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

 

PRESIDENT’S YOUNG 

PERFORMERS CONCERT

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Saturday (12 September 2026)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 13 September 2026 with the title "Singaporean classical talents shine in President's Young Performers Concert".

The annual President’s Young Performers Concert by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra is the ultimate platform for Singaporean classical soloists under the age of 25. This year’s edition, conducted by Jason Lai, had several interesting and pleasant surprises. For the first time, each concertante work was preceded and complemented by a rarely-played purely orchestral work.

English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams’ The Wasps Overture (1909), with its buzzing strings and rousing pentatonic melodies, was the prelude to Swedish composer and orthopaedic practitioner Franz Berwald’s Konzertstuck (Concert Piece, 1827) for bassoon and orchestra.

Typical of early-Romantic showpieces, its mix of bel canto lyricism and technical pyrotechnics also included a set of florid variations on Henry Bishop’s Home, Sweet Home. Its myriad complexities were superbly articulated by Shi Jia Ao, Yong Siew Toh Conservatory alumnus presently pursuing his masters degree in Mannheim, Germany.

Frenchman Andre Caplet’s lush 1911 orchestration of Claude Debussy’s popular Clair de lune heralded an even more sensuous work, Maurice Ravel’s song cycle Sheherazade (1903). The titular character from the Arabian Nights does not appear here, instead its intimations of exoticism and eroticism are explicit in the French texts by Tristan Klingsor, nom-de-plume of Leon Leclere.

Soprano Natasha Da Costa lived every word from the moment she sultrily voiced “Asie, Asie, Asie”, an invitation to dream and escape into the allure of Asia. Her perfect French and strong characterisations continued into La flute enchantee (The Enchanted Flute), a love song with Evgueni Brokmiller’s sinuous flute solo as protagonist, and L’indifferent (The Indifferent One) where beauty is unattainable and desire unfulfilled.

Another English work, George Butterworth’s The Banks of Green Willow (1913), opened the concert’s second half. SSO’s fabled strings were evocative of an English pastoral scene, filled with nostalgia and capturing the loss of innocence. Poignantly, this became Butterworth’s masterpiece before he was killed on the Somme during the First World War.

Photo: Clive Choo

Far more cheerful was Erich Korngold’s Violin Concerto (1947), one of the most-performed 20th century violin concertos. Famously premiered by Lithuanian-American violinist Jascha Heifetz, it received a suitably extroverted performance from Kaelyn Soh, who is double majoring in Music and Chemistry / Molecular Physics in London.

Kaelyn Soh in 2014,
when she won the Mediacorp
Symphony 92.4 Young Talents Competition.

Its three movements drew from four Hollywood movies scored by Korngold - Another Dawn, Juarez, Anthony Adverse and The Prince and the Pauper. Totally comfortable with its blend of arch-lyricism and virtuosic diablerie, Soh commanded the stage with bold authority and stunning aplomb.

The audience was moved to applaud between every movement, however inappropriately, but accorded her a rare standing ovation on the concerto’s conclusion. Attended by President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Jane Ittogi, this concert shone for its eclecticism and excellence of execution. Verdict: the kids are getting better and better.

President Tharman Shanmugaratnam
and Jane Ittogi meet with music
philanthropists Kris Tan and Lim Kang Ning.

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

 

PRESIDENT'S YOUNG 

PERFORMERS CONCERT

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Saturday (20 September 2025)

This review was first published on Bachtrack.com on 22 September 2025 with the title "Singapore’s Got Talent! Three President’s Young Performers hit the jackpot".

One dream of young classical musicians growing up in Singapore is a chance to perform a concerto with the national orchestra. Since the mid-1990s, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra’s (SSO) annual President Young Performers Concert has made that dream come true for dozens of musical talents. After two consecutive editions that highlighted pianists, this year’s gala gave golden tickets to a saxophonist, clarinettist and harpist.

Photo: Clive Choo

It was a pity that President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and his wife were not present to witness three excellent concerto performances with the SSO led by Associate Conductor Rodolfo Barráez. The evening opened with the Singapore premiere of Frenchman Henri Tomasi’s Saxophone Concerto (1949), performed by 18-year-old Dante Tan Yu Jie, student at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts. Despite its date of composition, this was no avant-garde nasty, but a lushly orchestrated score which resembled those of biblical movie epics. Tan made most of his opportunity by crafting a rich, creamy tone which confidently cut through thickets of orchestral textures. The tricky cadenzas were very well negotiated, including one accompanied by harp, before energetically racing off in the jazzy syncopations of the finale, aptly titled Giration.

