SING60: VOICES OF THE NATIONAL GALA CONCERT / Voices of Singapore / Review

 

SING60: VOICES OF A NATION 

GALA CONCERT

Voices of Singapore

Esplanade Concert Hall

Wednesday (8 October 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 10 October 2025 with the title "Voices of Singapore celebrates sixth anniversary with pleasurable concert".

There is no vehicle of musical expression as personal as one’s voice, and music-making becomes pleasure multiplied manifold when people sing together. That is the credo of Voices of Singapore (VOS), the nation’s largest singing organisation, with more than 2000 members in 30 separate choirs.

VOS, founded by choral conductor and composer Darius Lim, celebrated its 6th anniversary with an enjoyable mega-concert showcasing over 400 voices led by nine different choral conductors. While diversity, equity and inclusivity (DEI) has become divisive in certain nations, these are the very qualities that hold Singapore together, evident by variety of musical items on show.

The evening kicked off with VOS Children’s Choir (led by Lim Jing Xuan) singing Liong Kit Yeng’s Little Red Dot, a fun piece that recounted what makes Singapore unique – local food and the MRT. Nostalgia reigned when VOS Ladies Choir (Stephenie Lee) with Jeremy Wong on pipa took on a Mandarin medley of Xinyao by Liang Wern Fook, Tan Kian Chin and Bok Sek Ying, Shi Shui Chang Liu (细水长流) and Xiao Ren Wu De Xin Sheng (小人物的心声), songs which ruled the waves during the 1980s.

School children of a certain age will remember the Malay words to Zubir Said’s Semoga Bahagia, but with VOS City Chorus (Chong Wai Lun) and soloist Syakirah Noble, the unusually harmonised song took on jazzy vibes that were unthinkable years ago. Similarly, Malay song Dayung Sampan sung by VOS Men (Justin Goh) and accompanied by Artusik Multiethnic Ensemble had an unexpected martial edge. These fresh twists brought a new gloss to these old favourites.

Arguably the evening’s most entertaining item was the VOS Youth Choir (Vicknesvari Vadivalagan) and soloist Thirupurasundari S in Tamil songs Munnaeru Vaalibaa and Balleilakka. Backed by the Singapore Indian Orchestra and Choir, and three sari-clad dancers, this came close to a full-blown Kollywood scene at its most melodramatic. VOS Children’s Choir returned in Darius Lim’s Dragon Dance of Shang, a song with a strong film music feel accompanied by projected cartoon animations.

The second half, accompanied by SING60 Band, featured all of VOS’s community choirs, including VOS Starlight Voices (Tham Pei Wen) featuring special needs children in Lim’s touching Our Story. VOS Silver Voices (Sean Foo) rolled back the decades with Chen Gexin’s Rose, Rose I Love You while the unauditioned VOS Chorus of the People (Lim) were empowered by the words of The Power of the Dream and We Will Get There. Purely a cappella was Eric Whitacre’s Sleep, beautifully sung by VOS State Choirs (Lim) while chilling by the glow of candlelight.

There was also an audience sing-along led by Voices of COMO Lifestyle Group, National Kidney Foundation and Coronation Singers (Gerald Tan) in If We Hold On Together, You Raise Me Up and Dancing Queen.

For the grand finale, all the VOS Choirs came together for what must be Singapore’s second national anthem: Home. The biggest surprise was the unscripted appearance by the man himself, Dick Lee in the flesh, singing his perennial classic. The abiding take-home of the evening: a people that sings together stays together.

ZECHARIAH GOH: A CHORAL ODYSSEY / Review

 

ZECHARIAH GOH: A CHORAL ODYSSEY

Victoria Concert Hall

Wednesday (6 August 2025)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 8 August 2025 with the title "Choral concert showcases Zechariah Goh's wide-ranging works".

Singaporean composer Zechariah Goh Toh Chai, recipient of the 2003 Young Artist Award in 2003, was once described as promising. Twenty-two years later, he has established himself as one of Singapore’s most important composers. This two-hour mostly a capella choral concert, the first dedicated to a single composer since the late Leong Yoon Pin’s retrospective in 2008, featured 271 singers and nine choirs from three countries. 16 songs, from 1993 to the present, showcased Goh’s versatility in wide-ranging styles.

Opening the show was the Singapore Symphony Children’s Choir (Conductor: Wong Lai Foon) with Rose of Sharon (2014), ushering in a lush unison and series of echoing voices. More complex was Four Tones (2019), which played on Chinese words ying (阴), yang (阳) and shang (上) as resonating bell sounds, later ornamented with animal and bird calls to maximal effect.

From Anderson Serangoon Junior College Choir (Angela Lee), the folk-influenced In the Bamboo Forest (2004) had percussive drum beats from male voices accompanying lyrical flowing lines from female voices. The 19-women in red kebayas from Crescendo Voices, originally established in Malaysia (Raymond Lee Pei Khoon), sang in Malay for Irama Belia (2003) and Mandarin for Qing Ping Diao (The Beautiful Lady Yang, 2014), the latter’s mellifluous tones based on Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai’s words.

