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.

CHILDHOOD MELODIES OF YESTERYEARS / Ding Yi Music Company / Review

 

CHILDHOOD MELODIES 

OF YESTERYEARS 

Ding Yi Music Company 

Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre 

Saturday (1 June 2024)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 3 June 2024 with the title "Seriously playful concert of children's songs by Ding Yi".

One of the most important musical projects of Ding Yi Music Company is its Disappearing... Series, which documents Singaporean cultural heritage at risk of becoming extinct. Previous concerts have celebrated dragon kilns, giant joss sticks and Teochew embroidery. Its latest offering, conducted by Quek Ling Kiong, was a salute to Asian children’s songs over the ages. 

Its scenario was a 1970s Chinese school classroom, with members of Ding Yi dressed up like primary school students being lectured by their “form teacher” Quek. On the subject of old traditional songs, past ethno-musical research carried out by “headmistress” Tan Beng Luan had unearthed over 300 such examples. Not limited to the Chinese language, these also included Malay and Indian Tamil songs, a selection of which was performed in this 85-minute-long concert. 

Simple archival recordings were aired, but contemporary arrangements and new settings by composers Zechariah Goh Toh Chai and Liong Kit Yeng lent these ditties a relevence for younger people in the audience. Some of them may have forgotten or neglected their family’s spoken dialects and other traditions. 

The Hokkien song Ban Chun Hong (Wang Chun Feng or Pining for the Spring Breeze) was heard in an elegant transcription by Goh. A variation of its melody by Quek called Longing For Home played by Ng Hsien Han (dizi) and Yvonne Tay (guzheng) also evoked the same nostalgia. These tunes were based on an actual composition by Taiwanese composer Teng Yu-hsien. 

Most of the songs, however, were passed on by oral tradition. Mothers singing their children to sleep are the stuff of fondest memories. Hush-O-Hush (sung in Teochew), Sleep Well (Cantonese) and Pat-The-Bottom (Hokkien), sung by Chan Cheow Wee, Pang Hyin June and Isabel Kang respectively, had lovely arrangements by Liong. 

One was hard-pressed to suppress the mirth upon hearing that last song, also called Pai Pi Gu. In Hokkien, the words “pak-kah-chng”, if taken in the wrong context, could sound terribly vulgar, equivalent to “slap that arse”! As this was a family-oriented concert, it sounded endearing and charming instead. 

A nod to South Asian tradition came in three Tamil songs, Nila Nila Odiva (O Round Moon, Come To Me), Thosai Amma Thosai (Mother’s Thosai) and Vattamana Thattu (Round, Round, Plate), which saw Raghavendran Rajasekaran perform the bansuri (Indian flute), vocals and lead the audience in a spot of konnakol (rhythmic vocal percussion). 

The delightful pairing of Siti Shahira binti Abdul Halim and Nurul Amirah binti Amiruddin, singing in Malay, also lit up the stage in Bintang Kechil Di Langit Yang Biru (Little Star in the Blue Sky) and the playful Air Pasang Pagi (The Tide Rose In The Morning). 

As a final apotheosis, a kind of rap combining Chinese dialects, Malay, Tamil and English words, was memorised by the audience and sung with the help of Chordinate Singers (Acid Pang, chorusmaster) and orchestral ensemble at full tilt. The exhortation of this programme was to learn these “lost” songs, and then pass it on. Was it a guilty pleasure for one to have enjoyed a serious concert so much?

HANS GRAF AND VADIM GLUZMAN: BEETHOVEN AND SHOSTAKOVICH / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

HANS GRAF AND VADIM GLUZMAN:

BEETHOVEN AND SHOSTAKOVICH

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Victoria Concert Hall

Friday (5 August 2022)

This review was first published in Bachtrack on 8 August 2022 with the title "Exciting Beethoven and two premieres from Hans Graf and the SSO".

