Composer: Eric Watson
Conductor: Dedric Wong Deli
Dizi Soloist: Ong Guan Xian
Bansuri Soloist: Raghavendran Rajasekaran
Shakuhachi Soloist: Chua Keng Chiu
Suling Soloist: Brian Lim
Flute Soloist: Alvin Chan
Oriental Winds - Asian Cultural Music Through: Transverse and Vertical Flutes
10 February 2018, 7.30pm
School of the Arts Concert Hall, Singapore
~ Synopsis ~
The inspiration for this composition comes from several sources; the original request was for a piece with a western orchestra that featured several flutes from very different music cultures – Chinese, South East Asian, Indian, Japanese, and Western flutes – as the group of soloists. This presents challenges to the composer of the compatibility of these instruments in tuning, range, volume and significantly in musical philosophies. Also in their usual configuration, they are fundamentally high instruments, in some cases the highest in any ensemble, so how to write music that can reconcile these elements and be interesting or intriguing?
Serendipity played a part as coincidentally I came across a video showing the flight patterns, constantly changing, reforming and morphing of flocks of starlings, a graphically visual definition of the term Entropy, a word which has as many definitions as the state it describes, the precise moment everything is stable it starts to change!
The solo instruments are Chinese, Japanese, South-East Asian, European, and Indian so from these disparate thoughts and influences was born a piece that can, hopefully, migrate across continents and cultures, can change and reform and yet still remain true to an essential self. It’s a celebratory exercise in diversity, singularity and common purpose and, dare I hope, a reflection on contemporary culture.
