KEVIN LOH Guitar Recital & CLARISSE TEO Piano Recital / Review

RAY OF LIGHT

Kevin Loh (Guitar)

CLARISSE TEO IN RECITAL

Clarisse Teo (Piano)

Esplanade Recital Studio

Wednesday & Sunday (17 & 21 August 2022)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 24 August 2022 with the title "Young talents shine in summer concerts".

 

August is the month when music students overseas return home for their summer vacations, presenting concerts that are invariably impressive showcases of their artistic progress. The last week saw two such recitals from some of our brightest sparks. Singapore’s generational talent of the guitar, Kevin Loh, now an undergraduate at Cambridge University, surveyed the history of the classical guitar with varied works from the baroque to the 21st century.

 

Beginning with a transcription of J.S.Bach’s Cello Suite No.6 in D major, he showed that this music sounded just as idiomatic on the guitar as the original instrument. Most notable was his natural, unforced manner with music-making, allied with faultless articulation, which made for a pleasurable experience. Besides being totally in tune with the rhythmic aspects of its antique dance movements, his selection of three of Spaniard Fernando Sor’s Bagatelles also oozed charm and personality.  

 

Young Singaporean composer Lim Kang Ning’s Serenata del Caffe provided much-needed contrasts, its melancholy and introspection resembled an intimate conversation between two friends over coffee. Two of Schubert’s Lieder (art songs) transcribed by Johann Kaspar Mertz were a demonstration of the art of cantabile, not least the famous Serenade from song-cycle Schwanengesang (Swan Song). Outright virtuosity came in two Sonatinas by the Briton Lennox Berkeley and Mexcian Manuel Ponce, which displayed a mastery of myriad styles and techniques. Loh capped these off with a rip-roaring encore in Antonio Carlos Jobim’s Felicidade.   

 

Just as impressive was the solo recital of rarities by pianist Clarisse Teo, presently pursuing a musical doctorate at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. How often has one attended a recital of sonatas by Russian composers Nikolai Medtner and Anatoly Alexandrov? Both were born in the 1880s and lived well into the age of modernity. Bastions of the conservativism, they shunned atonality and avant-gardeism, composing some fourteen piano sonatas each.

 

Medtner’s Sonata-Skazka in C minor combined Romantic era lyricism with surprising whimsicality, the term skazka being the Russian equivalent of fairy tales. Alexandrov’s Fourteenth and Third Sonatas were even more obscure, both receiving their Singapore premieres. Paradoxically, the later 1967 work sounded far more traditional – including a masterly set of variations - than the earlier single-movement piece of 1920. All three sonatas presented thorny technical and interpretive challenges, but Teo delivered with crispness and passionate aplomb.

 

Sandwiched in between these were Englishman Arnold Bax’s Dream In Exile, a ruminative work of nostalgia serving as both a fantasy and lament, reflecting his love for the land of Ireland. More familiar was American Lowell Liebermann’s Gargoyles, four short movements of musical grotesquerie that juxtaposed eerie calm with coruscating violence. Teo’s confidently eclectic tastes extended also into her encores, Dane Rued Langgaard’s impressionistic The Restless Wind from Gitanjali Hymns and Frenchman Francis Poulenc’s rapturous Homage To Edith Piaf. No Chopin or no Rachmaninov in a piano recital? No worries. 

Kevin Loh's recital was presented by Kris Foundation.

A CONCERT NOT TO BE MISSED: KEVIN LOH GUITAR RECITAL - RAY OF LIGHT

Here's a concert 

not to be missed!

RAY OF LIGHT

KEVIN LOH Guitar Recital

Esplanade Recital Studio

Wednesday 17 August 2022, 

7.30 pm

KEVIN LOH is Singapore's finest and most accomplished guitarist. As a teenager, he was bestowed the HSBC Youth Excellence award. A winner of multiple international guitar competitions, he is presently pursuing his studies at Cambridge University. Returning to Singapore this summer, his one-night-only solo guitar recital presents a wide variety of styles and genres. A veritable showcase of virtuosity awaits!

