Orchestral Institute: Pärt, Britten and Elgar - Let Echoes Fly

VICE DEAN'S MESSAGE

Welcome and thank you for joining us in this special concert of YST’s 202223 Orchestral Institute: Pärt, Britten and Elgar: Let Echoes Fly – which features the Conservatory’s Ong Teng Cheong Professor of Music, William VerMeulen (world renowned brass pedagogue and Principal Horn of the Houston Symphony), guest conductor Dr Luke Dollman (Senior Lecturer of Conducting at the University of Adelaide), and YST’s Head of Vocal Studies, Prof. Alan Bennett – in a program exploring how the support of family, friends and community can inspire the creation of powerful musical art.

The timeless nature of this kind of human interconnectedness is sublimely captured in Alfred Tennyson’s Nocturne (the second of the six texts adopted by Benjamin Britten for his Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, Op. 31), where “bugles blowing” captures real and imagined lovecastles, “old in story” and echoes the communal resonance that connects humanity through time and space.

The splendour falls on castle walls And snowy summits old in story: The long light shakes across the lakes, And the wild cataract leaps in glory:

Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, Bugle blow; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

Benjamin Britten’s expert ability to set scenes, and to evoke the emotional underpinnings of text through music, is sparked right from the Prologue, where the modern hornist is asked to play a melody on “natural harmonics” (i.e., without the use of valves) in order to emulate the archaic sound of natural-horn – foreshadowing and transporting us, perhaps, to “snowy summits old in story” – an affect beautifully achieved by our guest horn soloist, William VerMeulen.

In the spirit of YST’s year of “Looking Back, Moving Forward”, it is apropos that Prof. VerMeulen – Yong Siew Toh’s 20th Ong Teng Cheong Professor of Music – echoes the Conservatory’s inaugural 2003 OTC Professor – the late horn-playing legend, Barry Tuckwell, OBE AC (1931-2020). Like Barry Tuckwell, Prof. VerMeulen is a masterful performer-pedagogue and is only the second wind player in the Conservatory’s history awarded this honorific.

Whether it’s Arvo Pärt’s Cantus in memoriam Benjamin Britten, who via the neo-renaissance polyphony of his powerfully contemplative string writing pays tribute to Benjamin Britten; or Edward Elgar in his Enigma Variations, Op. 36, who celebrates his friends and family, including the beloved Nimrod movement – a meditation on hope and perseverance (and a musical tribute to publisher-friend, August Jaeger, who offered the composer much needed affirmation in a time of artistic crisis) – it is through the support of the better angels of our community (living and past) that we transcend our individual foibles.

Through the art of storytelling, poetry, or music, we are reminded that the most positively hopeful attribute we share as a species is a sense of humanity’s interconnectedness – as Tennyson suggests in the last stanza of the Nocturne: “Our echoes roll from soul to soul, And grow forever and forever”.

Associate Professor Brett Stemple Vice Dean (Ensembles, Research & Professional Awareness)

ABOUT YST

Inspirational life-affirming music-making is at the heart of the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music at the National University of Singapore. Centred in one of the world’s most dynamic countries, the Conservatory is uniquely placed to offer a distinct and powerful contemporary Asian voice.

Founded in 2003, YST quickly established a reputation as Asia’s most exciting international conservatory by bringing together a worldclass faculty and facility to develop excellence in instrumental performance and composition. Building on this strong foundation, the Conservatory has evolved over the past two decades to become one of the world’s most distinctive music schools, diversifying its offerings and continually seeking to connect authentically with its surrounding community. Specialisations added subsequently include Voice, Audio Arts & Sciences, Conducting, Music & Society and Music, Collaboration & Production. Alongside students from Singapore, the Conservatory community is internationally diverse, with representation from over 20 countries and five continents.

