Envoicing Singaporean Music

My route to contemporary Singaporean new music (written by composers who have been trained in doctoral programs in the West; hereafter, "Singaporean music") began after I completed my Masters at Oxford and returned to enlist in National Service at the Singapore Armed Forces' Music and Drama Company as a clerk, during which time my brain had to grasp hold onto something. New music, which I had rarely encountered through my entire college education, seemed like fertile new ground. My interest in new music was subsequently narrowed into contemporary Singaporean composers while I was a teacher-in-training at the National Institute of Education, in large part because of the existence there of the Singaporean music archive set up by Eddy Chong. This research was given extra impetus with a research grant from the National Arts Council in 2007, which culminated in the release of the research report Scions of the Musical West: Singapore at Cultural Crossroads in 2009, just weeks before I left for the US to pursue my doctorate in musicology at Duke University. (Incidentally, the National Library Board initially listed my report as "...Singapore at Cultural Crosswords"--a fitting title for a volume about cultural puzzles!) 

In my dissertation, I focused on three works, one each by Robert Casteels (L’autre fille aux cheveux de Bali, 2002), Joyce Koh (TAI, 1998/2002), and John Sharpley (Kong, 2002). (The selection of these works—the fact that I selected these works— present a whole new set of issues, to be addressed elsewhere.) Such is the nature of academia that I have found myself staring at a narrower and narrower point where detailed discussion of specific works intersected with engagement with postcolonial, feminist, and affect theory. My success in this accelerating zooming-in has made me equal to the academic milieu of journal publication (forthcoming in Journal of the Royal Musical Association) and conference presentation (American Musicological Society, Society for Music Theory, Society for Ethnomusicology).

Now comes the exciting prospect of bringing Singaporean music to an international audience in the US and UK, but also the conundrum of accessibility. Conference audiences and journal readers expect to have access to the music which I discuss; this is entirely reasonable—why would anyone slog through a 30-min conference session or an entire 15,000-20,000 word article if the music in question is not even easily available commercially through major music labels and publishers? Now, I have to insert the caveat that the dissemination of Singaporean music is growing (though not at a pace I would like). Nevertheless, I think it is reasonable to argue, from a purely pragmatic point of view, that the problematic of relative inaccessibility takes the form of a vicious cycle: since the music is relatively inaccessible (you often can’t access it at the click of a button), my conference attendees and would-be journal readers are relatively reluctant to pay attention to it, which reinforces the relative inaccessibility of this music (record labels and music publishers are less likely to pick it up because the audience is small and not growing much). Compounding the pragmatic aspect of accessibility is the more complicated issue of aesthetic validation by new music networks globally, comprising composers in and outside of university music faculties, music historians and theorists, graduate programs, publishers, record labels, music critics, and audiences.

My research output at conferences and especially in journals brings Singaporean music to a wider audience, but if this music is not easily accessible, it is going to be stuck in the vicious cycle of relative invisibility from the admittedly limited point of view of the academic music audience (music historians and theorists). Yet the power of appealing to this group should not be ignored; professors, after all, are the ones who write music history, both in the more general form of music history textbooks, and in the more specialized form of monographs about narrower music topics. Consider a thought experiment where a new textbook on Western music actually mentions Singaporean composers—this textbook would be written by a music historian. (I realize that the definition of Singaporean music as "Western" presents a whole new set of issues, also to be explored elsewhere.)

Music professors are also the people who review journal articles about music to determine whether an article should be published, and the fact that a work discussed in a potential journal article is not readily available is most definitely a negative point in the review process. If the music is not already in the average journal reader's music library, and if the music is written by a brilliant composer whom the reader has nevertheless not heard of because of cultural geopolitics, and if the reader already has a huge Western canon at hand, including contemporary Asian composers such as Chinary Ung and Bright Sheng, what are the overall odds that this reader would consider going online to buy other music off a commercial website, or to listen to the music on the composer's website? And if further, the reader actually has to search for the composer online, and write to the composer personally to request for the music, what are the lesser odds that he would do this? Pondering these questions are key in the process of exploring ways to envoice Singaporean music, an issue of particular salience as research in a broader definition of "Singaporean music" than I have been pursuing intensifies (see Jun Zubillaga-Pow and Chee-Kong Ho eds., Singapore Soundscape: Musical Renaissance of a Global City).