The programme:

J.S.BACH Cello Suite No.6

FERNANDO SOR Six Bagatelles

LIM KANG NING Serenata del Cafe*

SCHUBERT Three Lieder (arr. J.K.Mertz)

LENNOX BERKELEY Sonatina Op.52 No.1

MANUEL PONCE Sonatina

* World Premiere

Book your tickets here:

Kris Foundation presents Ray of Light: Kevin Loh (guitar) [G] | SISTIC

Kevin Loh is presented by 

Kris Foundation.

I MOLINISTI by ROBERTO ALVAREZ & KEVIN LOH / Review

I MOLINISTI

FRANCESCO MOLINO

Complete Works for Flute & Guitar

ROBERTO ALVAREZ, Flute

KEVIN LOH, Guitar

Centaur CRC 3850

 

It will come as no surprise that Italian composer and conductor Francesco Molino (1768-1847), born near Turin, is all but unknown outside of guitar-fancying circles. He was a virtuoso guitarist who made his name and settled in Paris from the 1820s to his death. His dates have him as a contemporary of Beethoven, but his musical style, embracing the lyricism of bel canto traditions, aligns him more closely to the likes of Paganini and Rossini.

 

This album, produced in Singapore, conveniently houses Molino’s complete works specifically conceived for flute and guitar. He also composed works for violin (interchangeable with the flute) and guitar, but are not included here. There are nine such works, six Duos (Op.16 and 61) and three Nocturnes (Op.37, 38 and 39). All comprise two movements, a slow movement followed by a faster dance-like conclusion. That latter movements usually take the form of a rondo, and in the Op.61 duos, include a Polonaise and Eccosais (Scottish dance).

 

Each work lasts between three to eight minutes, and not given to longeurs or florid elaborations, the full excesses of Romanticism having yet gained a foothold. If not for their titles, works seem indistinguishable from each other. So why listen to them at all? The secrets lie in a penchant for songfulness and mellifluousness. To this end, flautist Roberto Alvarez (Assistant Principal Piccolo of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra) delights with his silky tone and seamless phrasing, aided by guitarist Kevin Loh’s excellent accompaniment. While these works are unlikely to appear as main events in chamber concerts, they make high class background entertainment.     

   

Fernandino Carulli (1770-1841) may be a name known to non-guitarists, as one might regard Mauro Giuliani or Fernando Sor. The Neapolitan Carulli also settled in Paris, where he developed a rivalry with his close contemporary Molino, their respective students clashing over differences in guitar technique! The album’s “bonus” is Carulli’s Concerto in G major for flute and guitar, a full-length three-movement work no less than 23 minutes.

 

The “orchestra” is a string quintet formed by members from the Singapore Symphony, who are fully in the spirit of the music. The first movement culminates with a properly discursive cadenza for both solo instruments, making it a second cousin to Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp. Make no mistake, this is the outrightly virtuosic work of the album and its crowning achievement. Molino versus Carulli? Carulli wins but the music of both Italians deserve to be heard.   

GOH SOON TIOE @ 110 / AWARD WINNERS IN CONCERT / Review

GOH SOON TIOE @ 110

AWARD WINNERS IN CONCERT

Esplanade Recital Studio

Sunday (18 April 2021)

 

Goh Soon Tioe is 110 years old this year! For those not old enough to remember the name, Goh Soon Tioe (1911-1982) was Singapore’s Western classical music pioneer, one who combined illustrious careers in violin performance, conducting, musical education and impresario work like nobody else had and nobody ever will. In our age of specialisation, his kind will never come again. His legacy lives on in his students, who have included the likes of Choo Hoey, Seow Yit Kin, Lynnette Seah, Lim Soon Lee, Kam Kee Yong and his three daughters (Vivien, Sylvia and Patricia), and the annual Centenary Award bestowed to deserving young string players that bears his name.

