IMAGES OF EXOTIC LANDS / re:Sound / Review

 

IMAGES OF EXOTIC LANDS 

re:Sound 

Victoria Concert Hall 

Wednesday (13 November 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 15 November 2024 with the title "Impressive soloists and enjoyable romp by re:Sound".

If one thought that classical music was old-fashioned, staid and boring, one just needs to attend the latest concert by re:Sound, Singapore’s first professional chamber orchestra, for a serious rethink. Which famous orchestra had as its motto, “True Pleasure Is Serious Business”? That could very well apply to re:Sound’s collective identity as well. 

The concert opened with the world premiere of Cultural Medallion recipient Eric Watson’s Concerto Arabesque for flute and strings. A happy marriage of the Baroque concerto grosso and hallowed British string work tradition, its four movements were highly engaging and enjoyable. 

A more excellent soloist than Rachel Ho, familiar to concert-goers as Red Dot Baroque’s traverso player, would be hard to find. She comfortably surmounted the onerous technical challenges in its fast outer movements, yet yielded a silky smooth tone for the second movement’s filigreed and sinuous lines, accompanied by sliding string portamenti. 

Composer Eric Watson takes a bow.

The third movement’s slow tango oozed sensuousness over a palpable South American beat, and the solo arabesques for the finale had everyone’s attention captivated. Even its false ending had nobody fooled, with vociferous applause coming when it truly mattered. 

Programming Maurice Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin after Watson was elementary, a case of perfect symmetry. Its four neo-Baroque dance movements complemented and mirrored the earlier work. Fluidity of string playing defined the flowing opening Prelude, and the quirkily syncopated Forlane benefited from extrovert woodwind and discreet brass contributions. 

The slow Menuet was the only concession to formality, while the closing Rigaudon’s romp again had woodwinds in top form for its central interlude. Tay Kai Tze’s oboe stole the show, with cor anglais, flute and clarinet following up his good work. 

In case no one noticed, the entire first half was performed with the conspicuous absence of a conductor. For the second half, Francis Poulenc’s Concerto for Two Pianos had Adrian Chiang leading from the podium, if only to keep all the riotous elements in check. 

The impressive soloists were Nicholas Loh and Jonathan Shin, who had earlier played examples from the concerto during re:Sound founder Mervin Beng’s eloquent yet succinct preamble about its musical themes. Chief of these were tinklings of the Balinese gamelan, with pelog scales getting a workout, Mozartian niceties with a Gallic twist, and Parisian dancehall frivolities all wrapped up in three neat movements. 

Despite being very different pianistic personalities, Loh and Shin worked like hand and glove, with pinpoint precision and unfettered clangour. The hypnotic slow section at the first movement’s end was so filled with Oriental mystique that one could almost smell the incense. 

The joke-a-minute Finale, with fingers flying over both keyboards, seemed like too much of a good thing. However, the final word was left to the “gamelan” making its run of mass malleting before closing with several healthy slaps of the bottom. The duo’s encore of the uproarious Finale from Poulenc’s Sonata for piano four hands was just as rousingly received.

CONCORDIA QUARTET @ HOME / Review

CONCORDIA QUARTET @ HOME

Streamed Live on the Internet

Friday (12 June 2020) 

This review was published in The Straits Times on 15 June 2020 with the title "Hurdles aplenty, but quartet's first online concert a success."

  

The Concordia Quartet, Singapore’s latest professional chamber group, made its debut in February  at the Ngee Ann Kongsi Theatre (Funan Centre) to critical acclaim. Its second public concert was another first, a live performance by four musicians on the Internet, separated physically by Covid-19 circuit breaker and social distancing rules.

Its players, violinists Edward Tan and Kim Kyu Ri, violist Matthias Oestringer and cellist Theophilus Tan, never had face-to-face rehearsals for this concert. Instead, they played from their own living rooms, united by nifty technology, employing the Jamulus audio software, high-tech headsets and microphones, and the ubiquitous Zoom app for visual cues.

Its audience was alerted via social media, and tuned into Youtube for the concert experience. While it seemed a surreal experience attending a concert remotely, one was spared of extraneous distractions like rustling programmes, fidgety children, and worst of all, coughs and sniffles.

