STRUMMING & DRUMMING
Singapore Conference
Hall
Saturday (17 January 2015 )
This review was published in The Straits Times on 19 January 2015 with the title "Melodies with a festive air".
The Singapore Chinese Orchestra's first concerts
of the year had a festive air about it, even though the Lunar New Year is more
than a month away. SCO Resident Conductor Quek Ling Kiong also served as the
concert's host, speaking to the audience in Mandarin and English, which added
to the informality of the event.
Young Singaporean composer Wang Chen Wei's We
Soar combined Chinese melodies with the patented sonata form in a colourful
melange, memorable for its second subject first heard on the xun, a
blown instrument resembling an ocarina. The development took the form of a
fugue with different groups of instruments taking turns on its cheery principal
subject, which made for a rousing opener.
The “strumming” in the concert's title was
fronted by Shanghai-based guzheng virtuosa Luo Xiao Ci in two of her original
compositions. Night Thoughts was based on arguably the best-known poem
Tang dynasty by Li Bai, an exquisite piece of chamber music featuring a duo
with SCO Principal cellist Xu Zhong. Its evocation of nostalgia and longing
built up from a quietly ruminative beginning to an ecstatic climax.
More showy was Luo's guzheng
concerto The Rhythm, which opened with vigourous tribal drumming before
settling down in a medative solo, discreetly accompanied by serene bell sounds
and temple block. A lively dance soon dispelled the dreamy reverie before
closing on a percussive and frenzied high. Prolonged applause ensured that the
audience got to hear her haunting alto voice in a brief encore Like A Dream.
The “drumming” was provided by percussionists
Ngoh Kheng Seng and Xu Fan in two concertos for percussion duo. Chung Yiu Kwong's
King of Qin in Battle was premiered by Dame Evelyn Glennie and Xie Cong
Xin in Taipei
Xu's mastery of marimbas
on four mallets, reprising Glennie's role, was a sight to behold. Roles were
reversed when Ngoh commanded the tuned percussion in Zhang Yong Qin's Ji Ji
Feng which elaborated on a popular motif found in Beijing opera. Concertmaster
Li Baoshun's jinghu, the highest pitched fiddle, made a small but
significant cameo.
The orchestra also
performed Jiang Ying's Daqu, the final movement of Impressions Of
Chinese Music, which portrayed the broad vistas and landscapes of Central Asia in a canvas that
resembled the film music that accompanied the epic Westerns of old. Gu Guan
Ren's Spring Suite in five movements was a picture-postcard view of a
nascent season, replete with birdsong and multiple dizi solos,
culminating in a raucous dance of Silk Road origins.
The ever-energetic
conductor Quek then led a clap-along in a newly composed encore piece, Jiang
Ying's Train Toccata, a railway-inspired piece with suonas that
simulated whistles and pistons, which was a big hit with the audience.
Photographs by the kind permission of Singapore Chinese Orchestra
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