A CELLO LIFE / Voice of the Cello 10th Anniversary Concert / Review

 

A CELLO LIFE 

Voice of the Cello 

10th Anniversary Concert 

Chijmes Hall 

Thursday (28 November 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 30 November 2024 with the title "Voice of the Cello's 10th anniversary concert a celebration of budding young talent".

Voice of the Cello (VOTC) is a collective for cellists founded by cellist and cello teacher Natasha Liu which made its debut at the Singapore Raffles International Music Festival in 2014. What appeared then like an encouraging prospect has now burgeoned into a full-blown movement merging musical excellence with an unadulterated sense of fun. 

There were 32 cello cases. Count them all.

Popper Eight.

No less than 32 young cellists played at VOTC’s 10th anniversary concert, in a wide-ranging programme from solos to massed performances. The opening act had The Popper Eight, an octet of eight to eleven-year-old girls, playing Bohemian composer David Popper’s Polonaise de Concert (Op.14). Coordination and intonation was an initial concern but they soon warmed up, giving the lively dance music its shine. 

Next came a series of duos and solos accompanied by pianist Michelle Seah. Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Pezzo Capriccioso (Op.62) paired 13-year-old Alyssa Teo with 12-year-old Ji Yuanjun, who were very well matched. Together, they brought out the work’s melodic allure and Slavic melancholy, with a short virtuosic flourish to close. 

In the fiery first movement of Camille Saint-Saens’ First Cello Concerto, Amelie See (12) played keen mentor to Lexi Eugenie (8), with a cohesiveness palpable despite their age-gap. A similar tandem saw Jacqueline Low (10) with Wang Yaxi (13) in Nicolo Paganini’s Mose-Fantasia, based on music by Gioachino Rossini, with the result being just as astonishing. 

In the solos, Grace Joy Chee (10) navigated Frederic Chopin’s Polonaise Brillante (Op.3) with utter confidence, its lyrical cantabile opening soon progressing to impressive fireworks. After that, Lucas Liow (13) ably brought out the dramatics of the opening movement of Antonin Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B minor. 

Arguably the most arresting performance of all came from Natalie Yong (15) in Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme, scaling its peaks and troughs with an authority and ease that seemed uncanny. Here is a natural talent who could walk into any music conservatory of her choice. 

The concert’s shorter second half was devoted to cello playing involving larger groups. William Squire’s Danse Rustique saw the six members of Cello Buds (all under 9) playing in an even unison voice. For Saint-Saens’ The Swan, the six players of Cello Cygnets divided their labour between bowing melodies and plucking pizzicatos. 

One of the youngest cellists
demonstrating her ballet moves in Le Cygne.

The Cello Oppas at work.

The mixed group of Alpha Origins, six girls and two boys, generated a pleasant blend of sound in Tomaso Albinoni Adagio in G minor. A half-dozen of older teenaged boys called the Cello Oppas brought out the angst and pathos of John Williams’ Main Theme from Schindler’s List. The unaccompanied quartet of Jazz Belles played it cool in Duke Ellington’s It Don’t Mean A Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing). 

14 cellists and 4 tambourine players.

The stage got ever more congested with an increasing number of players, the peak being reached with 14 cellists in Astor Piazzolla’s rocking Libertango before the closing Hymn a l’Amour by Edith Piaf with ten performers. The sheer passion and enthusiasm shared by all who performed can only bode well for the future of the instrument in Singapore.

Pianist Michelle Seah and
VOTC founder Natasha Liu get their bouquets.

MADELINE GOH Violin Recital / STORIES FROM THE HEART by Voice of the Cello / Review

MADELINE GOH Violin Recital

Esplanade Recital Studio

Wednesday (4 January 2023)

 

STORIES FROM THE HEART

Voice of the Cello

School of the Arts Concert Hall

Sunday (8 January 2023)

 

This review was published in The Straits Times on 10 January 2022 with the title "Concerts showcase Singapore's wealth of string talent".

If one wondered how Singapore produces so many excellent young musicians in recent decades, the answer can be attributed to good teaching. Pioneering classical musician Goh Soon Tioe (1911-1982), violinist, conductor, pedagogue and impresario, saw to the beginning of this renaissance. His legacy lives on through his many students and awards bestowed in his memory.

Photo: Gilbert Chan

 

The tenth and latest recipient of the Goh Soon Tioe Centenary Award was 15-year-old violinist Madeline Goh Anyi, former student of violinist Min Lee, who is pursuing pre-college studies at the Salzburg Mozarteum. Her hour-long recital was a showcase of precocity balanced by maturity beyond tender years.