Concordia’s programme was a compact one, just under half an hour of music, boosted by a question-and-answer session hosted by technical controller and Resound Collective’s founder Mervin Beng. These precious few minutes were however hard earned, given the logistical hurdles to overcome, but paid off handsomely.

There was a false start at the beginning with Mozart’s Divertimento in D major (K.136) which was quickly remedied. As there was a lag phase between visual and aural inputs for the musicians, it seemed a miracle they even came together at all. All that will be down to hard work getting used to the medium and how professional musicians adapt to each other’s music-making.    

Like in a jazz combo, a three-count from first violinist Tan was needed to start the music flowing, when a nod of the head used to suffice. The issue of balance surfaced for a short while in the lively opening movement, when accompanying low strings sounded over-emphatic but that was also corrected. The slow movement was lovingly coaxed, while the fast finale which necessitated pin-point accuracy was driven to a breathless close.

This was what viewers got to see at home.

Judging by positive live comments from its audience, this experiment was going to be a success. The heart of the concert belonged to Russian nationalist composer Alexander Borodin’s Second String Quartet. While some hoped to hear its popular and melancolic Notturno, the more meaty opening movement was performed instead.

By now, the quartet had more than warmed up and wearing heart on sleeve, this ultra-Romantic music’s passionate throes were milked for all its worth. For the online listener, this was as good as it gets. As a short encore, the world premiere of young local composer Jonathan Shin’s highly idiomatic arrangement of the Beatles hit-song Eleanor Rigby was the icing on the cake. Judging by positive live comments from its audience, this experiment was a success.

While live concerts witnessed by a live audience in a concert hall will not die an ignominious death, could online concerts such as this be a regular feature of the new normal?

You can view the video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k14_9OQX4zA

CHAMBER PLAYERS / The Chamber Players / Review

CHAMBER PLAYERS

The Chamber Players

Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Orchestra

Sunday (15 March 2015)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 17 March 2015 with the title "From the familiar to the obscure".

The Chamber Players is the only surviving non-professional classical music ensemble that existed during the early 1980s. In those days, classical music here was just the newly-formed professional Singapore Symphony Orchestra and a small handful of amateur groups. After a hiatus of almost twenty years, The Chamber Players returned under the leadership of engineer, French horn player cum Straits Times music critic Mervin Beng, becoming the mainstay of the Singapore Chamber Music Festival.

The Festival is now run by the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, and The Chamber Players makes regular appearances with interesting programmes that juxtapose the familiar with the rarely heard, like the one this evening. Very familiar was Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, designated as a Serenade in G major, but resembles a 4-movement symphony in miniature.

The ensemble brought out a rich string sound, unafraid to apply vibrato whenever possible. Performing without a conductor, the players took their lead from experienced concertmaster Seah Huan Yuh, one of few professional musicians assisting the group. The slow movement radiated warmth, and even the tricky fast central section held little terrors. The 3rd movement's Minuetto flowed unabated, but the quicksilver finale was taken a tad too cautiously to be truly thrilling.

Rather unfamiliar was the Viola Concerto in D major by Franz Anton Hoffmeister (1754-1812), a German-born Viennese better known as a music publisher and close friend of Beethoven's. This innocuous and attractive little work gave much by way of display to young violist Jeremy Chiew, who lapped up every virtuoso turn with relish, including a couple of showy cadenzas.

His tone was healthy and robust, putting paid to those violist jokes about violin envy. The ensemble included two oboes and two horns which contributed to overall body of sound in this Mozart-like work, which closed with a jocular Rondo that stretched and extended the players' abilities to the max.

Very obscure was Bohemian composer Leos Janacek's Idyll For Strings, an early work from the 1870s before he developed his spare but immediately recognisable hallmark style. The spirit of Dvorak looms over its seven movements, with a melodic charm that is hard to dislike. Based on folktunes and rhythms, its occasional irregular meters troubled the players at times, which was when the ensemble could have benefited from a conductor's baton.