Keenly focused on nurturing identity as a driver for excellence, YST’s Bachelor of Music programme

offers full financial support for all its undergraduate students, enabled by major gifts from the Yong Loo Lin Trust. The Conservatory’s continuum of offerings further includes Master of Music and Master of Music Leadership degrees, NUSfacing Second Majors, Minors and modules, Continuing Education & Training courses for adult learners, and a Young Artist programme. We host a vibrant performance calendar with around 200 concerts annually, featuring students and faculty alongside international artists and ensembles. Our community engagement and professional integration programme has extensive local, regional and global reach. Students are supported to find their own artistic pathways through exchanges, festivals, competitions and projects. More broadly, our international networks and partnerships further enhance the educational experience and ensure our continued evolution.

ABOUT THE YST ORCHESTRAL INSTITUTE

The YST Orchestral Institute is a creative musicians’ laboratory, designed as an innovative forum for conservatory-level orchestral training. First conceptualized in 2018 by former YST Dean, Prof. Bernard Lanskey, as a way of revitalizing learning and teaching systems within a large ensemble context, the Orchestral Institute has emerged as a dynamic platform in which aspirational orchestral musicians work collaboratively alongside professionals drawn from Conservatory faculty, staff, and alumni, as well as YST partner institutions, from Southeast Asia and beyond. Pioneering interdisciplinary programming, a unique production style, collaborative-composition creation, musician

health & well-being, and an open-dialogue approach to rehearsing are all hallmarks of the Orchestral Institute approach – a philharmonie philosophy which seeks to create a safe ‘play-space’ emphasizing creativity, mutual learning, and skills development appropriate for large ensemble musicmaking, with the ambition of enabling musicians to be even more open, daring, questioning, collaborative and passionate about the music they make together.

Currently under the leadership of YST Conservatory Principal Conductor, Jason Lai; Vice Dean of Ensembles, Brett Stemple; OpusNovus Conductor (and YST Artist Fellow), Dr Lien Boon Hua, and Orchestral Manager, Yap Zi Qi; and working alongside Conservatory students, faculty, staff, and YST Artist Fellows – the Orchestral Institute has created and curated a number of groundbreaking orchestral productions including Telling Beyond Words (2019), and – despite the global pandemic – Springs of Uncertainty (2020), Lichtbogen (2020), Landscapes of Souls (2021), Transfigurations (2021), Dream for Future (as part of SoundBridge Music Festival 2021) and a special collaborative family concert with the Kids’ Philharmonic, Symphonies Simple and Philharmonic Friends (2021), among others, many of which are available for viewing at the YST Conservatory’s YouTube channel.

LUKE DOLLMAN

GUEST CONDUCTOR

Luke Dollman began his musical life as a violinist, performing professionally with orchestras on both modern and baroque violin. After deciding to focus on conducting, he furthered his studies at the renowned Sibelius Academy in Helsinki gaining a Masters of Music degree with Leif Segerstam and Jorma Panula, as well as studying at the Aspen Music Festival as a Fellow with David Zinman. Luke was also a participant in the inaugural Allianz Conductors Academy in 2004, studying with Kurt Masur and working with the London Philharmonic in the process. In 2000 Luke was awarded the First Prize in the Symphony Australia Westfield Conducting Competition hosted by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.

A recipient of the Bernard Haitink Scholarship, Luke Dollman held the position of Assistant Conductor to Edo de Waart at the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic from 2001 until 2003. During this time he performed with the orchestra regularly,

conducting public performances for national radio and television.

In 2005 Luke Dollman made his UK debut with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in a main series concert which was broadcast on BBC Radio 3, and has since returned to them many times for concerts and recordings. A laureate of the Besançon International Conducting Competition, he made his French debut conducting the Monte Carlo Philharmonic for the opening concert of the Besançon Festival in 2009. 2011 saw his German debut with the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie. Other orchestras he has worked with include the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, Oulu Symphony, Lausanne Sinfonietta, Pori Sinfonietta, Het Brabants Orkets, Holland Symfonia, Belgian National Orchestra, Orchestra of the Welsh National Opera, Malaysian Philharmonic, Helsingborg Symphony, Gävle Symphony, Odense Symphony, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia, Christchurch Symphony and all of Australia’s professional orchestras.

