XPERIENZ:
IN C
Asian
Contemporary Ensemble
University
Cultural Centre Dance Studio
Friday (25 March 2016)
This review was published in The Straits Times on 28 March 2016 with the title "Unusual experience of minimalist music".
The Asian Contemporary Ensemble (ACE)
founded by young conductor Wong Kah Chun surprised once again, and in ways
which one least expected. Its latest concert coupled Beethoven's evergreen Fifth
Symphony with the Singaporean premiere of American minimalist Terry Riley's
seminal score In C, in performances which confounded expectations and
pre-conceived ideas.
The Dance Studio at UCC is a very small
space, which meant that the audience numbering about 100 was seated within the
orchestra's ranks. This closeness must have been unnerving for performer and
listener, but within a friendly milieu of sharing space and feedback, both
parties soon got used to each other.
Conductor Wong, informally attired in
polo shirt and denim jeans, introduced the various instrumental groups to the
audience and also briefly spoke about Beethoven's orchestration between the
movements. Without further fanfare, the Beethoven symphony got underway with
the familiar “da-da-da-dum” motif.
Shorn of opulence or bombast, the
composer's ideas were laid bare on a plate. One soon discerned how he brought
the disparate parts together, in consonance and dissonance. Just four each of
first and second violins, three violas, two cellos, two basses and the minimum
complement of winds, brass and percussion, meant that the sound was not going
to be rich or fulsome.
That was not the idea in the first place,
and depending on where one sat, the balance was also certain to be awry.
However what the listener got was a truly organic feel of an overplayed
masterpiece, and the power of raw emotions set into music. This pair of ears
happened to be in the direct trajectory of the trio of trombones that announced
themselves wholeheartedly in the finale, and shrill blast of the piccolo.
The Surround Sound effect worked better
in Riley's 1964 classic that started an inexorable trend in musical minimalism.
Its premise was both simple and primitive, a repeated rhythmic pattern of the C
note over which various sequences from combinations of instruments could be
grafted onto its unwavering linear structure.
The ensemble was further pared down, now
led by percussionist Ramu Thiruyanam on the MalletKat Pro (an electronic
xylophone) and drum, with significant contributions from cello and keyboard.
Traditional instruments like guzheng, tabla, guitar and bamboo flute were added
into the mix, and audience members armed with a single-paged score were
encouraged to sing any of the 53 notated fragments during appropriate moments.
The result was a heady and serendipitous
melange of sounds, dizzying and strangely hypnotic. Riley's work was in essence
the basis of music itself, the very foundation upon which the sounds of African
drumming and Javanese gamelan become possible. The Western forms of the canon,
passacaglia, theme and variations and the more sophisticated fugue could all be
derived from its basic pulse and momentum.
Every incarnation of In C would
result in very different outcomes, and ACE'ss version which played for a good 37 minutes became a thrilling
encounter with music at its most rudimentary grassroots. Little wonder that the
many children in the audience sat quietly transfixed, clearly overawed by the
experience. That is exactly how good music should move people.
 |
| Professor Ho Chee Kong was in the audience, and took the opportunity for photos with the performers. |
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