SLIDE MONSTERS LIVE IN SINGAPORE / Review

 

SLIDE MONSTERS 

LIVE IN SINGAPORE

Conservatory Concert Hall

Tuesday (2 September 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 4 September 2025 with the title "Brass ensemble entertains with classical and jazz repertoire".

Slide Monsters is an international trombone quartet formed in 2018 by Eijiro Nakagawa (Japan) and Joseph Alessi (USA, principal trombonist of the New York Philhamonic Orchestra since 1985), with Marshall Gilkes (USA) and Brandt Attema (Netherlands). With members from both classical and jazz backgrounds, its Singapore debut was attended by a near-full house of brass practitioners and enthusiasts, both young and old. Although running for 90 minutes without intermission, the concert felt much shorter than that.

Photo: Faezah Zulkifli

The evening opened in near total darkness with loud dissonant tones blared through speakers for Florian Magnus Maier’s Abyssos as the quartet trooped onstage from the flanks. The long-breathed unearthly utterances at times resembled the growling of large animals in pain, industrial machinery cranking up or even the deep chants of Tibetan monks.

Photo: Faezah Zulkifli

Imaginations run riot when allowed, which is what brass instruments with the curious ability for glissandi (or slides, hence the ensemble’s name) are wont to do. This wake-up call provided the concert’s most forbidding seven minutes, leading to music of a more popular and accessible nature.

Monster’s Tango by Kotaro Nakagawa (Eijiro’s elder brother) was clothed in bright and burnished Broadway sonorities, the sort often heard in film and television music. With much scope for improvisatory freedom, it began to sound like the foursome doing some serious jamming.

Photo: Faezah Zulkifli

Gilkes’ own composition Cora’s Tune was inspired and dedicated to his daughter, likely an endearing lass judging by the work’s melodiousness and upbeat gospel vibe. He lapped up the impressive solo part and variations with relish, warmly supported by his partners. His Improvisation #1 for Attema’s bass trombone was no less attractive, revealing the unlikely instrument’s capability for sheer lyricism.

Nakagawa himself had several of his pieces aired, including the humourous Rodeo Clown, which spun circles with a ground bass of recurring slurring drones on which virtuoso runs were built. His solo also opened Secret Gate, also crafted over ostinatos, which was as exuberant as a jazz work can possibly get.

The seasoned veteran Alessi, hitherto maintaining a low-key presence as not to upstage his younger colleagues, was thrust centrestage for the Johnny Green jazz standard Body and Soul, arranged by Robert Elkjer. His cool solo, crafted with almost nonchalant ease, seemed to echo its luscious lyrics, “I’m all for you, body and soul”.

If there were a work which did not completely cohere, that was the arrangement of Claude Debussy’s Reflets dans l’eau (Reflections on the Water) from Images Book One. While attempting to be faithful to the original, brass simply could not replicate the piano’s crystalline and flowing qualities.

The concert closed with Nakagawa’s Trisense, the longest work in the programme, with both classical and jazz sensibilities coming to a heady confluence. The opening’s Spanish martial rhythm gave way to still reflection before racing off to a gripping finale of rapid fire. Slide Monsters’ playful encore of Mike Mainieri’s Oops was followed by a selfie with the audience and a march past, exiting the hall to the sound of rhythmic clapping and cheers.

Slide Monsters take a bow and a wefie!

Photo: Faezah Zulkifli