(21 Nov 08) Tang Quartet performs Singaporean New Music @ Republic Polytechnic Cultural Centre

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Ravel, String Quartet in F

Tan Dun, Eight Colours

Phoon Yew Tien, Scenic Jiangnan

Ho Chee Kong, Echoes of Fall

Goh Toh Chai, Vasantham

Jimi Hendrix, Purple Haze

Tonight’s concert was a mix of pieces ranging from modal Ravel, avant garde Tan Dun, musical arrangements, to a transcription of a rock song by Jimi Hendrix. The opening piece (Ravel) set the bar for ensemble finesse and technical skill, although there were some technical glitches in the second movement when the tempo slowed. It is a pity that Ng Yu-ying (violin 1) still has yet to be presented with the opportunity to play on a superior instrument. His was adequate – a little shrill and tight at times, and one could sense that the artistic ability far exceeded the capability of the instrument. On the issue of the programming, Ravel stuck out like a sore thumb. One could constantly imagine a more colourful orchestral version as the piece is being performed. Ravel is also perhaps a little over-played. For a recital of 20^th century music, some of the early works from the Second Viennese School could have presented interesting perspectives.

Tan Dun’s Eight Colours made use of a large range of extended techniques, expanding the sound palette to include slapping, tapping, irregular vibrato, and glissando, all of which add up to a completely different sound world from the 19^th century. The quartet exhibited the interpretive and technical skills needed to explicate the epigrammatic fragments that comprise the piece.

Ho Chee Kong’s Echoes of Fall incorporated skillful use of the gambus, adding a new dimension to the string quartet. The piece centers on the meditative gambus solos, from which the string texture grows in an organic fashion, underpinned by a modal-flavoured centricity. One of the more striking features was the long gambus solo in the middle of the piece that held everyone spell-bound. This was soulfully performed.

Like Ho’s piece, the rest of the evening was relatively easy from a technical point of view for the performers. Phoon Yew Tien’s and Goh Toh Chai’s arrangements suffered very occasionally from lack of rehearsal time. Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze gave the musicians an opportunity to venture out of the refined, balanced and highly crafted world of classical sound, bringing a crude strength to the tone that bulged and slid in a wanton fashion into the world of rock. One could almost smell the Sixties in this unlikely and highly entertaining piece, executed with panache.

(22 Feb 09) Lim Yau conducts Haydn's "The Hunt" & "The Bear" @ The Salon, National Museum of Singapore

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Phua Ee Kia presenter

The orchestra presented two symphonies from different stages of Haydn’s development as a composer. Symphony No. 73 represents the light musical style of the period after Haydn’s venture into Sturm und Drang (‘Storm and Stress’). Symphony No. 82 clearly was written to capture the attention of the composer’s Parisian audience, replete with dramatic gestures, surprising twists and turns, and greater experimentation with orchestral colours.

The account of the Classical era given by the presenter for this concert had the character of a caricature, and was designed to engage an audience for whom classical music is akin to a foreign language. This was successful to a certain extent, though it was perhaps a little long; more explication of the musical material would have been useful for such an audience. More to the point, the presentation of two entire symphonies in the same characteristic Haydnesque style is not entirely suited to this audience, regardless of the countless distinctions musical connoisseurs can make. Nevertheless, the little quiz tickled the audience with its outlandish multiple choice options. One wonders if Haydn was not quite so proficient on the electric guitar, in response to the question of which instrument Haydn did not manage so well.

As an instance of performance practice (rather than the concert as a whole), the orchestra and the conductor was much more successful. The structure of the music was clearly presented. Important moments were suitably emphasized and one gets a sense of the ebb and flow of energy in the vivacious Allegros. Metrical and musical accentuation was applied in good proportion. Tempo was well judged, though a little flexibility in the inner movements would not have been amiss.