 

Since 2012, nine deserving young musicians have been awarded monetary grants (administered by the Community Foundation of Singapore) to further their musical studies and careers. Their names read like a young Who’s Who of music in Singapore today. This concert brought together six award winners in an enjoyable chamber concert,  reassuring one and all that the future of classical music in Singapore is in good hands.  

 

Kevin Loh (2018 winner) is the brightest guitarist to emerge from Singapore in many decades. Presently a Cambridge undergraduate, he helpfully reminded the audience that Goh Soon Tioe himself began his musical career as a guitarist. His studies had been sponsored by no less than Andres Segovia, who also served as mentor and guiding light. Kevin’s varied programme of transcriptions opened with J.S.Bach’s Prelude from Cello Suite No.6, characterised by rhythmic vigour and clarity of articulation. The Latino pieces were also well-contrasted, the vivacity of Albeniz’s popular Sevilla (originally a piano piece) alongside Astor Piazzolla’s slow tango Oblivion, a heart-felt portrayal of melancholy and untold tragedy.

 

Next came Italian opera composer Rossini’s Duet in D major for double bass and cello, composed for the great Domenico Dragonetti, who was hailed as “Paganini of the bass”. Bassist Julian Li (2013), who has served as principal in China’s Hangzhou Philharmonic and Guiyang Symphony, and Theophilus Tan (2015), cellist of the newly-formed Concordia Quartet, did the honours.

 

As with works by bass virtuosos, the orchestra’s largest instrument is no longer content with just providing mere accompaniment but having significant melodic lines of its own. Li showed himself to be very nimble in running passages, crowned by a melodic gift with bel canto qualities. The cello  also had melodic moments in the slow Andante molto movement, accompanied by bass pizzicatos, and the duet was completed with an enjoyable romp of the finale.

 

A much more familiar work was the Handel-Halvorsen Passacaglia, usually heard as a showpiece for violin and cello. In this instance, violinist Joey Lau (2017) and violist Joelle Hsu (2019) worked very well together, exhibiting good communication and the requisite “give and take” of chamber music performance while relishing in their virtuosic roles.  

 

Receiving a rare performance was Rachmaninov’s Trio Elegiaque No.1 in G minor, a teenaged work heavily influenced by Tchaikovsky, with violinist Helena Dawn Yah (2012, the inaugural awardee), cellist Theophilus Tan and guest pianist Jonathan Shin. In a short preamble, Shin explained that the trio’s main theme was in fact an inversion of the opening motif from Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto. The work’s typically Slavic melancholy and dolour was very well brought out, oozing pathos from every pore.

 

The final work was by Austrian bassist and composer Johannes Matthias Sperger (1750-1812), whose highly congenial Quartet in D major in three movements had one guessing its various influences. Did it sound like Haydn, Mozart, or even the young Schubert? Sperger’s milestone dates indicate that he would have been familiar with the first two composers, while the instrumentation (with the violin replacing the original flute) suggests this was an example of hausmusik (household music) to be played by a group of musical-loving friends over schnapps.

 

As expected, bassist Julian Li had a lion’s share of melodic interest besides also having the most difficult part of all. He was excellent throughout, and well-supported by violinist Joey Lau, violist Joelle Hsu and a most busy cellist Theophilus Tan. Why don’t we ever get to hear this music with any regularity (instead of countless performances of the Trout Quintet)? At least one can trust and hope that the Goh Soon Tioe laureates, who are now a family of a kind, to revive the hausmusik movement sometime. Such an initiative led by these extremely talented young professionals will be most appreciated.   

Vivien Goh, daughter of Goh Soon Tioe

addresses the audience and

thanks the award winners.