The fifth movement's Adagio saw some of the best playing, a heartfelt plaint based on the Slavic dumka, a lament that distinguishes much of Eastern European musical tradition. Despite the inherent difficulties, the general outcome was a positive and admirable one, enjoyed by the Kent Ridge faithful. It was thus a pity that the ensemble briefly acknowledged the applause, and then immediately broke rank and disassembled.

Milking the applause for the efforts of weeks of rehearsals is also part of showmanship and the concert game, something that musical amateurs can learn from the professionals.

SSO @ BBC PROMS / Review, Report and Reactions

Here are The Straits Times reviews and reports of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra's recent BBC Proms debut on 2 September 2014. Needless to say, the national orchestra covered itself with pride and made the nation proud of its achievements. Above is the ST review by fellow music reviewer Mervin Beng on 4 September. By the way, shouldn't the byline read "SSO sizzles" rather than "SSO sizzle"?

Also included is the official report by ST arts writer Lisabel Ting on 5 September, which quotes the Facebook of Minister for Culture, Communications and Youth Lawrence Wong who was in London for the concert.

He had posted this photo of the audience reaction at the end of the concert, which showed a Singapore flag being proudly flown... by a British gentleman Neil Franks Esq. who had lived in Singapore for 30 years before returning to England. 

Here is Neil Franks's letter to The Straits Times forum page on 6 September declaring his pride to have enjoyed and appreciated the Singapore's music scene over the years.

Here's another photo of the Singapore flag
proudly flown at the Royal Albert Hall
(Photo: Courtesy of  Mr Goh Yew Lin)

... and my letter to The Straits Times in the hope that some day, a Singaporean composer's work gets played by the SSO the next time it gets invited to the BBC Proms. This is followed by SSO General Manager Anthony Brice's reply, which does give some hope for the future. Let's hope that the BBC bites!

10 YEARS YOUNG! / The Chamber Players / Review

10 YEARS YOUNG!
The Chamber Players
Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Concert Hall
Sunday (19 September 2010)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 21 September 2010.

Like a woman who understates her real age, The Chamber Players (TCP), a mostly-amateur ensemble actually dating back to the early 1980s, celebrated its 10th anniversary with a stirring concert. Its present incarnation, brainchild of engineer, lecturer and French horn player Mervin Beng, is an outfit that instills serious fun in music-making despite having lofty ambitions.

Czech composer Josef Suk’s Serenade for Strings is a rarely-heard work long championed by this group. Its ingratiatingly melodies, like the Serenade of his father-in-law Dvorak, benefited from the warm, lush timbre produced by the Players, and aided by the hall’s reverberant acoustics.

The gentle lilt, lament-like elegy and quicksilver flourishes in the ensuing movements were deftly handled, with the music’s spirit being chief beneficiary. Despite the odd raw edges, the ensemble showed it had definitely matured over the past decade.

A regular collaborator with TCP has been Malaysia-born pianist Dennis Lee (above). Conducting from the keyboard, he helmed a polished and sensitive performance of Beethoven’s sleek Second Piano Concerto in B flat major (Op.19). The earliest and most Mozartean of five numbered piano concertos, Lee balanced its light-footed countenance with nervous tension, keeping the music on a keen edge throughout.

The orchestra responded with gusto, supporting his every gesture and turn of phrase sympathetically. Never mind the raspberry at the Rondo’s end, it was the coming of minds in a laudable group effort that really counted.

As the first commissioned work by TCP, the World Premiere of Simple-X by Robert Casteels and Seah Huan Yuh could not have been more different. Simply it may be described as a concertante for piano, three iPads, electro-acoustics and strings. Casteels led this odd-looking ensemble from the piano, hammering out repeated chords and clusters, cueing 18 string players who crafted ostinatos of their own.

As Robert Casteels leads, T'ang Quartet's violist

Han Oh (extreme right) takes his turn on the iPad.

Seah Huan Yuh and his PC are in the foreground.

Groups of players would then leave their stands to fiddle with the iPads located forestage, conjuring a fairyland mélange of tingling tones. This sequence would go on until every player had done its bit, with Seah at his PC, controlling a variety of sound effects and white noise. Fantastical and dreamlike, whether deliberate or random, the work generated a warm response from an audience more accustomed to Mozart and Haydn.

Could new music be a new direction The Chamber Players are taking?