Having earlier worked as an assistant at the Netherlands Opera, in 2004 Luke Dollman made his opera debut at Opera Australia (Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro) and was immediately reinvited to return

to conduct Die Zauberflöte. In 2005 he made his Finnish National Opera debut with Puccini’s Manon Lescaut to great acclaim and has since returned regularly to conduct works such as La Rondine, Rigoletto, The Taming of the Shrew and most recently the world premiere of Lera Auerbach’s Cinderella. 2011 saw Luke make his debut with the State Opera of South Australia conducting Bizet’s Pearlfishers. In recent years he has returned to conduct The Magic Flute, Don Pasquale and Dido and Aeneas for the company. In 2018 Luke released his first CD on the Decca label, with soprano Greta Bradman and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.

Luke has guest conducted regularly at leading schools such as the Guildhall School of Music, Royal Conservatorium of The Hague, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Yong Siew Toh Conservatory, and the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. Luke is also a recognised authority in the field of conductor training, and has taught at the Sibelius Academy, Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, University of Adelaide, and for the masterclasses of Symphony Services International and is currently Senior Lecturer in Conducting and Deputy Director at the Elder Conservatorium of Music, University of Adelaide.

KOH KAI JIE

CONDUCTOR

Koh Kai Jie is an emerging Singaporean conductor and pianist. Kai Jie is currently pursuing a masters’ degree in conducting at the Yong Siew Toh (YST) Conservatory of Music under the guidance of Jason Lai. He also graduated from the YST Conservatory with Bachelor of Music with Honours (Highest Distinction) in Piano Performance, studying with pianist Albert Tiu.

Kai Jie has a passion to share the joys of music making with younger musicians, serving as conductor for various ensembles which explore new and fresh pedagogical dimensions. In April 2022, he conducted the YST Electone Orchestra, a pedagogical tool which seeks to give undergraduate conservatory pianists a glimpse of orchestral playing using cuttingedge Yamaha Stagea Electones. He led eight YST pianists turned orchestral electone players in a performance of themonumental Beethoven

Symphony No 5. In addition, Kai Jie has conducted various YST ensembles in concert including the YST Conservatory Orchestra and OpusNovus, the conservatory’s new music ensemble. Most recently in August 2022, he conducted Chen Zhangyi’s chamber opera Kampung Spirit as part of the YST Voyage Festival, working with YST singers and musicians. Kai Jie also serves as Assistant Conductor of the St. Nicholas Girls’ School String Orchestra. His conducting journey started during the second year of his undergraduate degree, when Kai Jie formed a chamber orchestra comprising conservatory musicians, conducting the orchestra in performances in the conservatory regularly since. In particular, the orchestra’s performance of the Beethoven Coriolan Overture in 2019 was highly commended by music critic Dr Marc Rochester, who was “deeply impressed with both the quality of playing [he] drew from the orchestra and [his] insightful interpretation of the Beethoven Overture”.

As a pianist, Kai Jie has achieved numerous accolades. Most recently in 2020, he attained the first prize in the YST Conservatory Concerto Competition (Piano Category). He also won the second prizes in the Singapore National Piano

and Violin Competition (Senior Category) and the Yamaha Piano Competition (Singapore) in 2013. Kai Jie has also worked with eminent pianists Daejin Kim and Noriko Ogawa in public masterclasses in YST Conservatory.

WILLIAM VERMEULEN

FRENCH HORN

Hailed as “one of today’s superstars of the international brass scene,” William VerMeulen leads a varied musical life of soloist, orchestral principal, chamber musician, master teacher, and music publisher. VerMeulen has been principal horn of the Houston Symphony since 1990 and has performed as a guest principal horn with the Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Prior to joining the Houston Symphony, he was employed with the orchestras of Columbus, Honolulu, and Kansas City.