PRESIDENT'S YOUNG PERFORMERS CONCERT / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

PRESIDENT’S YOUNG PERFORMERS CONCERT
Singapore Symphony Orchestra
Victoria Concert Hall
Friday (27 September 2019) 

This review was published in The Straits Times on 30 September 2019 with the title "Young guitarist on top of his game".

The Singapore Symphony Orchestra’s President’s Young Performers Concerts have been an annual showcase of local talent in concerto performances since the 1990s. The series has spanned tenures of four presidents since Ong Teng Cheong, featuring the likes of pianists Shane Thio, Lim Yan and Abigail Sin, violinists Lee Huei Min and Chan Yoong Han, and even a saxophonist, Samuel Phua. Kevin Loh is the first guitarist to appear on this platform, although he has previously performed with the orchestra.

His concerto was no big surprise: Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez, surely the most performed and recorded guitar concerto of all time. While not presenting new insights, he gave a confident and big-hearted account of this familiar favourite. But how many people actually know its fast outer movements?

There was the intimate feeling of chamber music as Loh worked well with the orchestra, which relied mostly on strings and woodwinds in its narrative. Whether strumming out chords or negotiating tricky passage work, Loh was on top of his game. In the famous Adagio, he first accompanied Elaine Yeo’s sensuous cor anglais solo and then ventured out on his own. His sonorous mastery of the guitar’s lower registers was also a delight, sounding like some baritone majo (or Spanish gentleman) in love.  

The finale that followed erupted with festive colour, helped by the brass, especially the trumpets. Prolonged applause meant an encore, with Paraguayan guitarist-composer Agustin Barrios Mangore’s Waltz in G major (Op.8 No.4) being Loh’s perfect icing on the cake.

To balance the familiarity of Rodrigo, the concert led by SSO Associate Conductor Joshua Tan included two less familiar works. Opening the evening was Mendelssohn’s Die Schöne Melusine Overture, programme music on the legend of a two-tailed mermaid falling in love. Intricate woodwind passages and weepy strings painted a watery realm for an ill-fated romance to blossom, and eventually expire beneath the waves.

Max Reger’s Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Mozart, receiving its Singapore premiere, concluded the concert. The German composer, front-liner of the “back-to-Bach movement”, was responsible for some impossibly turgid pot-boilers, but this was thankfully not one of those. Based on the 1^st movement theme from  Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A major (K.331, the one with the Turkish Rondo), the variations were well-crafted but difficult to pull off.

One might regard this as an expanded version of Brahms’ Haydn Variations, as there were more than a few similarities. The theme itself was plainly stated, with excellent woodwinds to thank again, but the variations got increasingly florid while maintaining a basic outline.

Kudos go to both conductor and orchestra for keeping the variations tautly strung, without allowing instrumental ornaments and details to complicate matters. There were even stretches of Straussian opulence and beauty, all coming before the massive fugal finale and the theme’s glorious re-entry. This could have been one big contrapuntal bore, but it simply was not to be.

Concert photographs by the kind courtesy of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra.

PICNIC SUITE / ROBERTO ALVAREZ, KEVIN LOH & FRIENDS / Review

PICNIC SUITE

ROBERTO ALVAREZ, Flute

KEVIN LOH, Guitar et al

Esplanade Recital Studio

Sunday (16 April 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 18 April 2017 with the title "Inspirational folk music". 

Spanish flautist Roberto Alvarez has introduced more new music to audiences than anyone else, including world and local premieres of works by Spanish, Singaporean and New Zealand composers. His latest concert, a collaboration with HSBC Youth Excellence Award recipient guitarist Kevin Loh, however shied away from the avant-garde.

All the works had inspirations from folk music and the past, beginning with Maximo Diego Pujol's Suite Buenos Aires with four movements reflecting colours and flavours of different districts in the Argentine capital. Similarities with Piazzolla's Portenos (Seasons) exist, but these were not tangos. Palermo exuded melancholy and nostalgia, while scherzo-like San Telmo had vigourous rhythms tapped out by Alvarez's feet and Loh's hands.

