BACH CONCERTOS EXTRAVAGANZA / Red Dot Baroque / Review

 

BACH CONCERTOS EXTRAVAGANZA!

Red Dot Baroque

Victoria Concert Hall

Sunday (7 September 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 10 September 2025 with the title "Celebrating 60 years of Singapore-Germany diplomacy with Bach extravaganza".

Red Dot Baroque (RDB), led by violinist and Young Artist Award recipient Alan Choo, is Singapore’s only professional group playing period instruments. In 2023, it performed all six of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos in a single sitting. Its latest concert, celebrating SG60 and marking sixty years of Singapore-Germany diplomacy, saw four favourite concertos of the German baroque master aired.

Photo: Yong Junyi

Opening the show was the Concerto for violin and oboe in C minor (BWV.1060) with soloists Placido Ho (violin) and Veda Lin (oboe). Both played as members of the general ensemble before assuming their solo parts and standing out with piquant tones. There were few moments as beautiful as the slow central movement’s duet, before a flurry of counterpoint completed the fast finale.

The title of Orchestral Suite No.2 in B minor (BWV.1067) may seem a misnomer as there were just six players partnering Rachel Ho on traverso (baroque flute) for the set in seven movements. Partita or Overture might have been more apt titles for this, but Ho’s lovely tone presided over dances including a Rondeau, Sarabande, Bourree, Polonaise and Menuet.

Photo: Yong Junyi

The audience’s erratic response of applauding between some movements may have distracted the ensemble, leading to a false start for the Badinerie. However, playful bantering between players was the idea of this mercurial finale, closing the work on an irrepressible high.

Photo: Yong Junyi

After the interval, a rare performance of the Harpsichord Concerto in A major (BWV.1055) featured Mervyn Lee as soloist. His understated but crystal-clear articulation was the highlight in this forerunner of the piano concerto, with brooding and emoting in the Larghetto slow movement, before breaking free of fetters in the fast outer movements.

Photo: Yong Junyi

Closing the matinee was the popular Concerto for two violins in D minor (BWV.1043) with leader Choo and Gabriel Lee in the spotlight. The unspoken chemistry between two founding members shone through despite having quite different stage demeanours, Choo’s animated movements versus Lee’s steadfast stance. The performance, true to form, exuded joy from every pore.

Inserted between the concertos in each half was the Asian premiere of Rainforest Refrains (2025), composed for RDB’s Italian tour earlier this year by Young Artist Award recipient Chen Zhangyi. This is a modern update of the multi-movement baroque suite or partita. With narration and delightful singing by soprano Teng Xiang Ting, this could also pass off as a neo-baroque cantata.

Photo: Yong Junyi

Tropical flora and fauna were the subjects in its nine movements. Burung Hamba Kera (The Monkey’s Servant Bird), a reimagination of the Malay song Burung Kakak Tua contrasted with Pangolin Passacaglia, a doleful lament. The lively finale became a play on the Chinese words “liu lian”, which was to linger besides being the name of a thorny but aromatic fruit.

Composer Chen Zhangyi
acknowledges the applause.

The encore of Phang Kok Jun’s A Barojak Suite (2020) comprised four dance movements which were settings of local songs in the form of antique dances: the allemande, corrente, sarabande and gigue. Commissioned out of pure fun, one has not lived without having heard Munnaeru Vaalibaa or Jinkli Nona played on baroque instruments.

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.

THE TASTES REUNITED / Red Dot Baroque / Review

 

THE TASTES REUNITED 

Red Dot Baroque 

Conservatory Concert Hall 

Wednesday (6 November 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 9 November 2024 with the title "Lively and sublime all-French concert by Red Dot Baroque".

The Tastes Reunited comes from the French phrase Les Gouts-reunis coined by Baroque composer Francois Couperin, referring to a glorious unification of Italian virtuosity and dramatics with French elegance and restraint in musical performance. That was the basis of an enlightening and entertaining all-French programme by period instrument group Red Dot Baroque (RDB), ensemble-in-residence of the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, led by its founder-leader Alan Choo. 

There is no story more melodramatic than the infamous demise of Jean-Baptiste Lully, who led his musicians by stomping a wooden staff on the ground. That was until his foot got in the way, with septic gangrene being his cause of death. Percussionist Derek Koh did the honours for Lully’s rousing March for a Turkish Ceremony, which opened the evening, but he was far more careful.

Photo: Ong Shu Chen

Michel Corrette’s Concerto Comique No. 25 in G minor, based on earlier music, was a happy marriage of tradition and innovation. Choo’s improvisatory flourishes on violin were let loose on in Les Sauvages (The Savages), originally a harpsichord piece by Jean-Philippe Rameau. In quand on sçait aimer et plaire (When You Know How To Love and Please), Rachel Ho’s graceful flute entreaties were gently accompanied by pizzicato strings and Gerald Lim’s harpsichord. Then it was a return to more lively fiddling in La Furstemberg, which closed this attractive work.

