Review | Japanese drummer Senri Kawaguchi steals the show in fusion concert with Hong Kong Sinfonietta
- Fly LIVE! by Hong Kong composer Ng Cheuk-yin came alive through the inspired drumming of Senri Kawaguchi, and Ng on keyboards received a rock-star welcome
- The work, and another by Ng, formed part of a concert in which the orchestra played Copland’s Appalachian Spring with aplomb, and Barber’s Adagio for Strings
When a composer who is equally at home writing music for the Chinese sheng (a mouth-blown reed instrument) as he is keyboards or works to be sung a cappella produces a piece for drum set, bass guitar and full orchestra, the question of whether cross-genre fusion could turn into confusion inevitably arises.
Thankfully, this wasn’t the case on March 23 in Hong Kong Sinfonietta’s diverse and jam-packed Hong Kong Arts Festival concert at Hong Kong City Hall.
Fly LIVE! and An Array of Stars by Hong Kong composer Ng Cheuk-yin were the featured works after interval, and if the ecstatic audience reaction was anything to go by, both pieces were roaring successes.
Even if the rhythmic complexity of Fly LIVE! and its high volume levels were challenging at times, the work’s fascinating blend of jazz, rock, and contemporary orchestral sounds and rhythms always entertained.
Left untouched for years after its premiere at the Hong Kong Arts Festival in 2007 (also by the Sinfonietta), Fly LIVE! received a revival during the Covid-19 pandemic as Project FLY!, a recorded video performance initiated by Ng and motivated by a need to make music during the “deafening silence” of the health emergency.
In this live performance Japanese soloist Senri Kawaguchi, a drummer active in the jazz scene, stole the show with her inspired, near-possessed drumming and the sensitivity that she lent her tender cymbal work and accompaniment.
Kawaguchi set a scene of cool tranquillity from the word go.
In one early passage a lone trumpet, soft flutters in the strings, and her hushed cymbals made an ideal platform for bass guitarist Shingo Tanaka to blossom in his first, warm solo, the music reinforcing Ng’s notion of flying as “peace amidst uncertainty” to which he alluded in his programme notes.
As the jazzy interplay and stylistic rapport between Kawaguchi and Tanaka grew, conductor Yip Wing-sie kept the orchestral force tight from the podium, ensuring precision in snarly brass and woodwind interjections and swirling passages for upper strings.
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Clearly, balancing such eclectic forces in the big climaxes was no piece of cake.
Although the high notes from the upper strings came through well, much of the viola, cello and double bass articulation and sonority was largely optical, as it got lost in the sound wash.
Nevertheless, the sound design team led by Roy Cheung deserve kudos for keeping the sound from Kawaguchi’s partly encased, transparent drum set “dome”, the bass guitar, and later on the synthesiser, controlled and compact.
To rapturous, rock concert-style cheers, Ng joined the musicians on synthesised keyboard for the world premiere of An Array of Stars for drum set and orchestra, a work commissioned by the Hong Kong Sinfonietta and composed by Ng for Kawaguchi and Tanaka’s appearance in Hong Kong.
The jazz was less complex here, and Ng’s own glassy, psychedelic sounds prompted plenty of energetic and fun exchanges between the three artists as the orchestra, particularly the brass, took on more of a big-band role, the music at times reminiscent of TV sitcom soundtracks from the 1970s and 80s.
Even during the encore, where Ng’s jazz licks were lapped up by the trio, the breathtaking displays of drum dexterity from Kawaguchi were not to be topped.
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The second half of the concert was a paradigm shift in musical genres from the well known and quintessentially American works with which the orchestra began the evening.
That famous tear-jerker, Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, originally the second movement of his Opus 11 String Quartet, while balanced beautifully by Yip and with fluidity in its stepwise motion, never quite reached its heart-wrenching maximum.
Even when the string tone was sumptuous, especially in the violas, the extraction of the Adagio’s taut harmonies was more well-behaved than impassioned.
The performance of Aaron Copland’s beloved Appalachian Spring suite, arranged from his ballet in 1945, was more effective, offering a lovely evocation of the simple life in the Pennsylvanian hills in the early 19th century.
Woo Hee-soo’s clarinet solo was heartfelt and typified the emotion found early on in the suite’s peaceful “prologue”.
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The celebratory elements were aptly depicted with a deft, angular spikiness in both violin sections, and woodwind solos, such as Sandy Xu’s warm oboe contributions, were delightful.
The orchestra’s playing bubbled with positivity in the climax of Copland’s work, commonly known as “The Lord of the Dance” from the Shaker hymn Simple Gifts, before it reached its tranquil conclusion.
Fly LIVE!, Senri Kawaguchi & Hong Kong Sinfonietta cond. Yip Wing-sie, Hong Kong Arts Festival 2024, Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall. Reviewed March 23