Photos: Tan Zexun

Chinese inspirations continued in Loyalty to the Nation (2015), with the words Jing Zhong Bao Guo (精忠报国) associated with Han dynasty general Yue Fei’s patriotism and martyrdom. The music turned from calm to heroic and finally reflective. Goh’s arrangement of Dayong Sampan (1993) was his first commissioned work, involving counterpoint well-handled by the 20 singers of Novae (Quek Jing).

The combined Eunoia and Hwa Chong Junior College Choirs (Lim Ai Hooi) was the largest contingent, their strength in numbers displaying exuberance for Sounds of Joy (2009), which rang out with bell and drum-like sonorities. Plangent tribal drone effects also coloured Reminiscences of Hainan (1995), a joyous tribute to Goh’s own dialect group and forebears.

The 23 singers of the Taichung Chamber Choir from Taiwan (Yang I-Chen) were the best ensemble, performing four works, a mini-concert within a concert. Whoever thought that the Chinese word for Tea (2024) – cha (茶) - could be subject to so much elaboration and ornamentation. Wonderful solo voices distinguished Hakka Triptych (2025) and The Happiness of Fish (2013) which pondered serenity, contentment and ethereal beauty. By contrast, Assassination (2014) played on the word for kill – sha (杀) - complete with pugilistic poses and martial arts choreography.

Photo: Tan Zexun

Vox Camerata Chamber Singers (Shahril Mohamed Salleh) sang the evening’s only sacred work, Psalm No.1(2023) with its opening line Blessed is the Man a firm reflection of Goh’s Christian faith, while Lullaby (1999), sung in Chinese, was a gentle cradle song.

Closing the evening was Ode (2025), performed by the Voices of Singapore State Choirs (Justin Goh) accompanied on piano by Gabriel Hoe. Sentimental and ear-catching, its aspiring strains about flying away were intruded upon by one of the hall’s alarms. A welcome encore was requested, this time sounding even better. Could this be the song to take over the popular mantle of Dick Lee’s Home?

All lit up for National Day.

OMM GOES TO THE MOVIES IV / Orchestra of the Music Makers / Review

OMM GOES TO THE MOVIES IV

Orchestra of the Music Makers

Esplanade Concert Hall

Friday (13 January 2023)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 18 January 2023 with the title "OMM showcased breadth of film and games music."

 

There was a time when music aficionados pointed their noses up at movie music, as if it were inferior products by composers who could not cut it as serious artists. Not anymore, as film composers are now the best remunerated of creative talents, and even considered legitimate heirs to legacies of Wagner, Mahler and Rachmaninov.

 

The Orchestra of Music Makers’ fourth concert of film music, conducted by music director Chan Tze Law, demonstrated the breadth and depth of the medium which continues to capture the imagination. 150 minutes did not seem overlong thanks to the variety offered, which did not include a single minute from Star Wars or Lord Of The Rings.

 

Opening with End Credits from Star Trek: First Contact, Jerry Goldsmith’s music had a touch of familiarity by including Alex Courage’s music from the older television series. From celestial realms to somewhere local, there was a reference to Singapore in Hans Zimmer’s music from Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End, which opened in the pre-1819 lair of Chow Yun-Fat’s Lord Sao Feng. Dressed in musical Chinoiserie, this later continued to the sea-jig dominated music of the swashbuckling series.

 

Numbering close to 110 members, this orchestra of mostly young non-professional musicians  performed the scores with energy and zest. Totally admirable were the brass and percussion, working overtime in the flashy music. Their spirits never flagged, even in the longest work, a Suite from seven Harry Potter movies with music by John Williams, Patrick Doyle, Nicholas Hooper and Alexander Desplat.

 

Of all these, John Williams’ Hedwig’s Theme (accompanying Hagrid’s snow owl) with its tinkling celesta appeared to be the most familiar leitmotif of the cycle. If one were to poll older listeners, chances are Williams’ Adventures On Earth from E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, with its soaring Mahlerian melody, would win hands down. And not far behind, the broad open vistas of John Barry’s Main Title from Out Of Africa. If its expansive string passages sounded like those in James Bond movies, that was because Barry scored no less than twelve of those.  

OMM alumnus composer
Tsumugu Misugi takes a bow.

 

Significant was the world premiere of Tatsumeeko Suite, music from a mass multiplayer online role-playing game, by Tsumugu Misugi, who was an alumnus of both the School of the Arts and OMM. His score was both novel and imaginative, matching the likes of Michael Giacchino and Alan Silvestri, whose Spiderman and Avengers music followed his.

 

Memorable music from Disney movies included Alan Menken’s Beauty And The Beast and Choral Suite from The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, joined by the excellent choir of over 130 singers from Voices of Singapore (Darius Lim, Chorusmaster). Tenor Leslie Tay had idiomatic solo cameos in the latter and the encore, Christopher Tin’s Baba Yetu (The Lord’s Prayer in Swahili) from Civilisation IV, before the orchestra rounding up with John Powell’s How To Train Your Dragon.

 

OMM has become Singapore’s top film music orchestra, without a doubt. Little wonder it plays Mahler symphonies and Wagner operas just as well too.