H. K. Cultural
Center Concert Hall. Balcony F164
(HK$1040.)
Program
Symphony in C
(1855) by Bizet (1838-1875).
Silent Woods,
op. 58, no. 5 (1884, arr. 1893) by Dvorak (1841-1904).
Duo (2013) by Zhao
Lin (b. 1953).
I am stopping by
Hong Kong this weekend on my way to several meetings in Manila next week. When I decided on the trip, I looked around
and found this program that would be the season opener for the Hong Kong
Philharmonic. With Yo-Yo Ma as the
headliner, it was close to a no-brainer; more on the “close to” a bit later.
The program
started with a symphony Bizet wrote when he was all of 17 years old. The piece however wasn’t published or
performed until 60 years after his death.
I recall hearing Mozart’s first symphony, written when was 8, over the
summer. Perhaps reviving very early work
of composers is in vogue nowadays?
The piece was
not particularly difficult, except for some very fast passages in the last
movement. However, I wouldn’t have
guessed that this was written at the beginning of Bizet’s composition career: the melodies were beautiful, the orchestration quite sophisticated, and there
was much contrast; the only complaint I have would be how often some melodies
got repeated, they got a little old. Not
necessarily a showcase for the orchestra, especially as a season and concert
opener, nor for the conductor, for that matter.
Nonetheless a good way to get the concert started, especially if one didn't have specific expectations.
The Program
Notes tries to say something about each of the Bizet movements. The upside is one knew what to listen for, the
downside is that may limit one’s appreciation of the music, the very downside
is the disappointment I felt when I couldn’t get the “obvious forerunner of
those memorable oboe solos from The Pearl Fishers” (second movement, Adagio) or
the “bustling idea which Bizet subsequently adapted for use in Carmen” (fourth
movement, Allegro vivace.) On top of
that, I am sure the description of the first movement (Allegro vivo) as “could
have come straight from Schubert” would offend both the French and the Austrian. The only thing I got was the “drone bass”
discussed in the third movement (Scherzo – Allegro Vivace.) So sometimes music can be enjoyed simply for
its sake.
After the
intermission, Yo-Yo Ma played the Dvorak piece.
It started life as a movement entitled “Silence” in the piano duet “From
the Bohemian Forest” composed in 1884.
Dvorak hastily arranged it as a cello and piano piece during his “farewell”
concert before he left for the US in 1892.
It was arranged into the current version in 1893. The piece is relatively short at about 8
minutes. My seat was in the balcony
section, behind the orchestra, so the solo cello was furthest away from
me. As a result I had a bit of trouble
picking out the solo's lines, but they sounded beautiful when I could hear
them. And this is one instance where I
wished they had a smaller orchestra so they wouldn’t drown out the soloist the
way they did. (It may work very well for
audience facing the stage.)
“Duo” was the
title in English, translated from the Chinese.
It is based on the story (popularized as Journey to the West, known to most Chinese) that describes how the monk Xuanzang traveled in search
of scripture, enduring much hardship in the progress. The original description of the piece is in Chinese, an
English translation (which I went to first) was provided in the program. It was only when I also read the Chinese that
I realized how botched the translation was.
While the description involves some Buddhist concepts, those terms are
quite well known and Google Translate should do quite well for them. Instead, we seem to have whole passages
translated by Google Translate, which can’t quite get the idioms and word
orders correct in my own experience.
So something that should mean “early days of the Tang Dynasty” got
translated as “an early morning during the Tang Dynasty,” and the Chinese title
度 (pronounced “du”) became “duo” in
English. As this was a double concerto,
I thought the composer was being unimaginative in naming the piece. However, in Buddhism “du” means something
like “transition” or “salvation.”
The composition
consists of three movements played nonstop.
They are all slow, with some fast passages thrown in. Instead of tempo markings, we have the titles “Form,
Happiness, and Awakening.” A Financial Times
critic called the work “more a matter of contemplation and survival than
reaching a particular destination.” On
the surface this doesn’t sound like a compliment, but it is actually an insightful way
to describe the rather pleasant and interesting piece. If this composition is typical of the young Zhao Lin (趙麟),
he is quite a composer.
The Sheng is a
Chinese music instrument made of bamboo, and is used in this work to represent
the qualities of the gods; the Cello, on the other hand, represents the
unquenchable human spirit. This and
other notes in the Program certainly helped one’s appreciation, but the music
can be appreciated at an abstract level.
It isn’t modern, not classical, not western, and not Chinese. A great example of something that is
cross-cultural and cross-period (as in classical, romantic, etc.)
This was the
first time I was exposed to the Sheng as a solo instrument (I might have heard
it in an ensemble before,) and I am impressed by both how versatile the
instrument was, and how Wu Tong (吳彤)
played it. It could produce a range of
sounds that one wouldn’t think possible from looking at the instrument, even
though it looks quite complex.
Yo-Yo Ma was his
usual exuberant self, delivering great music while appearing to enjoy it
tremendously. He had to feel
particularly good since this piece came out of one of his Silk Road project
activities.
The applause was
thunderous, and we had two encores. One
was with both instruments, also written by Zhao, that has a drinking cup as its
title, which Yo-Yo Ma roughly translated into “drinking song.” While it sounded nothing like the aria
Brindisi in La Traviata, it was capricious and enjoyable. Ma then played a cello encore; it was a familiar
sounding piece, but I do not know its title.
Both encores had orchestra accompaniment. To Ma's credit, he acknowledged many of the orchestra members, and waved at those seated behind the stage.
Curtain call after "duo." Yu Long and Wu Tong were wrapping their arms around one another, and Ma - cello in hand - was acknowledging the orchestra.
I have seen the
name Yu Long (余隆)
in Sydney and New York for quite a while now, mostly to conduct the Chinese New
Year programs for the Sydney Symphony and the New York Philharmonic. Per the Program Notes, he leads in some
capacity the China Philharmonic (not the China National Orchestra), the
Shanghai Symphony, and the Guangzhou Symphony; those must be among the top
orchestras in the entire country, and he rules them all. Recently he also collected high international
honors from France, Germany, and the USA.
The best I can say is I am puzzled how he manages to do all that. As my seat faces him, I imagined as a member
of the orchestra, and felt rather uninspired.
He was a lot better with the Zhao piece, though.
I said earlier
that buying a ticket to the concert was “close to” a no-brainer. One hesitation I had was the Zhao piece, I
thought if I were to listen to Ma it should be a famous cello concerto like
Dvorak or Shostakovich. The other
hesitation was the price. The best seats
in a typical HK Phil concert costs me around US$50 (with senior discount), for
this concert I had to dole out over $130 for a seat in the balcony (I didn’t
realize it was behind the stage.) I am
not saying it was worth the money (hard to put a price on art), or that I don’t
wish a more standard work was programmed, but I am quite happy with what I
heard, and don’t mind how much I paid for the seat. Of the many HK Phil concerts I have attended,
this is the only sold out concert. So
big names matter, and the pricing scheme is market pricing at its best (or
worst.) I do wonder why van Zweden didn't do the opener; he remains the music director of Hong Kong Philharmonic.
It was a short ride
back to Causeway Bay. I am staying up
past 2 am to get this finished, despite the considerable jetlag that is hitting
me right now.
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