Photo: Gilbert Chan

 

In Mozart’s Violin Sonata in B flat major (K.378), the hallmarks of fine musicianship were displayed, including clarity of articulation, beautiful cantabile tone, excellent intonation and  attention to phrasing and nuances. There was never a moment of artifice as she and pianist Beatrice Lin sang their way through to its virtuosic close in double-quick time.  

Photo: Gilbert Chan

 

In unaccompanied music, Goh was nigh unimpeachable in two movements from J.S.Bach’s Sonata No.2 in A major, with the fugue’s complex counterpoint mastered with aplomb. Scaling fiendish heights in Paganini’s mercurial Caprice No.10 and contemporary Austrian composer Gerhard Wimberger’s Toi, Toi, Toi (2016), tricks and cliches of the trade were laid out and skilfully dissected with a surgeon’s precision.

 

There were moments to relax in Eugene Ysaye’s salon-like Mazurka (In A Distance) in gentle triple-time but all stops were pulled for Wieniawski’s showpiece Polonaise in D major,  bringing down the house. As an encore, Madeline was joined by elder sister Mathea (award recipient in 2016) in the Allegro movement from Prokofiev’s Sonata for two violins (Op.56), a show of perfect synchrony demonstrating that musical talent does run in families.

Madeline Goh receives her big cheque
from Vivien Goh,Goh Soon Tioe's daughter.

 

If one thought pianists and violinists were main foci of attention, young cellists have begun to have their say. Stories From The Heart was a fundraiser for The Business Times Budding Artist Fund presented by Voice of the Cello, a collective mentored by veteran cellist Natasha Liu. No less than 40 cellists performed in this impressive showcase.

Amelie See with Michelle Seah

 

Its first half highlighted solo works, with 10-year-old Amelie See opening in Bohemian composer David Popper’s Polonaise de Concert with a display of confidence and poise. Even younger was 8-year-old Grace Joy Chee who blew away Saint-Saëns’ showpiece Allegro Appasionato with relative ease, followed by Ji Yuanjun (10) in the finale from Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C major, possessing both lightness and fleet-fingeredness.

Grace Joy Chee

Natalie Yong

 

By way of contrast, Lucas Liow (11) bared his heart and soul in the contemplative Andante movement of Rachmaninov’s ever-popular Cello Sonata, while Natalie Yong (13) luxuriated in the cantabile opening of Paganini’s Variations on Rossini’s Moses in Egypt, and never faltered as the work got increasingly thorny by the minute. All the works were partnered by pianist Michelle Seah.

 

The concert’s second half featured cello ensemble works ranging from three to twelve cellists. Six six-year-olds delighted in Tchaikovsky’s Sugar Plum Fairy while twelve seven-to-nines had their work cut out in William Squire’s very animated Tarantella. Stealing the show were four immaculately dressed lasses in all-white outfits for Saint-Saëns’ The Swan, and a choreographed  Elgar’s Salut d’amour for three cellists accompanying three dancers befitting the gracefulness of the music. Just too cute for words.

 

Six twelve-year-olds tackled Gabriel Fauré’s Elegie, calling for sobriety and depth of expression without piano accompaniment, while Shostakovich’s Waltz No.2 closed the variety programme on a lighter note. The grand finale saw the entire ensemble of 40 cellists converge in Harold Arlen’s Over The Rainbow, with a melody that would melt even the stoutest of hearts. Singapore’s got talent, and there are no two ways about it.  

Photo: Voice of the Cello

VOICE OF CELLO & CHAMBER MUSIC NIGHT / Singapore Raffles International Music Festival / Review

VOICE OF CELLO & 

CHAMBER MUSIC NIGHT

Singapore Raffles 

International Music Festival

The Chamber @ The Arts House

Wednesday (20 August 2014)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 22 August 2014 with the title "Upbeat end to cello, chamber gig".

The inaugural Singapore Raffles International Music Festival brought together talented young musicians and teachers from Asia in four days of competition, masterclasses and concerts at The Arts House. The third evening’s concert was a showcase in two parts, the first half highlighting ensemble cello playing, followed by chamber music.

Opening the evening was a guest performance by 9-year-old cellist Li Zi Yi who gave an adroit and confident account of the 1^st movement from Saint-Saens’s First Cello Concerto. How unusual it is for a musician to be so technically strong yet at a loss of words on being interviewed. When asked what piece he was to perform, all he could muster was, “I forgot!” much to the amusement of the audience.    

The cello ensembles that followed were spared the blushes of awkwardness. The Malaysian Cello Quartet had fun with three Malay songs and dances in excellent arrangements by Leonard Yeap, which the ronggeng took on the warmth and sultriness of Latin American tangos. The Natasha Liu Studio Ensemble (below) of eight coaxed a rich and fulsome sound in the central section of David Popper’s Concert Polonaise, with their leader-mentor Liu impressively helming the solo cadenzas.