VerMeulen has been an artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and participates as a performer and on faculty with the finest music festivals and chamber music presenters, among which include the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Aspen Music Festival, Music@Menlo, Banff Centre, Da Camera of Houston, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Joshua Bell and Friends, Tanglewood,

Sarasota Music Festival, Strings Music Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, New World Symphony, Domaine Forget, Chamber Music Northwest, and the Sun Valley Summer Symphony where he also serves as principal horn.

VerMeulen has performed to critical acclaim on four continents as a soloist and chamber musician and is a popular artist at International Horn Society Symposiums where he was a member of the advisory council. He serves as a board member of the International Horn Competition of America. Along with the dozens of orchestral recordings in his discography are numerous solo and chamber recordings, including the complete Mozart Horn Concerti with Christoph Eschenbach and the Houston Symphony, Texas Horns featuring the Dallas and Houston horn sections, and “The Christmas Horn” which features VerMeulen combined with his students from Rice University, conducted by Dale Clevenger. He has recorded live the Brahms Trio op. 40, Mozart Quintet K. 407, Beethoven Septet, Ravel Tombeau de Couperin for wind quintet, Schubert Octet, Spohr Nonet, Ligeti Bagatelles, and the Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 1. A champion of new music, VerMeulen has had numerous pieces written for him including concerti by esteemed American composers

Samuel Adler, Pierre Jalbert, Tony DiLorenzo, and the horn cantata “Canticum Sacrum” by Robert Bradshaw. He recorded the Canto XI by Samuel Adler for a CD called First Chairs. Among his awards and honors, VerMeulen received first prize at the 1980 International Horn Society Soloist Competition and the Shapiro Award for Most Outstanding Brass Player at the Tanglewood Festival.

Regarded as one of the most influential horn teachers of all time, VerMeulen is a professor of horn at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University and brass artist-in-residence at the Royal Conservatory of Music’s Glenn Gould School. His students perform in numerous major orchestras throughout the world including the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic, Canadian Brass, Cleveland Orchestra, and the San Francisco, Cincinnati, Montreal, St. Louis, Toronto, Detroit, Dallas, and Houston Symphonies. Over 250 positions of employment have been offered to his students. In 1985, he was invited to the White House to receive a Distinguished Teacher of America Certificate of Excellence from President Reagan and the White House Commission on Presidential Scholars.

VerMeulen received his training from Dale Clevenger at Northwestern University and the Interlochen Arts Academy and is founder and president of VerMeulen Music, L.L.C., which offers music and products for horn players worldwide at www.vermeulenmusic.com

VerMeulen is married to Houston Opera and Ballet violinist Sylvia VerMeulen, and they have two lovely children, Michael and Nicole. In his rare free time, he enjoys having good friends over to share in his passion for fine cooking and wine.

ALAN BENNETT

TENOR

Lyric tenor Alan Bennett has enjoyed a diverse career, performing extensively throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe, in Central and South America and Asia, singing with prominent festivals and orchestras, as well as in recitals and opera.

His students and former students are likewise singing and recording professionally throughout the world and have earned placement in numerous international competitions including the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. Many other former students hold teaching positions in universities and colleges. He is in frequent demand as a guest teacher and has offered masterclasses at Toho Conservatory in Tokyo, Seoul National University, Yonsei University, Ewha University, the National University of Costa Rica, and many others.

Bennett has presented performances at such venues as Carnegie Hall (the main stage, Weill

Recital Hall and the Zankel Hall), Wigmore Hall, the Berlin Schauspielhaus, the Kennedy Center, Alice Tully Hall, Kumho Arts Hall and many others. He has sung with numerous symphony orchestras including the Cleveland Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Seattle Symphony, National Philharmonic, Calgary Philharmonic, National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica, Kansas City Symphony, Omaha Symphony, Colorado Symphony, Honolulu Symphony, New Mexico Symphony, Santa Rosa Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Grand Rapids Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony and Chamber Orchestras and others. He has also sung with many period instrument ensembles such as the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, the Handel & Haydn Society, Tafelmusik, Les Violons du Roy and Apollo’s Fire. An avid recitalist and chamber musician, he has performed with the Vermeer and Penderecki quartets and his recital partners have included the late Leonard Hokanson and lutenists Nigel North and Paul O’Dette. In addition to numerous performances in the U.S. and Canada, his recital engagements have taken him to Brazil, Germany, and Korea.

He is a frequent guest at music festivals and has appeared at the Tanglewood Festival, Oregon Bach

Festival, Boston Early Music Festival, Bethlehem Bach Festival, Baldwin-Wallace Bach Festival, Boulder Bach Festival, Carmel Bach Festival, Parry Sound Festival, Mammoth Lakes Chamber Music Festival, Bay Chamber Festival, Plymouth Music Series, the Caramoor Festival, the Grand Tetons Music Festival, the Augsburg Mozart Festival and many others. Choral societies who have featured him as a soloist include the Oratorio Society of New York, Washington Choral Arts Society, Baltimore Choral Arts Society, San Francisco Bach Choir, Houston Masterworks Chorus, Dartmouth Handel Society, Seattle Chamber Singers and many others. He has collaborated with some of the world’s most prominent conductors including Bruno Weil, Sir David Willcocks, Christopher Hogwood, Helmuth Rilling, Nicholas McGegan, Bernard Labadie and the late Robert Shaw. His recording credits encompass works of the medieval through contemporary periods, including premiers by Steve Reich and Arvo Pärt and he has recorded for Harmonia Mundi USA, Nonesuch, Telarc and Focus Records. Highlights of recent seasons included performances of Handel’s Messiah at Carnegie Hall and in the Disney Concert Hall in LA, Bach’s Passions in the Washington National Cathedral, as well as return engagements at the Carmel and Baldwin-Wallace Bach Festivals.

PROGRAMME NOTES

Let Echoes Fly Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, Bugle blow; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying. - Alfred, Lord Tennyson (from Benjamin Britten's Serenade)

Each of the pieces presented this evening, in their own unique way, celebrate the depths of support, inspiration and interconnectivity that reverberates through the power of community. Whether it’s Arvo Pärt, realizing a kindred creative-spirit in Benjamin Britten upon the great English composer’s passing – giving rise to the composition Cantus in memoriam in 1977; or Britten’s own collaboration with partner, Peter Pears, and the twenty-twoyear-old horn-playing virtuoso friend, Dennis Brain

(who commissioned the piece) – leading to the transcendentally-dark Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings in 1944; or Edward Elgar’s life-affirming Enigma Variations of 1899 – which paints a series of colorful musical portraits of the composer’s circle of family, friends (and even a bulldog!); all of the music curated for this prograwwm echoes with the influential resonances of community, ranging from intimate family and friends to artistic acquaintances across time and space.

Echoes in memoriam

Arvo Pärt (b. 1935) was surprised by his swell of emotions upon learning of Benjamin Britten’s (191376) passing, explaining that “in the past years we have had many losses in the world of music to mourn. Why did the date of Benjamin Britten’s death – 4 December 1976 – touch such a chord in me?”

Pärt realized that it was in the “unusual purity” of Britten’s compositional style that he felt a special aesthetic consonance with the older composer, a revelation that made “the magnitude of the loss” particularly striking, especially because Arvo “for a long time had wanted to meet Britten personally –and he now [knew] it would not come to that.”

This is the context that inspired his Cantus in memoriam Benjamin Britten, a short canon for string orchestra and a single orchestral bell (in A). The work was composed in 1977 and as the name suggests, is an elegy to mourn Benjamin Britten’s death. This work is an early example of a Pärt’s signature Tintinnabuli (from the Latin for “bell”) style, influenced by the aesthetics of late medieval chant music.

As music critic Ivan Hewett observed, despite the piece being simple in concept, Pärt “produces a tangle of lines which is hard for the ear to unravel. And even where the music really is simple in its audible features, the expressive import of those features is anything but.” The music evolves in a meditative, yet expressive arc, emanating from silence, cresting into a lush sound wave, before eventually returning to the single bell tolling in the distance.

For Pärt, the tolling of bells, like the resonance of an A-minor triad, is a search for meaning out of the chaos of the everyday, “The complex and many-faceted only confuses me, and I must search for unity. What is it, this one thing, and how do I find my way to it?”. The plaintive counterpoint in the strings, in dialogue with the bell’s persistent chime, suggests that through the echoes of history – recent and ancient – humanity’s cultural DNA reverberates eternally.

(Dennis Brain, Peter Pears, and Benjamin Britten)

Echoes in the night

O soft embalmer of the still midnight, Shutting with careful fingers and benign Our gloom pleas'd eyes, embower'd from the light, Enshaded in forgetfulness divine: -John Keats (from Benjamin Britten’s Serenade)

Part of the genius of Benjamin Britten’s oeuvre is while capturing the contemporary essence of the time for which he composed, Britten’s output – like the best of the classical tradition – also captures timeless truths about the human condition. This is certainly true of his 1945 operatic masterpiece, “Peter Grimes”, a work that touches on themes of ostracization, brutality, and the interrelationship between individual and society. Britten wrote that this was a subject very close to his heart – “the struggle of the individual against the masses. The more vicious the society, the more vicious the individual".

The Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, Op. 31 (1943), was also a composition conceived concurrent with the brutalities of the Second World War. Although imbued with the kind of shadows of darkness – and explorations of humanity’s relationship with “curious Conscious” – central to Peter Grimes, the Serenade has a more idyllic, sleepy transcendence, “Enshaded in forgetfulness divine”, that leaves the listener far more at peace, than at the end of Britten’s stormy opera.

The Serenade is a song-cycle in eight movements, and through the collaboration with his novelist friend, Edward Sackville-West – a beautifully curated musical reflection on six poems from the

British canon – by Charles Cotton, Alfred Tennyson, William Blake, the Lyke-Wake Dirge (anon.), and John Keats – on themes contemplating (in Sackville-West’s words) “night and its conjuring tricks: the lengthening shadow, the distant bugle at sunset, the baroque panoply of the starry sky, the heavy angels of sleep; but also the cloak of evil.” The song cycle is dedicated to Britten’s partner, the tenor Peter Pears, and horn-playing virtuoso, Dennis Brain, both of whom for which it was composed and who performed the premiere.

The cycle opens with the horn soloist intoning the virtuosically sombre Prologue, in which Britten requests the artist to play on natural harmonics (avoiding the modern valve system) evoking hunting-horns of old, and setting our “once upon a time” narrative in motion.

The setting of Charles Cotton’s (1630-87) Pastoral begins with the fainting sun, captured in the long horn lines, and the recurring falling accompaniment in the strings. Through extraordinary text-painting, the texture has become vivid and clear, but not without a sense of humour, including elongated shadows from the setting sun making “the ants appear a monstrous elephant” which Britten depicts with playful pizzicati in the strings.

Britten’s vivid text-painting sets Alfred Tennyson’s (1809-92) Nocturne alternatingly in real-world militaristic “castle walls”, and in a fairy-taleworld where we hear the muted “horns of Elfland faintly blowing”. The movement is fantasy-like, weaving in and out through time realms, where the composer’s sound-paintings dramatically evokes Tennyson’s mediation between fictions and realities.

The setting of William Blake’s (1757-1827) Elegy is pensive and dark, suggesting a Mahlerianlike foreboding. It begins with an extensive horn soliloquy, setting the stage for the tenor’s evocative recitative eulogizing the deadly duplicitousness of a thorny rose. The middle-English Lyke-Wake Dirge, opens with a haunting chromatic motif sung by the solo tenor, appropriate for our month of Halloween! In contrast to the earlier movements, the Dirge is very rhythmic, creating a twisted nightmarish sound-world reminiscent of the kind of witches’ party Hector Berlioz celebrates at the close of his Symphonie Fantastique.

Ben Jonson’s (1572-1637) Hymn is full of galloping spirit – perfect for the timbres and

colours of the horn, an instrument that has long historical connections with hunting calls. This short movement is full of jest and humour, and is a cornucopia of virtuosic duo passages between tenor and horn.

Britten’s setting of John Keats’s (1895-1821) Sonnet beautifully brings the song-cycle’s narrative arc full circle. From the fainting sun first depicted in the opening Pastoral, here again we begin with a calm night, this time with the clock striking midnight. Death’s peaceful sleep “It’s strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole” is portrayed through the subterranean double-basses wiggling their way out of the ground. By the end of the movement, the wretched and chilling fears transports us to an ethereal plane, where the “key deftly in the oilèd wards”, seals “the hushèd Casket” of our souls.

Underscoring the cyclical nature of the life-cycle, Britten reprises the opening horn-call, this time as an Epilogue echoing from off-stage. Coming to the end of a dramatic and provocative narrative, the distant horn evokes dreams of our nocturnal forebearers, echoes rolling “from soul to soul”, and growing “forever and forever”.

(Edward Elgar and August Jaeger (a.k.a “Nimrod”))

Echoes in the day

Enigma Variations, Op. 36 by Sir Edward Elgar is a set of 14 variations, composed in 1898 and premiered in the following year. The piece was very well received at the premiere and has remained a mainstay of the standard orchestral repertoire ever since. Elgar dedicated the variations “to my friends pictured within”, referring to his friends, colleagues, and his wife, Alice. The composition acts as a kind of musical time-machine, echoing Elgar’s life through the musical portraits he composed of family, friends, and of the professional associates he most valued. The work is filled with a variety of characters,

colours, moods, and mysteries. Not least of which is the enigmatic source of the Theme. Although debate continues as to the source material, Elgar’s identification of the theme’s potentiality for a set of variations is well documented. The main theme was a result of Elgar’s improvisation on the piano after a long and tiring day of teaching, which caught Alice’s attention. “What is that?” Alice asked. “Nothing, but something might be made of it” Elgar replied.

The first of the variations “C.A.E.” (Caroline Alice Elgar) was dedicated to none other than his wife, Alice. It is highly expressive and contains a romantic outburst of passion.

“H.D.S-P” is dedicated to the amateur pianist, Hew David Steuart-Powell. It is a short variation rich in chromaticism and vibrant musical activity, lampooning Powell’s raucous piano warm-ups.

“R.B.T” is dedicated to the author and amateur actor, Richard Bater Townshend. It begins with an angularly lyric oboe solo, which is developed through rising chromatic fragments eventually imitated in the low winds and strings, evoking Townshend’s propensity to shift his thespian voice from the deepest basso profundo to the highest soprano.

“W.M.B” is dedicated to the squire, William Meath Baker. The shortest of the variations and the most explosive, apparently reflecting Baker's hot-headed, volatile nature.

“R.P.A” is dedicated to the amateur pianist, Richard Penrose Arnold. The music is noble and is warm in temperament, alternating with lighter flights of fancy, depicting Arnold’s conversationalist style, who was adept at mixing the serious with the whimsical in his storytelling.

“Ysobel” is dedicated to Elgar’s vio`la pupil, Isabel Fitton. The music is pensively expressive, and appropriately features lovely viola solos rising out of the orchestral texture.

“Troyte” is dedicated to one of Elgar’s firmest friends, Arthur Troyte Griffith. The music is zestful and lively, and is said to capture Griffith and Elgar running from a suddenly appearing thunderstorm, a situation we are well familiar with here in Singapore!

“W.N.” is dedicated to the music aficionado, Winifred Norbury, and is full of grace and elegance.

Augustus Jaeger (“hunter”, auf Deutsch), Elgar’s friend and dedicatee of the famous Nimrod (the

biblical “mighty hunter”) variation. Jaeger provided Elgar with much-needed emotional support and affirmation in the composer’s time of creative crisis. The music is filled with unshakable resolve, and the moving hymn has become associated with ceremonies of mourning and hope, particularly throughout the Commonwealth.

“Dorabella” is dedicated to his Elgar’s friend, Dora Penny. The music is whimsical and parodies Dorabella’s stuttering speech patterns in the woodwind utterances.

“G.R.S.” is dedicated to the organist, George Robertson Sinclair. The music is filled with fastpaced action, almost like a chase, and celebrates Sinclair’s bulldog, Dan, “falling into a river, vigorously swimming to shore, and finally landing with a rejoicing bark”!

“B.G.N.” is dedicated to the amateur cellist, Basil George Nevinson. The variation is pensive and features a sublimely expressive cello solo.

“ * * * ” is dedicated to the arts patron, Lady Mary Lygon. Curious echoes to Mendelssohn’s “Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage” can be heard in the descending melody first introduce by the clarinet. It is a musical send-off to Elgar’s friend, Lady Mary,

about to embark to Australia, by ship.

The finale of the variations “E.D.U.” (from his wife’s nickname for Edward “Edu”) is a self-portrait of Elgar himself. In its march-like British grandeur, it provides a grand, triumphant processional for the Enigma variations, and a musical snapshot of a composer at the zenith of his creativity.

Programme notes written by Pun Punyasavatsut, compiled and edited by Brett Stemple.

Echoes of the community

Some reflections on COVID-19 and personal artistry…

"Covid was a period met with lots of uncertainties, transitions, as well as different kinds of losses for many. Having seen many sacrifices made by the musicians around me to continue doing what they love made me realize for the first time that the arts ecosystem can be such a beautiful yet fragile thing, and how important it is to believe in what we were doing."

"During Covid, I began recording myself performing hymns and sharing it to others through social media in hopes of encouraging my loved ones in the community."

"I last performed Elgar’s Enigma Variations preYST, back in Dec 2018 with the Singapore National Youth Orchestra. None of us would foresee the travel restrictions and reduction in performance opportunities soon after that. Seeing the immense musical growth of some of my then-SNYO peers now in YST is also so amazing!"

"

The past two years showed me the beauty of smaller size and more intimate chamber music playing at a time when it was difficult to gather in large groups."

"Navigating through the ups and downs of Covid proved to me that I really want to do music and perform because I found myself craving very much for performance opportunities."

Some thoughts on tonight’s program…

"It is touching to experience Elgar's attentiveness and love towards the community around him, even for people who don't necessarily play a terribly important role in his life."

"In Sonnet, Britten sets the text by John Keats so beautifully. The string writing is ethereal, transparent and moves effortlessly along. The coming together of text and music is typical of what he was capable of as an orchestrator— creating such beauty out of something that is quite simple."

"Britten’s "Elegy" is particularly beautiful, mournful and evocative. It gets inside your skin."

"The "Prologue" and "Epilogue" bookends the work with natural harmonics of the horn, which lends itself to some pain because it feels out of tune. Yet there is perfection in the imperfection—as if perfection is the enemy of creativity, and Britten chooses to start with imperfection."

" The poetry in Britten’s Serenade generally talks about how darkness and light intertwines, and for that reason it pairs very well with the Elgar."

"Having played "Nimrod" for the first time during a period of personal loss, the sentimentality of the music feels very much like sadness, but not without hope and perseverance at the same time."

Some dedications...

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I would like to dedicate "Troyte" from the Enigma Variations to the percussion studio, I think it reflects the energy and experience of studio life. In "* * *", the way in which the timpani gently supports the clarinet solos mirrors the patient and palpable support I have felt from my mentors and teachers, so that movement is for them."

- Lee Yuru

"I would like to dedicate "Nimrod" to my teachers Jamie Hersch and Hoang Van Hoc, for being the biggest support systems to my musical pursuits and beyond. For their inspiration, encouragement, and most importantly how they believed in me before I could believe in myself."

- Linnet Sim

"I would like to dedicate "R.B.T." to Jiaao. It reminds me of how lively and cheerful he is, and how he jokes around a lot."

- Quek Jun Rui

MUSICIANS