In terms of the choice of venue, chamber groups (such as the downsized TPO formed specially for this concert) tend to be limited in their options. However, a worse choice could not have been made. The Salon is much too small for the 30 or so players. Much of the fine work by the orchestra was undone by the acoustics. Loud forte passages on the violins came across in a shrill manner as, beyond a certain point, the ear cannot comfortably adjust to the higher decibels. As a result, the perceivable dynamics range was much smaller than in reality. Soft piano passages were like desiccated leaves, deprived of the benefits of reverberations. This dryness is due in part to the limited use of vibrato, as is the practice in the eighteenth century; a different venue is clearly needed. The wind instruments’ sound was more palatable, perhaps because they were not disadvantaged by a playing technique not designed for their instruments; these were often too loud in the small room. More disturbing was the constant pounding of the three cellos and two double basses, which in a larger venue would not have had the same effect. The punishing acoustics revealed every instance of splayed microtones which would have been disguised in another venue.

The slower movements of No. 73 were a little dull due to the ‘light’ style Haydn employed; this music was perhaps more suited as the background to conversations. If we were to follow performance practice to the extreme, i.e. in the manner performances were conducted in the eighteenth century, the symphony could have been performed in the middle of the sunlit atrium in the National Museum, while museum goers pass by. It is clear that certain symphonies (‘The Bear’) are intended to capture the attention of audiences more than others. Even into the 1780s, symphonies were intended not to be the main attraction, serving instead as a formal gesture signaling the start of concerts that featured singers and pianists; they were sometimes performed as outdoor serenades. Symphonic movements were often divided and dispersed through the programme, serving to open the concert, and end the first half of the programme or the entire concert. (Neal Zaslaw, Mozart’s Symphonies: Contexts, Performance Practice, and Reception).

Overall, this concert would have been more enjoyable with if more consideration had been given to the ‘extra-musical’ aspects, such as the venue and the programming. Some symphonies can be transferred from the pedestal to other performing spaces, and mixed with other genres or music by different composers. Musical decisions such as the number of lower strings and the use of vibrato on strings can also be profitably reviewed, given the specific acoustics of the venue. Instrumental technique was not generally a problem with the exception of one of the horn players who had permanent difficulties with tone production - and practically crippled the last leg of ‘The Bear’.

(13 Nov 2008) Lan Shui conducts Brahms' Requiem with Singapore Symphony Orchestra @ Esplanade Concert Hall

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Singapore Symphony Chorus, Singapore Bible College Chorale, and Hallelujah Chorus, with soloists Brigitte Wohlfarth and Garry Magee

The combined choir was excellent tonight, and the choristers did justice to a work in which they were the primary feature. Different sections were homogenous and equally matched. The intonation was mostly in place, with some notable misses from the sopranos, who were also noticeably out of place a few times. When the singers came together, the sound was brilliant and remarkably pure for a choir of this size. There were a few places when the men’s vowels were less than refined, and they were also perhaps a little overly enthusiastic in enunciating consonant endings. (A particularly unsettling moment was one individual’s loud ending on ‘Kraft’, meaning ‘power’, at the end of the sixth movement.) The chorus did admirably well in bringing out the different choral colours of the requiem, although the phrasing suffered under the laborious tempo of the opening movements, especially at the beginning of the movement two.

Brigitte Wohlfarth’s startling vibrato brought new meaning to her opening line ‘And ye now therefore have sorrow’. She belongs to a tradition of sopranos who have now gone out of fashion. In a world dominated by the new school of early music influenced singers, characterized by brighter timbre and restrained, colouristic use of vibrato, the old school needs more than ever to find a way of singing that uses vibrato to enhance the emotive appeal of music. There was some evidence of the latter tonight, especially in the higher tessitura. However, the soprano had little control over the mechanistic pitch fluctuations of her vibrato in her siren-like middle range.

Garry Magee’s crystal baritone was a reservoir which invited one to quench his thirst. Unfortunately, this was not to be. A minor problem was that of high notes, which Magee tossed out but missed. On the issue of interpretation, the singer really needed to follow the text more closely. In movement six, ‘Behold, I shall show you a mystery’ lacked the obvious. (Why did the singer not follow the pianissimo marked in the score?)