The young SOTA Cello Ensemble (above) was boosted with one more player, but was over-rushed in Schubert’s First Military March, with a reading that lacked nuance or subtlety. When four teachers - Liu, So Youn Park, Song Woon Teng and Linda Kollati (below) - came together in an arrangement Albinoni’s famous Adagio in G minor, they showed how things were done, with much feeling and tenderness.

The chamber music half began with the 1^st movement of Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet from the MusicPro Camerata Kuala Lumpur (above). Standing out was clarinettist Chen Ya-Ching whose tone was full-bodied and phrasing amply articulated, well supported by her string colleagues even if they briefly grappled with intonation issues.

Much welcome was a performance of Italian baroque composer Giuseppe Brescianello’s Sonata in G minor on period instruments (above). Leading on baroque violin was none other than Alan Choo, who shared the melodic lines with Trevor Sze on baroque bassoon. The accompaniment was provided by Shawn Tan’s baroque cello and Shane Thio whose harpsichord notes were simulated on electronic keyboard. The sound in its three movements, mellow yet incisive, was a breath of fresh air.

The concert closed with the dynamic duo of flautist Roberto Alvarez and harpist Katryna Tan. Young Singaporean Chen Zhangyi’s Five Constellations were short and varied numbers with maximum mileage yielded from both instruments. In the final two pieces, flowing lyricism in Coma Berenices was well contrasted with the jazzy flourishes of Eridanus. The infectious Spanish rhythms of Jacques Ibert’s Entr’acte gave a suitably animated and upbeat note to close the proceedings. 

The Natasha Liu Studio Ensemble with
Singapore's "First Lady of the Cello" Mrs Herminia Ilano.

The Malaysian Cello Quartet with
Natasha Liu (extreme L) and Mrs Herminia Ilano.

All photos by the kind permission of the Singapore Raffles International Music Festival.

A VIRTUOSO'S ENCOUNTER: EAST MEETS WEST / Ding Yi Music Company / Review

 

 

 

A VIRTUOSO’S ENCOUNTER: EAST MEETS WEST

Ding Yi Music Company with I-Sis Trio

Esplanade Recital Studio

Tuesday (18 December 2012)

 

This review was published in The Straits Times on 20 December 2012 with the title "Bold explorations".

 

There are several qualities that unite the Ding Yi Music Company with its senior counterpart the Singapore Chinese Orchestra, one of which is its zeal to collaborate with musicians from different cultures. The I-Sis Trio, comprising harpist Katryna Tan, violinist Cindy Yan and cellist Natasha Liu, was its latest guest in a 90-minute long exploration of widely disparate musical idioms.

 

Each soloist performed separately with the ensemble of Chinese instruments, conducted by Quek Ling Kiong, beginning with Tan’s own Water Dance which juxtaposed dissonances with lyricism. Although inspired by the popular Chinese tune Flowing Water, Tan’s score also paid heed to the rugged landscapes and rocky outcrops through which streams flowed, which accounted for its seemingly uncompromising modernism.

 

 

Yan and Liu’s individual solos were more conventional, the former in the familiar Fishing Boats at Dusk with its slow-fast rhapsodic schema, and the latter in Liu Zhuang’s Romanza based on a Xinjiang folksong, a Central Asian-flavoured elegy that could have come from the pen of a Russian composer. Close your eyes, and the ensemble’s plucked pipas and ruans sounded like balalaikas.

 

The trio then performed Reminisce by young Singaporean composer and arranger Phang Kok Jun, also a zhonghu player of Ding Yi. This is one of those unremittingly lush pieces the melody of which lingers on long after the work has ended.

 

 

All three were joined by the sheng and percussion for Jia Da Qun’s The Prospect of Coloured Desert, an atonal work even thornier than Water Dance. The sonorities of this instrumental combination were however most interesting, the gentle throbbing marimba and harp sharply contrasted with more penetrating tones from the sheng and bowed strings.  

 

By now, the audience had its fill of contemporary music, and the mood lightened considerably for Piazzolla’s Milonga del Angel and Lecuona’s Malaguena, Latino standards of the I-Sis repertoire. The supporting orchestrations by Lu Heng and Wynne Fung respectively were subtle, the presence of the Chinese instruments coming to bear strongly only during their climaxes.

 

There was a bizarre-sounding Variations on Jingle Bells in a gamut of rhythmic styles, including a waltz, swing, rock and roll, which called for the obligatory audience clap-along. This left an odd taste in the mouth, like cheese-coated durian pastries. All was forgiven when Piazzolla’s vibrant Libertango was offered as an encore, which worked like a charm and sent everyone home with a kick in the step.