Photo: Clive Choo

Another SSO premiere saw 22-year-old Chua Jay Roon, student at the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, take on the thorny challenges of Carl Nielsen’s Clarinet Concerto Op.57 (1928). Its angular dance-like main theme derived from folk music was very well projected, dominating much of the single-movement work. Her virtuoso credentials were established on the outset, handling the highly chromatic and convoluted passages with much natural ease. An ongoing duel with Jonathan Fox’s snare drum (echoes of the belligerence in Nielsen’s Fifth Symphony) ratcheted up the tension, before the concerto coming to a surprisingly peaceable close. Responding with a fist pump, Chua knew she had nailed it, and the audience responded with equal enthusiasm.

Photo: Clive Choo

After the intermission, it was the turn of 19-year-old Renee Yadav, recent graduate from the School of the Arts, with her solo in Claude Debussy’s Danses sacrée et profane (1904). Quite unlike the exuberance of the earlier wind concertos, this was a far more sedate affair but one lit up by Yadav’s grace and dignified poise. Clarity and purity of her lines shone through the light string accompaniment, first in the chaste opening dance before letting loose somewhat in the gentle waltz rhythm of the second dance. There was nothing profane about it, just a show of a little self-determination which came up trumps in the end.

Completing the evening was an ebullient reading of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No.4 in A major, popularly known as the Italian Symphony. Conductor Barráez led with an easy authority, bringing out the Mediterranean sunshine of the opening movement, then maintained a steady but not strait-jacketed pulse for the second movement’s religious procession. The third movement’s dance had a more casual air about it, tempered by martial interjections from the winds. The finale’s Saltarello was taken at a furious pace, closing a very satisfying concert where the youths shined... with or without the President.

The original article may be found here:

President’s Young Performers at the Singapore Symphony | Bachtrack

Star Rating: ****

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

 

PRESIDENT’S YOUNG 

PERFORMERS CONCERT 

Singapore Symphony Orchestra 

Victoria Concert Hall 

Friday (13 September 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 16 September 2024 with the title "Ebullient show at President's Young Performers Concert".

Graced by President Tharman Shanmugaratnam, this year’s President’s Young Performers Concert by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra led by Associate Conductor Rodolfo Barraez was a very accessible programme built around a common theme of youth and precociousness. 

Opening with Felix Mendelssohn’s Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, this work of genius from a mere 17-year-old was distinguished by feathery light string playing reliving Shakespeare’s realm of fairies and magical spells. Wry humour came in the form of repeated brays, musical representation of Nick Bottoms’ character with a donkey’s head, which was milked for all its worth. 

Two young pianists from Yong Siew Toh Conservatory’s Young Artist Programme, both students of Albert Tiu, had been selected from live auditions to perform for the president. The first was 16-year-old Toby Tan Kai Rong, who was awarded first prize at the 2023 Aarhus International Piano Competition (Denmark), in Sergei Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (Op.43). 

Seldom has someone this young left such an indelible imprint on a tried and tested warhorse, supremely confident yet highly nuanced was his memorable reading. Technically unimpeachable, he dispatched the harp-like Variation 11 and treacherously difficult runs of Variation 15 with seeming effortlessness. 

Furthermore, the manner in which he built up famous Variation 18, with restraint and no little rubato before the collective outburst of emotion, was the touch of a master. The work’s thrilling climax and laconic close drew the loudest cheers, to which he reciprocated with Rachmaninov’s “Little Red Riding Hood” Etude-Tableaux in A minor (Op.39 No.6) as an exciting encore. 

19-year-old Adrian Tang, 1st prizewinner of the 2023 National Piano & Violin Competition (Senior category) and presently his serving national service, was no less trenchant in Sergei Prokofiev’s youthful First Piano Concerto in D flat major (Op.10). In this heady mix of clashing dissonance and lush lyricism, an explosive energy characterised his opening salvo. Despite almost coming undone with a rash of missed notes, he kept his composure and never faltered thereafter. 