If one thought Alvarez had all the melodies, Loh showed that his nifty guitar provided more than merely accompaniment. With a good share of lyricism and virtuosic flourishes, he closely tracked the flute in the finale Microcentro, a perpetual motion with spiky dissonances for good effect.

Moving northwards, Celso Machado's Musiques Populaires Bresiliennes exhibited a more gentle side, with less angular and jolting rhythms but no less spirit. Three movements included the title Choros (songs of street musicians), a form also employed by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos. With hardly a line separating folk music from concert music, only a pedant could resist the allure of Sambossa, a bossa nova number lightly spiced with some harmonic ambiguity, leading to Pe De Moleque, which was a fast and lively samba.

The most traditional work was Hungarian Bela Bartok's Six Romanian Dances, a popular study of ethnomusicology. Better known in its version for violin and piano, the flute and guitar guise was no less piquant, but should the audience have applauded after each minute-long dance?

The duo was joined by pianist Kseniia Vokhmianina, double-bassist Tony Makarome and drummer Ramu Thiruyanam in French jazz pianist-composer Claude Bolling's Picnic Suite, receiving its Singapore premiere. Cast in seven movements, it is a tribute to the baroque suite of disparate dances.

Note the picnic basket on the right.

The 1st movement Rococo opened with a fugue. Guitar followed flute, and when the “orchestra” entered, it opened up a new world of sound – of syncopations, blues and collective letting down of hair. Every phrase had been notated on score, but the playing was so natural and convincing that it sounded fresh and improvised.

Gaylancholic was the title of the 3^rd movement, swinging between the two groups, a friendly contest where formal lines alternated with the seemingly informal. “Gay” must be taken in the traditional sense of the word, which means happy. Alvarez turned to the alto flute for the lyrical Tendre, a beautiful interlude before the busy bantering of Badine, a reference to Bach's Badinerie from his Second Suite (which prominently features the flute).

There were two gratefully received encores, a dance by Pixinguinha and an Asturian lullaby sung to Alvarez by his mother. True to form, the latter was also a World Premiere.     

SOUL OF THE SAMURAI / Xposé Guitar Ensemble / Review

SOUL OF THE SAMURAI

Xposé Guitar Ensemble

School of the Arts Concert Hall

Saturday (4 April 2015)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 6 April 2015 with the title "Sword-fighting or serenading?"

It would seem strange that Japanese music should feature prominently in a guitar orchestra's repertoire. The most plausible reason is that the guitar ensemble formed by instruments of different registers and ranges (called a Niibori ensemble) was a Japanese innovation. It was during the 1980s when Alex Abishegaden introduced the Niibori method to Singapore when he founded the Guitar Ensemble of National University of Singapore (GENUS). In turn, alumni of GENUS formed the Xposé Guitar Ensemble which celebrated its 10^th anniversary with this concert.

Xposé founder and conductor Ow Leong San, who is a prominent figure in both guitar and wind communities in Singapore, energetically led this 2-hour long concert that was both interesting and eclectic. Hiro Fujikake's Jongara-Sho was a stirring arrangement of a well-known shamisen melody. It opened percussively with the guitars creating a ceremonial drum-like introduction before launching into the main tune where the plucking of the shamisen (the three-stringed instrument that resembles the Chinese sanxian) was simulated.

Sounding not even remotely Japanese was the World Premiere of Yuudai Hatanaka's guitar concerto Soul Of The Samurai. Its three movements ostensibly depicted martial, spiritual and revolutionary aspects of the Bushido code, but could easily have come from the pen of a Brazilian, Cuban or Latin American composer. This is not meant to be a criticism but when samba or tango melodies and rhythms dominate, having an Oriental title seemed superfluous, even meaningless.

