MUSICAL MOSAICS / Asian Cultural Symphony Orchestra / Review

 

MUSICAL MOSAICS

Asian Cultural 

Symphony Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Saturday (3 June 2023)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 5 June 2023 with the title "Celebration of Asian music ends on a high note".

 

Formed in 2016, the Asian Cultural Symphony Orchestra (ACSO) is a local semi-professional ensemble specialising in works of Singaporean and Asian composers. Within its short history, the group has revealed a wealth of music that exists in plain sight yet have often been overlooked. Its latest concert was led by three conductors, co-Music Directors Adrian Chiang and Dedric Wong, and guest conductor Yeh Tsung, Conductor Emeritus of the Singapore Chinese Orchestra (SCO).

 

All three are champions of locally-produced music, and the evening began with Chiang conducting Singapore-based British composer Eric Watson’s Mahjong Kakis. Although Asian in inspiration, the music had strong flavours of jazz and the blues, as if Gershwin or Duke Ellington had found themselves in the Far East. Instrumental balance was unfortunately off kilter, with the melodic interest all but drowned out by exuberant percussion and drum-set.

 

Faring better was the World Premiere of ACSO Composer-in-Residence Edmund Song’s Naadu Tapestry, which had significant parts for bamboo flute and concertmaster Ng Wei Ping’s violin, where Hindustani and Carnatic influences sat dizzyingly cheek-by-jowl with idioms of Hollywood film music and Broadway musicals.

 

Conducted by Wong, Law Wai Lun’s symphonic poem Prince Sang Nila Utama and Singa recounted the mythical founding of early Singapore. Its use of the pelog scale signified origins from the Indonesian isles, with the music shifting from serenity to tempestuous and finally glorious, with the sighting of the “lion”.

 

SCO Composer-in-Residence Wang Chenwei’s Peyalaran (Voyage) had a similar maritime inspiration, with Chua Yew Kok’s pipa and Azrin Abdullah’s oud (Arabian lute), both strummed instruments, stealing the show. The higher pitched pipa blended well with the mellower oud in this work that depicted perilous adventures on the high seas before finally finding peace on terra firma.

 

The concert’s second half was conducted by Yeh, beginning with Kelly Tang’s witty Symphonic Suite an a Set of Local Tunes, a medley which delighted in melodies like Dick Lee’s Home and Bunga Sayang, and Malay song Chan Mali Chan. The real fun was also in spotting Tang’s in-jokes, including sly quotes from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Elmer Bernstein’s The Magnificent Seven.  

 

The biggest draw was the return of Lynnette Seah, founding leader of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, in the perennial favourite that is Chen Gang and He Zhanhao’s Butterfly Lovers Concerto. In her first concerto performance since retiring in 2020, the now celebrity-chef rolled back the years to bring out a touching reading that tugged on the heartstrings.

 

Coaxing a lovely and sensuous tone from her 1750 Gabrielli violin, she became consummate storyteller in that ill-fated romance between Lang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai. Alternating between lyrical and rhapsodic, the music reached a feverish climax with an intimate duo with principal cellist Tan Wen Bin.

Lynnette Seah trying 
to hold back the tears.

 

Her encore of Massenet’s Meditation from Thaïs, accompanied by harp and strings, was no less emotional. Fighting off the tears in the face of beauty would be the final order of the day.

This concert was proudly sponsored by Temasek Foundation.