The orchestra supported the chorus admirably through most of the work, with the notable exception of the ending of movement six when it crowded out the voices. At some points, the higher strings sounded unsuitably soloistic. More peculiarly, the aggressive sforzando from the double bass at the beginning of movement seven sent a strange message at the start of a movement proclaiming ‘Blessed are the dead’. Neither the pitch, nor the timbre was blessed. Several entries from the trumpet in movements two and three had a similar effect to the double bass entry; one is reminded of the mechanism of the expulsion of wind rather too abruptly.

On a brighter note, the orchestra gave a full blooded, Romantic rendition in movement four with expressive swells (that are somewhat against the grain of modern interpretation). This style was more appropriately used here in relation to the cloying music than in movement two, when the string sequences near the opening was etched out in a gratingly slow tempo that did little to prevent the musical momentum from dissipating. That the maestro has placed his mark on Brahms’ Requiem is beyond question. His attempt to secure originality and meaning, though, is less successful in the opening movements than in the later ones. Still, one has to admire Lan Shui’s spirit. The audience was silently reprimanded when he refused to lower his baton at the end of the work, outraged as he was by one overly enthusiastic audience member who sparked off a brief avalanche of claps - which died off when the audience realized that the music was still reverberating in the air.

(10 Oct 2008) Leonard Slatkin conducts Vaughan Williams and Elgar with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra @ Esplanade Concert Hall

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The Royal Philharmonic was certainly very good but judging from the audience’s standing ovation (quite, odd, come to think of it – an ovation for an orchestral performance), you would have thought that they were Berlin or Wien. The opening piece, extracted from a film score by William Walton, showed off the melting tones of the strings. Thereafter, Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No.6 struck like a bolt of fury. I have to say that hearing the work was one of the most enjoyable musical experiences I have had in a long time. The orchestra, obviously under expert direction, slashed, burned, laughed hysterically, and left one with a terrible sense of cold beauty at the end. Here we got a glimpse of what the Maestro had been up to in the past few years with the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington D.C. A work in which all the movements were linked, the Symphony reverberated like a live wire through 35 min - and left the audience feeling bemused. I think most of them did not ‘get it’. Nevertheless, time and experience – I am sure – will lead more to appreciate such a fine work, one which is relevant to our political and musical times, being neither too esoteric, nor too cloyingly palatable.

I had to close my eyes as ‘Nimrod’, the world’s favourite English music - one of the movements from the Enigma Variations, was performed. So overwhelmed was I by the descending sevenths in the melody - powerfully expressive, and fleshed out in full glory by the orchestra, which I believe, is in top form. (None of the boo-boos one occasionally observes in London’s top four.) I am grateful that ‘Nimrod’ was not overdone, though I had yearned for more pathos in the opening variation. The principal cellist had a beautiful tone, although her stroke was somewhat wavering. Many brilliant passages by the brasses deserve mention, and the all too often forgotten percussionist did fine work, especially in ‘Nimrod’.

Overall, this evening witnessed fine musicianship and some great moments. The outer works were enough to melt a hardened cynic, whilst Vaughan Williams brought a different, more contemporary dimension of reality to the evening. This is a programme which is hard to beat. We had the opportunity to see London’s step-child of an orchestra at work (the only one of the top four not linked to a major performance venue), and it was quite remarkable.

(03 Sep 2008) Turandot @ Esplanade Theatre

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In 1920, after his foray into the Land of the Rising Sun in Madama Butterfly (1904), Puccini chose China as the setting for his next opera. Unlike Butterfly, which has captured the imagination of American audiences with the sexual drama of an American male’s encounter with an extremely young geisha (under-aged by today’s standards), Turandot is based entirely in the fictitious, ancient past. Princess Turandot originated from a set of Persian tales (translated into French); her name means ‘daughter of Turan’, which (historically) referred to the lower portion of Central Asia on today’s world map. Her eventual lover Calaf, a Tartar, originates from the higher portion of Central Asia, and in this production, is garbed in Mongolian dress. At the beginning of the opera, we witness the doomed Persian Prince from today’s Middle East. The bulk of the characterizations in the opera, of course, focus on the Chinese, from the emperor, to officials, servants, and the common people. At the end of the opera, the Mongolian prince successfully woos over the ruthless princess, while his forsaken Chinese slave girl, Liu, sacrifices herself to facilitate that union. Up till 1998, China had banned the opera. Perhaps they objected to the portrayal of the ruthless princess, the clownish trio Ping, Pong, and Pang, the methods of torture exercised on Liu, and the uneasy death of the abject Chinese slave girl who sacrificed herself for the royalty.