Nevertheless, this was a perfect vehicle for young Singaporean guitar virtuoso Kevin Loh, presently studying at the prestigious Menuhin School in England, to shine. He was amplified to stand out from the rest of the guitar throng and gave a tour de force of technical bravura. His confidence and sheer sturdiness was the main reason why one would easily forgive the work for confusing sword-fighting with serenading.

Loh was also centrestage for videogame composer Nobuo Uematsu's Vamo Alla Flamenco arranged by the ensemble's sole flautist Mohamad Rasull, delving on Spanish dances like the jota and fandango. In such company, the only non-Japanese composer Pascual Narro's Espana Cani, which quotes the popular malaguena, did not seem out of place.

There was a poignant moment when conductor Ow dedicated his own arrangement of Totoro, a medley of Joe Hisaishi tunes from the animated movie My Neighbour Totoro, to Florentina Widodo, biology teacher and fellow guitarist who perished in the 2014 Air Asia disaster. Ironically, this was followed by Hatanaka's Partition Orage, an ensemble work depicting scenes of stormy weather.

The most bizarre work was Kengo Momose's Gold Rush, which saw soloists Leonardo de Guzman and Lim Sheng Jun in cowboy hats playing on electric guitars. Here was a schizophrenic mix of styles, pitting the traditional with the new, in what may be described as spaghetti Western meets the Beatles and heavy metal. The stridency of both electric guitars almost completely overwhelmed their acoustic counterparts, but the full-house audience of mostly teenagers roared their hearty approval.

Their reward was a crooned number of Cantopop karaoke sung by one of the guitarists, with the ensemble as dutiful accompanist. Whoever said that guitar concerts were supposed to be boring?

SHALL WE DANCE? / More Than Music / Review

SHALL WE DANCE?

More Than Music Series

Esplanade Recital Studio

Saturday (13 December 2014)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 15 December 2014 with the title "Slight hiccup but show engages".

Concerts of classical music can be all too serious affairs, so it is refreshing to see an enterprise that attempts to demystify what is considered to be a difficult genre. More Than Music, founded by violinist Loh Jun Hong and pianist Abigail Sin, is such a series to bring music to the masses, albeit in the stuffy confines of a concert hall.

They did the ecologically friendly thing by doing away with programme booklets and printed notes, relying instead on speaking directly to the audience. Sin did so with her polished, received pronounciation, and Loh in a somewhat affected quasi-American accent and slightly irreverent manner. More importantly, they were able to connect with their listeners.

Their guest for the evening was guitarist Kevin Loh, and the concert opened with the two Lohs in three pieces from Manuel de Falla’s Suite of Popular Spanish Songs & Dances. Immediately one is struck by Jun Hong’s easy and natural way with the violin, where the passage of melody and intonation come as freely and spontaneously as breathing.

Kevin was attentive and sensitive as accompanist and soon had his chance in the solo spotlight in two movements from Heitor Villa-Lobos’s Suite Populare Brasilienne. He explained that these were choros, song and dances played by streetside bands. Their improvisatory quality was disarming, and his immaculate technique ensured that the gentle and ever-constant lilt was never lost amid the notes.

There were no pieces to accommodate violin, guitar and piano as a group, so Sin was left to perform piano solos. Displaying much versatility, the former child prodigy was equally comfortable in the music of Bach, Gtiffes and Chopin. In Bach’s French Suite No.5, her ornamentations were tasteful and fingerwork prodigious, except for a short lapse of control in the coruscating final Gigue. 

An acute sense of colour and nuance distinguished her performance of the Scherzo from American composer Charles Griffes’s Three Fantasy Pieces. Its bacchanalian revelry was well captured, contrasted with the earthier feel to the three Mazurkas Op.59 by Chopin. These are the Pole’s more mature utterances, and Sin was fully in tune with his nationalistic and nostalgic spirit.

Loh and Loh returned for three more dances by Brazilian Celso Machado, which possess jazzy and samba rhythms, with a more modern idiomatic twist. This was up-market lounge music, but played with an insouciant yet infectious quality that was hard to dislike.