It has often been lamented that Singaporean composers receive short shrift from the national orchestra but this Singapore Symphony season signalled that change is at hand. The evening opened with the world premiere of Zechariah Goh Toh Chai’s Flow, a work commissioned before the pandemic struck. Goh (born 1970) is one of the leading composers from Singapore’s Generation X. Although known for his eclecticism, his new work was founded on Chinese music.

Applause from composer Zechariah Goh
for the fine premiere of his new composition Flow.

 

Flow opened with bold pizzicatos from double basses, simulating strains of the ancient guqin (Chinese zither) as sonic shards coalesced to form something coherent. Like drops of water merging into rivulets and streams, the music gathered texture, volume and pace with further instruments – harp, celesta, strings, solo flute and later woodwinds and brass - joining the fray. The outcome was a surging river of sound, the gradual crescendo revealing a mastery of mystery and tension. Culminating with ostinatos on celesta, marimba and timpani, the climax now resonated with the vigour of Indian drumming. Its brief eight minutes, superbly marshalled by Music Director Hans Graf, was totally riveting.

 

Receiving its first long-awaited Singapore premiere was Shostakovich’s Second Violin Concerto, composed in 1967 as a 60^th birthday gift for David Oistrakh. Ukraine-born Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman wasted no time in flexing a brawny and dusky tone on his 1690 ex-Leopold Auer Stradivarius in a work painted in shades from dark grey to pitch black. Cutting large swathes of sonority through thickets of low strings was his prerogative as the music probed vistas of morbidity and mortality. The ailing Shostakovich, recovering from a heart attack, could still summon the spirit of the dance, which Gluzman duly obliged with a show of animation and nimbleness.

 

Quite unusually, all three movements of the concerto incorporated solo cadenzas, conceived like confessionals but each dispatched with utmost vehemence and grim authority. The passacaglia-like slow movement heaved with the lugubriousness of an elegy, before being swept aside by the madcap gallop-like machinations of the finale. Like in Shostakovich’s First Cello Concerto, where solo French horn jostled with the main soloist for attention, Marc-Antoine Robillard’s horn hi-jinks kept pace with Gluzman all through to the concerto’s outlandish conclusion. Reciprocating the tumultuous applause, Gluzman’s encore of Ukrainian master Valentin Silvestrov’s Serenade was no less heart-rending.        

 

Photo: Aloysius Lim

Coming after the freneticism of Shostakovich, Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony seemed like an anti-climax but the ensemble under Hans Graf had other ideas. Making this hackneyed music sound fresh without resorting to exaggerated or cheap effects takes work too, and seldom did the opening drones sound more welcoming. Beethoven’s introduction into the countryside was one of freshness, characterised by plush strings and immaculate woodwinds. The Scene by the Brook flowed by in a leisurely pace without sounding sluggish, with the reverie awokened by mimickry of the nightingale (solo flute), quail (oboe) and cuckoo (clarinet).

Photo: Aloysius Lim

 

Hesitant applause from newcomers in the audience after the first two movements was graciously acknowledged by Graf, before the orchestra launched headlong into the jocular Merry Gathering of the Peasants. The Storm that interrupted the merrymaking was brief but evocative, the chill-factor enhanced by a hyper-alert piccolo. Has there been a more sincere portrayal of thanksgiving and the warm glow of sunshine than this finale? With this show of largesse, the concert drew to a satisfying conclusion.   

Star Rating: ****

SONGS OF THE DRAGON KILN / Ding Yi Music Company / Review

SONGS OF THE DRAGON KILN

Ding Yi Music Company

Esplanade Recital Studio

Sunday (3 December 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 5 December 2017 with the title "Nostalgic ode to the dragon kiln".

This was not a concert in the traditional sense, but more a semi-interactive show-and-tell session accompanied by music from traditional Chinese instruments. Conducted and conceptualised by Quek Ling Kiong in collaboration with the team of composer Zechariah Goh Toh Chai, film director David Yap and heritage reseacher Lee Kok Leong, the concert centred on one of Singapore's dying trades – wood-fired pottery and porcelain created by a dragon kiln.