Ten years later, coinciding with the Beijing Olympics, Turandot is revived in Chinese-majority Singapore. The Games had monopolised the country’s only major English entertainment television channel for two whole weeks. Eighty-eight years after Puccini first set his pen to the score, a Singaporean audience finds itself bemused at some of (what are supposed to be) the most dramatic points in the opera. (Lots of ‘eights’ here, which the Chinese traditionally believes to be auspicious.) The audience could not help itself but laugh at the archaic mannerisms of an operatic tradition that has been grafted on our society. After her first kiss with Calaf, the distraught Turandot utters ‘What is happening to me?’, drawing laughter. When Calaf reveals his name, Turandot drew more laughter with her tautological ‘I know your name!’. (These translations were shown on the two screens on either side of the stage, which probably explains why the libretto was not provided in the $5 programme notes.) Well, the translations could be improved. There is also, however, the issue of the symbolic kiss and the symbolic revelation of identity, neither of which makes much impact on a modern audience more accustomed to – ironically - the ‘verismo’ (realism, in its original usage, referring to early twentieth century Italian opera) in today’s cinemas.

You may not think that an audience’s reception is important for an established work like Turandot. But trust me, it tells us a lot about ourselves. The audience was universally amused by Ping, Pong, and Pang, not least by their names, which correspond to a particularly distasteful joke that tells of how Chinese names are chosen as pots and pans fall down a staircase. (But you should know that ‘ping pong’, the game for which Singapore won a silver medal in the recent Olympics, originated in England; the name, too, came from the same country.)

From the Persian Empire, to Tartar, to Turan (which includes China), Turandot has traversed a vast track of the Asian continent, almost in the same way as some of our own music by Singaporean composers traverses India, China, and Indonesia. The composerly imagination is captured by the discourses of his time. By 1920, Europe, which at one time controlled 85% of the land mass in the world, was beginning the process of releasing this land to the populations in those regions. Canada, Australasia, the former Ottoman Empire, and the Baltic region all slipped from European control in the aftermath of World War I. What information about Asia that existed in Italy was what Puccini drew on in 1920, composing in a time when Italy was feeling the pinch of shrinking in the amount of land it controlled, at a point when the nascent imperialist Facist movement was about to engulf the whole country.

Today, we are privileged with better information about so many different countries, and we should be more resistant to characterisations that proceeded from a lack of knowledge. This is the meaning of ‘criticism’. We can appreciate the lavish, authentic-looking costumes (from what I have gathered through media images) of China, Mongolia, and the Middle East. (I am not sure if the dome on the Persian prince was a little large and unwieldy.) There were gracefully choreographed dances and fights (although the men in the fights could have been more aggressive). The staging was minimal but imposing, with effective use of lighting to suggest different times of the day and to enhance the mood. A particularly memorable, long drawn moment was the transition from night to sunrise effected on the large background screen, first with lights dotting a cobalt canvas like stars, then with streaks of off-white suggesting sunrise, followed by an emerging warm tangerine glow (the sun) that fused into the remnants of night.

Throughout the whole two hours, the orchestra provided brilliant support, though there were some unacceptable coordination problems right at the beginning of the opera, when the players should have been more alert. The chorus comprised of at least a substantial portion of amateur singers, with larynxes insufficiently raised to give depth, vowels insufficiently masked to give warmth, and phrases insufficiently nuanced to achieve the desired lyric quality; all these ironically lent the chorus a speech like, flat quality that distinguished a crowd that was supposed to be Chinese rather well from the European crowds in other operas. Indeed, if you compare the speech patterns of an upper class Englishman speaking Oxford English versus a Singaporean speaking Singlish, you will find that they correspond rather well to the singing voices of the royalty versus the crowd in the opera. A historical accident - but one which has many implications if we were to consider how to make opera come alive today.