Finally the gloves were off for Jun Hong, who joked that he was done with easy pieces, in Wieniawski’s Faust Fantasy. With themes from Gounod’s famous opera, he gave a short spiel on Goethe’s anti-hero and diabolical pacts before tearing away in the rip-roaring showpiece. It was going swimmingly until a desynchronisation between Loh and pianist Sin derailed the ride.  

Ironic titters issued from the audience as the duo conferred, before finishing the work in a storm of applause. Guitarist Kevin then returned with a welcome encore, a sonatina movement by Torroba. There were many children among the listeners, but they were impeccably behaved throughout the two-hour concert. That is what happens when audiences are fully engaged by a performance. In that respect, More Than Music had more than succeeded brilliantly.

HSBC YOUTH EXCELLENCE AWARDS CONCERT 2012 / Review

HSBC Youth Excellence Award Concert 2012

University Cultural Centre

Thursday (30 August 2012)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 1 September 2012 with the title "Depth of talent".

The HSBC Youth Excellence Award has been around since 2000, and if one scans its roll of honour, it reads like a very impressive young Who’s Who of classical music in Singapore. Every year, a new name is added and one marvels at the depth of talent that exists here.

The annual showcase concert, attended by President and Mrs Tony Tan, opened with performances by two previous recipients. Guitarist Kevin Loh (2010 winner), student at the Menuhin School, showed his mettle in Joaquin Turina’s flamenco dance-inspired Homage to Tarrega.

His keen perception of pulse and rhythm was allied with sensitivity of touch, both of which provided a strong backbone for Astor Piazzolla’s L’Histoire du Tango (History of the Tango), where he was joined by violinist Gabriel Ng (2006 winner). The four-movement suite was an enjoyable chronological treatise of the tango, and the duo blended well, delighting in its tricky counterpoint, and alternating sultry and fiery spirits.

This year’s awardee was unveiled as 10-year-old cellist Aoden Teo Masa Toshi, who had earlier made a very public appearance at this year’s National Day Parade. The smiley and bespectacled lad is the very portrait of confidence and poise. His sense of purpose and enthusiasm makes one want to listen to him, and hold the audience captive he did.

Aoden Teo plays Saint-Saëns's Allegro Appassionato with pianist Michelle Seah.

His Prelude from Bach’s Suite No.1 had both clarity and rock steadiness, besides being able to shade the repeated arpeggios with contour and colour. The cantabile line in Saint-Saens’s The Swan was deliciously shaped, and when fireworks were called for, his mastery of the same composer’s Allegro Appassionato was accomplished with breathtaking ease.

Some inexperience showed in the performance with the Orchestra of the Music Makers of Saint-Saens’s First Cello Concerto. Several spots saw intonation go awry, and synchronisation was not always perfect. As only the first movement was played, the music came to an unsatisfying jolting halt. One hopes to hear him in the whole work sometime soon. 

The young orchestra (itself the recipient in 2009) conducted by Chan Tze Law also accompanied Gabriel Ng in the rip-roaring finale of Mozart’s First Violin Concerto. Its own showcase was equally prodigious, first polishing off Walton’s Spitfire Prelude & Fugue with requisite pomp and aplomb. The highlights from Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake were also gripping, with the opulence of playing easily overcoming the dry acoustics of the hall.

As an encore, all three young soloists joined the orchestra in Elgar’s rambunctious Wild Bears from The Wand of Youth, with Kevin Loh ditching his guitar for the humble triangle. Clearly everyone on stage was enjoying themselves, and that is what makes these awards well worth the while and outlay.

The most recent HSBC Youth Excellence Award for Music winners (from L): Violinist Gabriel Ng (2006), Guitarist Kevin Loh (2010), Cellist Aoden Teo Masa Toshi (2012) with conductor Chan Tze Law and the Orchestra of Music Makers (2009).