Photo credit: Tails from the Lion City

There are only two dragon kilns remaining in Singapore today, both located in Lorong Tawas (off Jalan Bahar), in the western reaches of the island. Come 2023, the 36-metre long brick-lined and clay-covered ovens, which can fire tens of thousands of pottery pieces at one go, will be no more as the government seeks to close them down. Gone, like traditional kampongs, fishing kelongs and long-demolished monuments like the National Theatre and National Library on Fort Canning, these will become fading memories and mere footnotes in history.

Photo credit: The Finder Singapore

Composer Goh's score was high on nostalgia, playing upon a recurring theme that was reminiscent of the Beatles hit song And I Love Her. Whether Freudian in intent or not, it certainly tugged on the heart-strings, especially when heard on Chee Jun Sian's cello or Yvonne Tay's guzheng. This memorable leitmotif accompanied the short film features on the Thow Kwang Pottery Jungle's history and touching words by potter Yulianti Tan, descendant of its founder.

Two percussionists struck on pots with resounding clarity as a prelude, and the films rolled successively like chapters of a storybook. The history of pottery, architecture of the dragon kiln, the production process and associated rituals were outlined in basic terms such that even a child could understand. This was also aided by conductor Quek's engaging banter in Mandarin and a smattering of English.

As if to pad up the concert's hour-long duration, there was a slide-show segment featuring pottery and porcelain from around the world, with Suzhou pingtan, Middle Eastern-flavoured music and a version of Rasa Sayang being performed. The last was to represent the legacy of Peranakan kamcheng. After which, a quiz was held with winners taking home bits of pottery.

  

Then audience members were given an opportunity to accompany the orchestra by hitting and blowing on a wide array of pots that had been lying on the stage floor from the beginning of the concert. Striking to Quek's baton, a symphony of cacophony ensued, much to the relish of the invited performers.

The final chapter was provided by soprano Cherie Tse who sang a mellifluous ode to a Jurong urn, with words by Choo Liang Liang, Lu Yi and composer Goh. It dwelled on the sweat and toil of three generations of potters and the thousands of beneficiaries of their artistry. On that note, one pondered whether this nation could afford to forget and bury its heritage in the all-conquering name of progress.        

PAGANINI LOST AND FOUND / A Lecture-Recital at NAFA

Paganini Lost and Found was the title of a lecture-recital given at the Lee Foundation Theatre of the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts on Wednesday 14 September 2016. It appears to be a new approach to public music education adopted by the Academy, involving an informal discussion between faculty members and performances by students and alumni. 

The talk about Niccolo Paganini and the legacy spawned by his famous Caprice No.24 was moderated by composer-lecturer Zechariah Goh Toh Chai and the information provided to the audience was simple and avoided all technical jargon. Attended by a fairly sizeable audience including many children (who were well-behaved), this looks like something NAFA could do more of to make classical music approachable to lay-people.

The concert began with Chan Yoong Han
performing Paganini's Caprice No.24
with all its fiendish variations.

The panel of violinist Chan Yoong Han,
Dean of Music School Lim Yau and pianist
Nicholas Loh discussed about Paganini's legacy.
Just look at Nicholas' space-age boots. 

Young pianist Chen Yue performed Liszt's
Paganini Etude No.6, which was a literal
transcription of the caprice on piano.

The duo of Song Yuexuan and Zou Yuanxu
gave an excellent performance on 2 pianos of
Lutoslawski's Paganini Variations,
filled with harmonic and dynamic quirks.

Winnie Chua performed Robert Muczynski's
Desperate Measures with much aplomb,
a jazzy look at the popular theme.

Arguably the best performance of the evening
came from saxophonists Michellina Chan & Alexis Seah
with pianist Jessica Leong in Jun Nagao's Paganini Lost,
a most exuberant jazz showpiece.