Vivaldian virtuosity came to the fore in Michel Blavet’s Flute Concerto in A minor with Cheryl Lim as impressive soloist backed by two violins and continuo. Both outer movements were distinguished by thrilling runs particularly taxing cadenzas where her breath control was exemplary. The French penchant for dances was typified by a slow movement comprising two leisurely Gavottes.

Few moments in music are more sublime than Entry of Polymnie from Rameau’s late opera Les Boreades. What magic can be conjured with merely a sequence of descending scales was realised in RDB’s sensitive and finely judged performance. Piano-fanciers will know this as The Arts and the Hours from Icelandic pianist Vikingur Olafsson’s transcription.

Contrasting simplicity with outright showiness was violinist Brenda Koh in Jean-Marie Leclair’s Violin Concerto in A minor (Op.7 No.5). Playing within the ensemble as well as the demanding solo, she displayed both agility and excellent intonation. Carving long lyrical lines in the slow movement’s aria, she followed with a dance-like interlude in the finale which looked forward to future composers like Mozart.

Photo: Ong Shu Chen

The 110-minute concert concluded with a suite of orchestral movements and arias from Rameau’s opera Hippolyte and Aricie. Its Overture was a typical French overture, opening with dotted-rhythms followed by a faster fugue. Sound effects were de rigeur in Bruit de tonnerre (Sound of Thunder) with thunder tube, metal plate and bass drum being shook and struck for all their worth.

Soprano Alison Wong’s three arias were variedly attractive. There was solemn beauty in Temple Sacre, the joy of birdsong (with pair of flutes in counterpoint) in Rossignols amoureux (Amorous Nightingales), and L’amour, comme Neptune (Love, Like Neptune) which closed in a vigorous Rigaudon with jingles of tambourines. This concert ended as clangourously as it began.

BACH BEATS CORONA / Red Dot Baroque / Review

BACH BEATS CORONA

Red Dot Baroque

Streamed on SISTIC Live

Sunday (6 September 2020)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 14 September 2020 with the title "Bach's life-affirming music for troubled times".

 

Musical groups in Singapore are slowly but surely getting a grip on the Covid-19 pandemic, with more online concerts being released on the Internet in lieu of live concerts. The latest was by Red Dot Baroque, Singapore’s only professional period instrument ensemble, with Bach Beats Corona.

 

The catchy title was borrowed from the ongoing worldwide movement performing Johann Sebastian Bach’s life-affirming music in these troubled times. The group’s founder and lead violinist Alan Choo played host by introducing the works, each performed by one to four players, all socially distanced and masked.

 

The concert opened with the Trio Sonata in G major (BWV 1039) for two flutes, viola da gamba and harpsichord. A delightul work which contains exactly the same music as the Viola Da Gamba Sonata No.1 (BWV.1027), its four movements alternated between a song-like countenance and contrapuntal busyness. Cheryl Lim and Rachel Ho on traverso flutes (baroque flutes) revelled in their starring roles, partnered by Mervyn Lee (gamba) and Gerald Lim (keyboard).

 

Each work was prefaced by a short movement in the same key from Bach’s Cello Suites, performed on baroque cello by Leslie Tan (from the T’ang Quartet). This included the familiar Prelude in G, Sarabande in C minor and Allemande in D major, all being movements possessed with a meditative quality. The last was played on a 5-stringed cello, producing a deep and long-breathed sonority.

 

The Violin Sonata No.4 in C minor (BWV.1017) is probably Bach’s best known accompanied violin sonata. If its 1^st movement sounded familiar, that was because it used the same theme as the hauntingly beautiful aria Erbarme Dich, Mein Gott (Have Mercy, My God) from Saint Matthew Passion. The instruments may be different, but the doleful spirit of contrition remained. Violinist Brenda Koh gave a sensitive reading, accompanied on obbligato harpsichord by Lee, a former child prodigy known as a polymath in all things baroque.

 

To illustrate Bach’s great sense of variety, the works chosen displayed a wealth of nuances and responses.  For example, there was a highly dramatic and almost improvisatory prelude that opened the Violin Sonata in E minor (BWV.1023), very unlike the other works. Violinist Placida Ho handled its surprising exuberance brilliantly, then keeping up the same exalted level in later movements. Here she was partnered by cellist Tan and harpsichordist Lim.

 

The 70-minute programme concluded with Trio Sonata in D minor (BWV.527) with violinists Choo and Gabriel Lee, backed by Tan and Lee on continuo. Originally conceived as an organ sonata, its three movement schema resembled the concerto form pioneered by the Italians, which Bach was undoubtedly familiar with. The duo voices of both soloists came through clearly in a spirited reading which could be described as a joyful romp.

This lovely concert is available to view on www.sistic.com.sg on a pay-as-you-please basis till 6 October 2020.