A more than secure technique and steely brilliance ensured this was an exciting 16-minute ride, including a hyper-Romantic central slow section and the concerto’s coruscating and breathless close. His encore of Moritz Moszkowski’s Etincelles (Sparks) was scintillating, after which he was joined by Tan for Aram Khachaturian’s Sabre Dance from the ballet Gayaneh on four hands, a gala of sweeping glissandi. 

The concert closed with Prokofiev’s First Symphony in D major (Op.25), also known as the Classical Symphony because it was crafted as a pastiche in the manner of the four-movement symphonies of Haydn and Mozart. 

Conducted by Barraez from memory, the first movement was led at a riproaring pace, contrasted with a graceful Larghetto slow movement and a quaint Gavotte dressed up with a generous helping of rubato. A blistering finale brought this enjoyable evening to an ebullient close.

Adrian Tang (who's doing National Service)
and Toby Tan with their teacher, Prof Albert Tiu
of the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory.
Two further pianists who played for the President,
Hao Jia and Pualina Lim were also Albert's Tiudents.
Photo: Goh Kai Cheng (his turn coming soon!)

Review of the same concert that appeared on Bachtrack.com:

Young piano talents distinguish Singapore Symphony’s annual presidential concert | Bachtrack

PRESIDENT'S YOUNG PERFORMERS CONCERT 2023 / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

PRESIDENT’S YOUNG 

PERFORMERS CONCERT 2023

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Saturday (23 September 2023)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 25 September 2023 with the title "Pianist Hao Jia comes of age in President's Young Performers concert".

 

This year’s President’s Young Performers Concert by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra saw several firsts. It was President Tharman Shanmugaratnam’s first attendance at this august annual event which began during President Ong Teng Cheong’s term during the 1990s. It also marked the first time SSO performed Rachmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto in Victoria Concert Hall since its move to Esplanade in 2003.

Where's Wally? Presidential edition.

Here's the new President of the republic.
Photo: Michael Huang

 

The most important first, however, was 23-year-old Singaporean pianist Hao Jia’s debut performing this “Everest of piano concertos” with an orchestra. It was a performance of unashamed bravura and technical mastery that even a seasoned veteran would have been proud of. Wang Huang Hao Jia, as he was known while schooling at Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts School of Young Talents and Yong Siew Toh Conservatory (under the tutelage of Fang Yuan and Albert Tiu), has come of age.

 

Multitudes of notes hardly fazed his steel-cladded technique. Also capable of singing lyricism, he was unafraid of projecting at levels way above the dense orchestral textures. There was a tense moment when a string snapped midway through the first movement, but he forged ahead fearlessly nonetheless, culminating in the no-holds-barred solo cadenza. He performed the longer and thornier version, generating a pulverising brilliance reminiscent of famous recordings by Grigory Sokolov and Lazar Berman.   

Parental pride:
Hao Jia gets filmed.

Led by Associate Conductor Rodolfo Barraez, the orchestra breathed true Slavic pathos and melancholy in the slow Intermezzo, setting the mood for more of the Russian composer’s brooding. By its skittish waltz episode, it was clear that Wang was actually having fun. With fear and trepidation held at arm’s length, he romped like a juggernaut through the breathlessly exciting finale to the loudest of cheers heard in this series. His reading also cast into the shade the last SSO Rach 3 heard at this venue, played by Andrei Gavrilov in 2000, no less.

 

The audience thinned considerably for the second half, which showcased Mendelssohn’s Third Symphony, also known as his “Scottish” Symphony. It was a pity as those who left early had missed something special. Barraez, who was awarded first prize at the Hong Kong International Conducting Competition earlier this year, conducted the 40-minute work wholly from memory. This was no stunt, but clear indication of how its narrative would unfold.

 

From the solemnity of its long opening movement, inspired by the ruins of Holyrood Castle in Edinburgh, the music evoked mystery and tension. Its windswept vistas and chill factor were clearly palpable in its development, stark contrasts provided later in the sunny Scherzo's cheerful reel inspired by folk music.

 

Orchestral textures were kept light and buoyant, with string sonorities being particularly transparent. The slow movement never hinted of drag, while the finale’s martial strains flexed muscles, eventually letting loose with a triumphant and heroic end. After conductor Barraez stepped off the podium, he never got back up. This spoke volumes, as he simply wanted his charges to share the plaudits they truly deserved. 

Hao Jia's teachers: Fang Yuan and Albert Tiu.

Hao Jia and Tiudents having a blast.

Watch this video of 

Rachmaninov's Third Piano Concerto: