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PERFORMERS(') PRESENT

2016: Performers(') Present

102319 performers present

The musical landscape—inclusive of reflections and explorations in artistic research—evolved rapidly and globally in the early decades of the 21st century. Cultural intersections and reciprocations, inherent with this expansive growth, have been a recurring theme in the four artistic research symposia hosted at YST Conservatory since 2009. The negotiations and reconsiderations that have grown out of these cultural cross-currents evolves our relationship with art music, as well as Asia’s emergent role in performance, composition and curation of music that had been historically considered “Western”. Performers, and especially the performer-scholars who form the core of the artistic-research community, have an essential role to play in this evolution, for it is through their presence, that a piece of music is brought into the present and presented to an audience.

Here on the YST Performers(‘) Present digital platform, we offer a selection of presentations and highlights curated from our 2016 international artistic research symposium of the same name.

See The Programme Booklet

Selected Symposium Performance-Presentations

1) Geographical Exigencies: Locating Art Music in Southeast Asia

Session 13B: A Performer’s Approach to East Asian Musical Elements in George Crumb’s Mundus Canis (1998), for Guitar and Percussion

Paul Cesarczyk

Music can offer a neutral space where diverse cultural elements converge, allowing for conversation and collaboration. Might performers fulfill their roles as agents of change to erode cultural boundaries in the world? 

In this presentation, Paul Cesarczyk (Mahidol University) proposes a “culturally-informed” approach can result in more convincing performances of works with strong non-Western elements. He discusses his approach to performing George Crumb’s “Mundus Canis”, drawing on a theoretical framework largely derived from Yayoi Uno Everett’s “Locating East Asia in Western Art Music” to isolate and explore the Asian elements in this piece from a performer’s angle.

 

Keywords: George Crumb, guitar, percussion, musical syncretism, Asia, Takemitsu

Session 13B - A Performers’ Approach to East Asian Musical Elements in George Crumb’s Mundus Canis (1998), for Guitar and Percussion

Paul Cesarczyk

Abstract

Ever since Henry Cowell used youthful experiences with Chinese music to develop a distinctive vision of cross-cultural synthesis, American experimental composers have incorporated East Asian sonorities and  philosophies into their works. George Crumb (b. 1929), in particular, has drawn inspiration from a number of Asian sources including Chinese opera and Indonesian gamelan music. The purpose of this study is to isolate and discuss Asian influences in Crumb’s Mundus Canis (A Dog’s World), a pivotal work for classical guitar and one percussionist, composed in 1998. Evidence of Asian music in Mundus Canis ranges from the explicit parody of the pentatonic scale to the atmospheric use of the water gong and suspended cymbals; and the use of effects such as pitch bending, dramatic silences, and the evocation of animal personalities. These phenomena will be analysed on the basis of timbre, melody, rhythm, aesthetics, and spirituality.

This presentation suggests that, like historically informed performances of pre-Romantic repertoire, a “culturally informed” approach will result in more convincing performances of works with strong non-Western elements. As a result, this paper also examines the evolving role of the performer in a world where cultural boundaries are slowly disappearing.

Abstract
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Keywords: Outreach, folk tunes, South East Asia

Session 6: Presentations & Provocations –
Here and Now: Our Present Place & Time 

Panelists: Chen Zhangyi, Saw James Hsar Doe Soe, Him Sophy
Moderator: Dr. Anothai Nitibhon

Five composers from different SEA countries explore how classical music is received in SEA, given the perceived distance between their own (Western) musical training and the musical tastes of their home communities. How might composers write music and/or organize concerts in a way that establishes relevance?

Anothai Nitibhon (Princess Galyani Vadhana Institute of Music) introduces the efforts that PGVIM is putting into musical outreach. She discusses the need to be composing beyond the notes on paper, including composing for and through the community, creating engagement that are universally relatable. In this video, she showcases a project where underprivileged Thai children wrote their own folk tunes that students at the University later orchestrated.

Session 6: Presentations and Provocations -
Here and Now: Our Present Place & Time

Panelists: Chen Zhangyi, Saw James Hsar Doe Soe, Him Sophy
Moderator: Dr. Anothai Nitibhon

Abstract

In a time when our increasingly interconnected globalized world is confronting the unsettling, sometimes destabilizing effects of its own progress, where and what is classical music tradition’s role in shaping our present time and place here in Southeast Asia? Four composers based in Southeast Asia share their thoughts on particular recent works and on their desired contemporary resonances.

Abstract
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Session 7C: Preparing and Presenting Indian Music through Jazz

Tony Makarome

Dr. Tony Makarome (Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music) discusses his artistic process and challenges in fusing Indian Carnatic as well as jazz elements, showcasing the live performance of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s One Note Samba with his band, Varsha.

Keywords: Karnatic, Jazz, Mridangam, Samba, Bass, Indian classical music

Session 7C: Preparing and Presenting Indian Music through Jazz

Tony Makarome

Abstract

This lecture-recital will feature a Singapore-based improvisation group whose music organically combines jazz music and Indian music (mostly Carnatic or south Indian classical music). The journey of experimentation that the performers took to create their special sound involved months of “musical brainstorming” during which the performers either had to find common ground to germinate musical pieces or take a leap of faith and grow musically by absorbing some important elements from each other’s music. Overall, the experience has been a rewarding one and has culminated in several public performances in venues such as the Esplanade.

The process of preparing the music for presentation will be discussed in this lecture-recital. This will include:

  1. The initial jam sessions and improvisations.
  2. Indian classical music and how the group injected jazz elements into it.
  3. How a jazz musician studied Indian music and incorporated the spirit (and music theory) of Indian music into arrangements and compositions.
  4. What it means to be present in this ensemble and its significance in improvisation and performance.
  5. Some challenges faced while making music together.

The performance will showcase a unique arrangement of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s One Note Samba, an Indian classical piece and an original composition. The unique feature of this group is how they create music in the moment that may be appreciated equally by fans of both genres of jazz and Indian music.

Abstract
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Keywords: Contemporary music, South East Asia, outreach, community

Session 2B: Paving the Present Residing in the Resonant: Themes of Connectivity and Community in Southeast-Asian Contemporary Music

Ruth Rodrigues and Christoph Wichert

In this video extract, Dr. Ruth Rodrigues (Raffles Institution, Singapore) addresses what community engagement for new music means in a Southeast-Asian context, based on work by SETTS (Southeastern Ensemble for Today’s and Tomorrow’s Sounds). Using examples from the projects they have commissioned, she explores three themes: 1) connections between Asia and the world; 2) inter-/ intra-Asian links, and 3) currents in contemporary music.

Session 2B: Paving the Present Residing in the Resonant: Themes of Connectivity and Community in Southeast-Asian Contemporary Music

Ruth Rodrigues and Christoph Wichert

Abstract

Oh chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer,
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the hole?
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance?
— William Butler Yeats

When William Yeats created his sublime poem about the relationship between form, function and being, he articulated an ontological question that has been a part of Western civilisation at least since the beginning of our cultural self-consciousness: How can we know an object from its maker?

A meaningful definition of art does not originate solely from knowledge of the art object, from understanding the artist, or from analysing the audience. Instead, a meaningful definition of art acknowledges the interplay and connection of three discrete components - artist, art object, and audience - the community.

This paper by the founding members of the SETTS (Southeastern Ensemble for Today's and Tomorrow's Sounds), addresses new ways of understanding the art of South-East Asian music. Using examples from the projects we have commissioned so far, we will explore three themes: 

  1. connections between Asia and the world; 
  2. inter-Asia and intra-Asian regional links; and 
  3. empathic similarities possible within contemporary music. 

As part of our study of the third theme, we will also address the connectivities between composers, performers and the community – the mission and objective of SETTS.

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Session 5A: The Mediated Space: Voices of Interculturalism in Music for Flute

Jean Penny

Continuing with the theme of musical syncretism and synthesis, Jean Penny discusses the capacity of music performance to be a mediated and non-signifying space where one can experience the culture of another. She explores these ideas in the context of her performance of Toru Takemitsu’s Voice, drawing on diverse theoretical frameworks, including: Foucault’s theory of Heterotopia; Ingold’s theory of thinking through making and performance studies. Music for flute and voice, undertaken by one performer, may include poetry or narrative, singing while playing, phonemes uttered or sung, murmuring, whispering, breath sounds and a variety of articulations. These sounds, in combination with various flute tones, evoke a particular aesthetic and perception. How might performers act as cultural agents who can break down cultural barriers?

Keywords: Interculturalism, Musical Syncretism, Takemitsu, Foucault, Ingold, flute, extended techniques

Session 5A: The Mediated Space: Voices of Interculturalism in Music for Flute

Jean Penny

Abstract

This paper explores performative spaces between cultures that emerge in contemporary music for flute. The performance as mediated space, as an articulation of ‘art as living reality’ and as a model for aesthetic and
cultural exchange is investigated. Music for flute and voice, undertaken by one performer, may include poetry or narrative, singing while playing, phonemes uttered or sung, murmuring, whispering, breath sounds and a variety of articulations. These sounds, in combination with various flute tones, evoke a particular aesthetic and perception. Multiplicities of identity arise, questions of performer persona, location and dimension, and new layers of meaning emerge.

Two works for solo flute with poetic vocalization – Tōru Takemitsu’s Voice and Kaija Saariaho’s Laconisme de l’aile – provide exemplars for the creation of the heterotopian space as a performative context of understanding. The cultural significance of language, the sounds of Western and Eastern flute and voice traditions challenge and disrupt perceptions, providing a platform from which to construct experiential intercultural analysis. The investigation is focused on four main areas:

  1. Interculturalities: Sonority, identity, and score examining timbral and physical aspects of contemporary flute techniques, and the score as a context for activating shifts in cultural expectations and understandings
  2. Heterotopia as a context, as a space between cultures which activates an imaginary space
  3. Connecting Aesthetics: Contexts, processes, and dialogues – cultural contexts, artistic processes and the performance space
  4. Theories and Methods for an Intercultural Flute Practice articulates questions for investigation, and the importance of descriptive analysis in this performative context

This presentation is based on the author’s chapter of the same name in the Routledge Handbook of Intercultural Arts Research (2016). 

Abstract
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2) Temporal Exigencies: Locating the 21st Century in Art Music

Session 10B: The Performer’s Response as Symbolic Space: Exploring the Piano Music of Charles Griffes

Abigail Sin

How do we make sense of the infinite possibilities that instrumental performance offers? How is the “audiated” interpretation (presenter’s term) of the musical score as symbol, different from its “physical” realisation? How might we approach rarely-performed repertoire without an established set of performance practices? Abigail Sin proposes a theoretical framework with which to explore these questions.

“The performer’s response – which I call the audiated version – is a symbolic space, in the sense that it resides completely within the conceptual realm of the performer’s imagination, and therefore remains intangible … the act of transposing the performer’s concept of sound form the symbolic realm to the physical realm – what I call the performed version – is inherently volatile. Therefore, any performance is one of the infinite repercussions of the audiated version, and not only its definitive realisation, just as the symbol of the score itself has infinite repercussion for each performance.” – Abigail Sin

Keywords: Performance studies, symbol, musical score, repertoire, Charles Griffes

Session 10B: The Performer’s Response as Symbolic Space: Exploring the Piano Music of Charles Griffes

Abigail Sin

Abstract

Charles Griffes (1884-1920) was one of the most important yet misunderstood figures of American music. His eclectic artistic outlook has been a major point of fascination and he has frequently been compared to his more famous contemporaries such as Debussy and Ravel, often resulting in reinforcing unhelpful stereotypes. Griffes’s tautly-constructed, vividly-hued music has rarely been discussed on its own terms.

In this lecture recital, I will present two ways in which I as a performer have set out to develop my own language and toolkit for approaching Griffes’s music. Firstly, I will perform and present my reading of The Night Winds from Three Tone Pictures Op. 5, which is governed, both on a micro and macro level, by the dichotomy between minor 2nd and major 2nd intervals. Secondly, I will examine issues of sound production in performing The White Peacock from Roman Sketches Op. 7, using both piano and orchestral scores as an entry point to qualifying Griffes’s soundworlds.

The analysis and processes detailed in these two case studies constitute what I have proposed to call the “Audiated Version”. This is a symbolic space, constructed by the performer as a mediatory place to respond to the symbol of the score, and to translate the information gleaned from the score into conceptualised sound. The “Performed Version” is what takes place when the performer transforms and transposes this conceptualised sound into physical action and actual sound at the piano. The focus is thus on the agency of the performer and her active, imaginative response to the music.

This research could serve as a model for performers exploring similarly underresearched repertoire, and also as a case study on exploring a performer’s process and practice.

Abstract
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Keywords: Percussion, contemporary music, presence, activism

Pre-Symposium Concert: The Art of Listening

Vanessa Tomlinson

What does it mean for a performer to have presence, and to be present? Percussionist Vanessa Tomlinson expounds on her philosophy of being present through listening — not just doing but also listening to what has been done and everything around it: our own sounds; ambient noises; subtle variations in the instrument. This excerpt also features her performance of Graeme Leak’s And Now for the News (1983) for percussion with pre-recorded accompaniment.

Session 7A: Quiet is Beautiful: Aesthetics of Softness Today

Mieko Kanno

Mieko Kanno (Sibelius Academy) explores the aesthetics of soft sound and soft playing in music performance today, particularly concerning contemporary music and electronics. Softness offers its own poetics and politics of listening: what kinds of “presence” does soft sound have in our praxis? Who produces its presence? How is it presented and perceived? Kanno showcases the music that led to these ideas in a lunchtime recital, of which, Sciarrino’s Caprice no. 2 is presented here.

Keywords: Softness, Aesthetics, Sciarrino, John Cage

Session 7A: Quiet is Beautiful: Aesthetics of Softness Today

Mieko Kanno

Abstract

This presentation explores soft sound and soft playing in the practice of music-making today, with reference to contemporary music and electronics in particular. Softness offers its own poetics and politics of listening. What kinds of ‘presence’ does soft sound have in our practice? Who produces its presence? How is it presented and perceived?

There are at least two strands of historical development that can be considered to have strongly influenced the current practice of musical softness. The first strand is creative in an imaginative sense: in the 1970s and '80s, a number of composers (such as Feldman, Nono and Sciarrino) proposed new aesthetics of soft sound against the prevalent style of sound projection developed in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The second strand is also creative but in a more practical sense: the last three decades saw musical communities develop the use of amplification and digital signal processing. The impact of this strand is less visible but more pervasive in our experience. For example: (a) an amplified (otherwise inaudible) whispering sound can offer a distinctive musical effect, very different from the softness of unamplified – yet audible – whispering sounds; (b) incidental sounds – such as finger-tapping and bowing noises – that would be eliminated in 'normal' listening can be brought forward by electronic processing to produce a new palette of sound; and (c) a distant sound produced by a sound-diffusion system is very different from the same sound produced softly right in front of you, although both are 'pianissimo' in terms of
measurement/notation.

The aesthetics of softness also puts the listener at the heart of perception. The presentation will conclude with thoughts on communication of musical softness.

Abstract
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Keywords: Gestures, choreography, contemporary music, silence, Thierry de Mey

Concert 5: Performance of Thierry de Mey’s Silence Must Be (2002)

Joachim Lim

YST percussion artist-faculty member, Joachim Lim, explores the visual and choreographic elements of music-as-performance, through Thierry de Mey’s Silence Must Be (2002). This enthralling performance leads us to question: What sort of meanings can emerge through performance gestures, when performed in isolation and without sound? Does music have to be heard, or is our perception of music intrinsically multi-modal?

Session 8: Presentations & Provocations –
Illuminating the Score: The Past rePresented

Panelists: Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Wong Kahchun, Darrell Ang
Moderator: Bernard Lanskey

Three conductors, Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Wong Kah Chun and Darrell Ang, explore the relationship between musical score and performance, in a session moderated by Dean of Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music (YST), Prof. Bernard Lanskey.

In this video extract, Takacs-Nagy discusses the embodied knowledge distilled from his decades-long work as a conductor and violinist. He demonstrates the capacity of artistic practice to generate knowledge and insights beyond music performance, through a performance of Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony with YST Conservatory Orchestra.

Keywords: Beethoven, Pastoral Symphony, emotions, embodied knowledge, leadership, conducting

Session 6: Presentations and Provocations -
Illuminating the Score: The Past rePresented

Panelists: Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Wong Kahchun, Darrell Ang
Moderator: Bernard Lanskey

Abstract

The performer, whether soloist, chamber/orchestral musician, or conductor, has the ever-evolving responsibility to bring past and living composers’ music to embodiment in the present. From historically informed performance (HIP) practice, to radical reimaginings, how do our creative reflections on the inherited musical past impact the way we make our mark in interpreting the musical score at hand?

Utilizing Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony as a departure point, three conductors share what they imagine when they see the score, and what markings they themselves are inspired to make in order to trigger creative responses in live performance.

Abstract
Full Video

3) Technological Frontiers: Contemporary and Electronic Music Developments

Session 14A – When More is More: How to Supersize Musical Expression

Maria Kallionpää and Hans-Peter Gasselseder

How could one supersize acoustic instruments so as to unlock previously-unheard instrumental sounds? And then what constitutes a super-instrument, and what challenges does this pose aesthetically and technically?

Maria Kallionpää and Hans-Peter Gasselseder explore the aesthetic merits of super-instruments by super-sizing the piano. Three case studies are presented: Karlheinz Essl’s Sequitur V (2008), Jeff Brown’s Love & Hydrogen (2013), and their own Celestifilia (2012).

Keywords: Augmented instrumentation, piano, keyboard, electronics

Session 14A - When More is More: How to Supersize Musical Expression

Maria Kallionpää and Hans-Peter Gasselseder

Abstract 

How could one supersize acoustic instruments so as to unlock previously-unheard instrumental sounds? And then what constitutes a super-instrument, and what challenges does this pose aesthetically and technically?

Maria Kallionpää and Hans-Peter Gasselseder explore the aesthetic merits of super-instruments by super-sizing the piano. Three case studies are presented: Karlheinz Essl's Sequitur V (2008), Jeff Brown's Love & Hydrogen (2013), and their own Celestifilia (2012).

Abstract
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Kallionpää's DPhil Thesis

Keywords: Machine learning, PureData, Disklavier, doppelgänger, interactive music-making, human-software musical improvisation

Session 5C – Learning to Dialogue with my Doppelgänger

Stephen Emmerson

Stephen Emmerson’s experimentation with interactive music-making systems was inspired by Professor Andrew Brown’s research into interactive computer music systems. One interest of Brown’s research for human-software musical improvisation was “the stimulation of human creativity with fairly minimal automated input”. This could be achieved via “a reflexive approach to creativity … a system that reflects back at the performer – in a slightly distorted way– their own inputs”. [source]

In this excerpt, Emmerson walks the audience through the history of doppelgängers in past artistic works, and how these gives him ideas for his interactive music-making, an area out of his comfort zone. This results in his Doppelgänger Sweet, which involves a PD (Pure Data) program by Lloyd Barrett, and a Yamaha Disklavier (or two) as the doppelgänger(s).

Session 5C: Learning to Dialogue with my Doppelgänger

Stephen Emmerson

Abstract

This presentation offers an insider account of developing an effective musical language while improvising with interactive software on a Yamaha Disklavier (or two). The software using the program PD (Pure Data) was developed over the last couple of years in collaboration with my colleagues Andrew Brown and Lloyd Barrett. While it permits me to control the nature of the instruments’ responses in terms of various parameters (such as interval, register, delay and duration), in essence the program reflects back the musical gestures that I play and functions both as a tool to stimulate my musical creativity and develop my improvisatory skills. If a Disklavier is available, the presentation will demonstrate some of the various possibilities afforded by the instrument/software and will include some short improvisations. It will also be illustrated by video recordings of extracts from performances of Doppelgänger Sweet, a work of 10 short movements that I devised for performance last year.

As a musician who has worked virtually exclusively within the tradition of Western classical music, and who is thus unaccustomed to improvising the notes of the music I play, the project has offered me some distinct perspectives on the experience of being truly present in the act of performance. The presentation will share and reflect upon some of these insights.

Abstract
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More about Doppelgänger Sweet

Session 10C – Mauricio Kagel’s Experimental Sound Producers

Luk Vaes

Luk Vaes (Orpheus Institute) is concerned about reconstructing performance practices of experimental music for his artistic research as a performer. A precise reconstruction, similar to those employed by the historically-informed performance (HIP) professionals for early music, could offer critical benefits: They could add new insights to the pieces themselves, better our understanding of their histories, and also ensure their survival for posterity.

This excerpt showcases the challenges Vaes would face while reconstructing Mauricio Kagel’s experimental performance practice within Kagel’s Acustica. This involves painstaking attention to detail. For this symposium, Vaes would also lead Yong Siew Toh Conservatory students for a stage performance of Acustica. 

Keywords: Kagel, historically-informed performance (HIP), experimental music, performance practice

Session 10C: Mauricio Kagel's Experimental Sound Producers

Luk Vaes

Abstract

Both Kagel's instrumental theatre and experimental sound producers are embedded in a historical biotope defined by his performance practice and that of the musicians he worked with. Despite the fame of some of the relevant music, mostly from the decade between the late 1960's and 1970's, their performance practices have all but disappeared, and reconstructing is not only necessary to gain an understanding of what makes those "works" Kagel's, it also demands the hands-on development of "unorthodox performers who extend the boundaries of their craft", and, ultimately, of how sound becomes theatre and how theatre becomes music.

For the symposium, Luk Vaes will work with students of the conservatoire to present this particular type of Kagel music. The performers will come to the project with different instrumental backgrounds, providing insights into how the historical knowledge of this particular type of performance practice, embodied by Luk Vaes' extensive involvement with Mauricio Kagel, his music and his performance practice, can be made explicit and transferred. The multi-phase event will consist of practice sessions including a workshop and rehearsals, during which the knowledge of Kagel’s experimental performance practice is developed for a stage performance, a lecture in which the artistic research underlying the project is elaborated upon, and a concert performance presenting the artistic result of the project.

Abstract
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4) Creation, Curation and Composition: Inclusive, Brave and Eclectic

Session 2B – Performance of Paganini’s Variation no. 18 accompanied by Indonesian Angklung ensemble, in When West meets West (Java) in Gifting Classical Music Today

Oriana Tio Parahita Nainggolan

Leading postcolonial theorist Homi Bhabha writes of the third space that emerges when two cultures meet. This performance of a piano concerto from the Western canon, performed by an Indonesian pianist accompanied by an Indonesian angklung ensemble, represents the hybridity of Western classical and Indonesian classical music. Perhaps this could give birth to what Nainggolan coined “Indonesian Western classical music”.

Keywords: Angklung, Indonesian, classical, syncretism, Homi Bhabha, Rachmaninov

Session 2B: When West Meet West (Java) in “Gifting” the Classical Music Today

Oriana Tio Parahita Nainggolan

Abstract

The development of classical music in Indonesia shows a significant growth in the past couple of years. It is arguably a result of the hard work of classical music musicians in Indonesia to conduct a wide range of innovations with the aim of introducing the music to a wider audience, maintaining its presence, and blending it into the existing local music. Despite such efforts, challenges remain huge. Classical music remains stigmatised and regarded as elitist among the Indonesian people.

This study showcases an empirical investigation to portray a set of efforts to allow the Indonesians to become more familiarised with the music. The latest effort is carried out by mixing classical music with angklung music. Angklung, which is made of bamboos, is a musical instrument that originated from Indonesia; specifically, West Java. This study was conducted as a descriptive method. The results show that by mixing classical music with angklung, the Indonesian people become more familiar with classical music, and the stigma about classical music only for elitist decreases. This form of music also is part of the development of classical music today.

Abstract
PowerPoint Slides
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Keywords: Native American, shamanism, ritual, world music

Session 1B: Performer as Shaman, Performance as Ritual From Late 19th Century Native American Healing Songs to An Early 21st Century Piano Recital

John Sharpley

John Sharpley, a composer born in Texas and now based in Singapore, described his artistic process while composing his Native American Song Fantasies for piano. Thanks to feedback from his two Native American friends that something was lacking in the original version, Sharpley found new motivation, drawing from shamanistic and ritual influences, for his piano work.

ii) Session 1B: Performer as Shaman, Performance as Ritual From Late 19th Century Native American Healing Songs to An Early 21st Century Piano Recital

John Sharpley

Abstract

Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows.
- Native American proverb

American musicologist Natalie Curtis (1875-1921) pioneered the study of Native American music through extensive field research, visiting numerous tribes (nations). She consequently transcribed, translated and annotated a vast collection of songs. Her book, The Indian’s Book: An Offering by the American Indians of Indian Lore, Musical and Narrative, to form a Record of the Songs and Legends of their Race (Dover Publications, 1968) is a remarkable gift to humanity.

In 2014, I premiered my Native American Song Fantasies for piano, in Houston Texas. The work embraces 10 healing songs from Curtis’ book mentioned above. Two Native American friends attended the concert. I was profoundly struck by their feedback that something of a non-musical, non-artistic, non-physical dimension was lacking. Thus began my journey to find this allusive “something”.

Chiefs and Shamans transmitted each of the songs from the Native American Song Fantasies. Each song is a portal to altered states of consciousness and healing. This supports my conviction that music holds such spiritual power. After searching, experimenting and meditating, and several subsequent performances, I awaken to ever expanding horizons. Numerous revisions with extensive manipulation of overtones, innovative ways of using all three pedals, influences from chi gong along with the incorporation of chant and recitation into my Native American Song Fantasies are some of the tangible expansions that may inspire greater connectivity to nature and conjure compelling drama and ritual. Nevertheless, it is only towards the negation of ego that a truly authentic performance can transpire.

Abstract
Full Video

Concert 11: Lorong Boys – Happy by Pharrell x Pokémon Theme Song x Classical Cadenzas

Lorong Boys

The Lorong Boys consists of five conservatoire-trained musicians from YST. Displaying a virtuosic mastery of diverse genres of music, they perform their unique mashup of pop song Happy by Pharrell Williams and the theme song from Japanese animé “Pokémon”, interspersed with recognizable riffs from the classical cannon. The seamlessness of the resulting mashup points towards potentialities for future developments in syncretism and hybridity – not only between cultures, but also between methodologies (improvised vs. notated music) and genres (art music vs. mainstream).

Keywords: Pop music, improvisation, genres, jazz, animé, hybridity, syncretism

Keywords: Music history, outreach, Bach, Metallica, country, Mozart, Stravinsky

Concert 11: Lorong Boys – A History of Music x Mary had a Little Lamb

Lorong Boys

Continuing the spirit of innovation, Lorong Boys give their own history class (“condensing four years of music education into 10 minutes”), illustrating the development of Western music from Bach to Metallica through the ubiquitous nursery rhyme, Mary had a Little Lamb.

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