freshness and vitality. A slow introduction heralded a florid cadenza from
flautist Jasper Goh, and the ensuing Allegro
was launched with an energetic fervour. Veda Lin’s oboe and Goh provided
the main melodic thrust in the four movements, well supported by their partners
on lower pitched instruments.
Frenchman
Jean Francaix (1912-1997) was a colleague of Olivier Messiaen but their music
could not be more different. The former was the master of musical comedy, as his Wind Quintet No.1 (1948) proved. After
a languorous opening, jazzy runs erupted in all directions, with side-splitting
bellyaches from Alan Kartik’s French horn which almost stole the show. Neoclassical
and mock-serious, this was music that spared no effort to entertain, and the
performers reciprocated with every ounce of their wits.
Two
works that utilised folk music followed after the interval. Hungarian Ferenc
Farkas’s Serenade (1951) was short
and pleasing, full of bucolic charm and Italianate warmth. The World Premiere
of Singapore composer Zechariah Goh Toh Chai’s Four Taiwanese Aboriginal Songs (2013) was nothing short of a
success. The way he dressed these simple melodies with unusual harmonies and
counterpoint made them sound contemporary and relevant.
Opportunities
were given for clarinettist Benjamin Wong and bassoonist Emerald Chee to bask in melody, while Goh briefly exchanged his flute for the piquant piccolo in the Dance of the Paiwan Tribe. The final Dance of the Beinan Tribe brought all
five instrumentalists together for a grand tutti.
The
final and longest work was the Sextet
(1888) for piano and winds by the Austrian Ludwig Thuille (1861-1907), who knew
Richard Strauss and was probably acquainted with Mahler. The first two
movements breathed the same air as Brahms, the expansive themes rich with piano
chords and figurations from guest artist Nicholas Loh. The music could have
suffered from a surfeit of voices, but it was the clarity of articulation and
individual mastery of each performer that saved the day.
As
if effecting a change of heart, the music broke off from its shackles of
convention with a jocular little Gavotte
and finished with a sunny Tarantella
in rapid triple rhythm. It was like the composer saying, “Enough of the serious
stuff, and now let us have fun.” That spirit was clearly conveyed by the six
musicians to all present, and the audience voted with its feet. Bravo all round.
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