The P*ng trio sang well, adopting feminine characteristics to draw laughter from the audience. Their gender ambiguity generated humour which relieved the tense moments, especially in their extended nostalgic aside in Act 2. Opposed to this femininity is the masculine figure of the emperor, who unfortunately failed to fulfil the requirements of his role both vocally and visually. Martin Ng portrayed a convincing father to Calaf, and Nancy Yuen was brilliant in her characterization of the pious Liu, although I think the character of Liu can plausibly be reinterpreted for today’s audiences as someone who is less of a submissive female slave. (I’m sure some of you are reminded of the other sexualized Liu in American media; let’s find other alternatives.) At times, Yuen’s voice sounded pinched, and the pitch faltered, but her dramatic entry right in the middle of the mob scene in Act 1 was nothing short of flawless.

Jessica Chen and Lee Jae Wook played the roles of Turandot and Calaf respectively. Both were adequate to the exhausting vocal demands of their roles, which necessitated two different artistes who sang each of these roles on alternate nights. They both sang in the expansive style associated with the heroes and heroines of Puccini. This is the general practice but I wonder if more characterization could have been infused in their quieter passages. Chen sounded tense in her higher register where all the consonants disappeared. Lee was much more successful, handling the vocal pyrotechnics effortlessly, although his first entry in Act 1 was obviously very tense and paled beside Yuen’s dramatic cry (mentioned earlier). The real test for Lee, though, is - of course - the staple of all operatic fans, the crowning aria of Turandot, ‘Nessun Dorma’. This was adequately sung, but the orchestra started out far too slowly for the tenor’s comfort; I’m not sure whether this was due glitches in the rehearsals. Like Turandot, the character of Calaf could have been more thoroughly thought through, both vocally, and in terms of stage presence. The singer appeared to fall short of breath at the apex of the aria on the triple pronouncement of ‘winning’ over Turandot. Nevertheless, his performance was undeniably the most brilliant of the night.

Overall, I would say that Singapore Lyric Opera has indeed come a long way since the times of poor orchestral support and dubious singers. This was a major production which showed Singaporeans that the musical scene has developed the capacity to handle Western opera. Now, how about more operas by our local composers?

(18 Jul 2008) Lim Yan plays Rachmaninov Complete Preludes @ Esplanade Recital Studio

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Young Artist award winner Lim Yan lived up to his name in his fiery performance this evening which promises to be a preview of greater things to come. The opening prelude Op. 3 No. 2 was the only unsatisfactory item which sounded a little clockwork-like, and could definitely have done with more tonal variation. Op. 23 opened with one of the exquisite melodies that only Rachmaninov could write, which the pianist passionately traced over pleasurably/painfully long arches. Lim Yan’s ability to observe the architectonic lines of the precludes is one aspect of his pianistic brilliance which I am sure must have moved both expert and amateur music lovers. Other highlights from the first half of the concert included the flashy G minor prelude which Lim Yan took at lightning speed, and the elegiac G flat major prelude which concluded Op. 23. Op. 32 provided more extended opportunities for technical display which the pianist exploited to the full. From the expansive E major prelude, to the turbulent F minor prelude, to the bombastic D flat major prelude which concluded the set, Lim Yan performed with finesse, meditation and volcanic energy. He is not one of those pallid, risk adverse pianists flooding the field of professional performance, but one risk taker to look out for in the future. In exchange for the occasional slip, one receives an entire world of the pianist’s creation.

As a concert goer, I would personally have preferred a more varied programme. Such unnecessary musicological completeness (‘complete preludes’), providing the illusion of unity and an atmosphere of methodological scholarliness has the effect of alienating some amateurs, and tiring some experts. (And this is in spite of the tonal linkages between the preludes. Do you seriously expect each successive prelude to slowly add up to an aesthetic whole of 24 keys in the listener’s head over the course of 2 hours?) The era of composer/oeuvre-worship has already met its demise in the academy and one would expect the international field of performance to follow suit soon. Let us celebrate the pianist and not the score.