Bangkok Opera's new season

There are interesting political developments unfolding in Thailand all the time it seems, but in my focus on the governmental woes of the country I missed the equally interesting announcement of Bangkok Opera's new season. It is wholly ambitious:

• Massanet's THAÏS in June
• Bruce Gaston's A BOY AND TIGER in July (World Premiere)
• Puccini's LA BOHEME in August
• Wagner's SIEGFRIED in Novemeber, continuing the "Bangkok Ring"
• Gluck's ORFEO ED EURIDCE in December

While in Bangkok from September 2007 to July 2008, the only full production Bangkok Opera was able to produce was Die Walkure. According to Artistic Director Somtow Sucharitkul, "2008 was a year of regrouping for Bangkok Opera." The Siam Philharmonic--the opera's resident orchestra--was completely overhauled and embarked on a concert series to establish a "more reliable standard" for the group. It seems the year off from producing was a wise and healthy choice for the company, given the fervence of its return 2009 season.

There is too much for me to comment on here, so I'm going to focus on the Gaston premiere (not that the Thai premiere of Thaïs, the resumption of the Bangkok Ring Cycle, and Michael Chance starring as Orfeo aren't worthy). A Boy and Tiger is based on "The Life of Pi" and will be Bangkok Opera's first presentation of a Thai language opera (something they've been criticized for neglecting in the past). It's a children's opera, created by Gaston for the young members of the Baan Garda community, a refuge for HIV postive orphans. In this adaptation, the Tiger comes to be a symbol for AIDS. Read more about Gaston's concept on the Bangkok Opera website, and note the last paragraph:

Bruce Gaston, the composer, has combined the Orff Schulwerk system of music education with the rich tradition of Thai classical singing and xylophone playing to create the music for the opera.

Gaston has created Thai music dramas in the past and was a pioneer--along with Sucharitkul--in combining Western art music and Thai classical music sounds in unconventional ways, starting in the 1970s (more on that here, in Chapter II, section vii and Chapter III, sections iv & v). Judging from this collaboration and recent postings on Somtow's blog, it seems that after nearly thirty years, he and Gaston are ready to start a fresh partnership, something that frankly did not seem likely to me even just a year ago. I'm sorry not to be there for the results, which are sure to be interesting. A Boy and Tiger is an important project that I hope will find an audience beyond Thailand. 

Community Orchestra Concert

Madison Community Orchestra
Friday, March 27
7:30 PM
Mitby Theater (MATC Truax Campus)
Free! With refreshments to follow.

Featuring Glinka's Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila, Tchaikovsky's Waltz from Eugene Onegin, and Ippolitov‐Ivanov's Caucasion Sketches: Suite No. 2 (Iveria). The Ippolitov-Ivanov is a gorgeous work, sort of like Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius, and Bartok all rolled into one.

A link to "the paper"

A working version of the paper that came out of my research in Thailand last year is now available here. (Apologies the formatting is so stark.) Another chapter or two remains to be added, though some of that material is what I covered in the Symphony article. Questions, comments, suggestions welcome.

UPDATE: A fully linked table of contents has been added to the paper for easier navigation.

The VieTrio: Pop meets classical in Bangkok

The VieTrio is a phenomenon that was developing right as I was leaving Thailand. Composed of the Srinarong siblings Paye, Parn, and Pintusorn ("Pui"), the trio aggressively fuses pop and classical, a formula that's met with great success in Bangkok. They were signed by GMM Grammy (the largest record label in Thailand), became the face of Nissan's advertising campaign for the Tida, and released their first album, "Miracle," this summer. I've been told it reached number one on the Thai charts. Their music is light and geared for wide appeal, with all sorts of computerized accompaniment, but I would not be so quick to dismiss the VieTrio's efforts.

Sutin Srinarong, the father of Paye, Parn, and Pui, was an original member and longtime principal violinist of the Bangkok Symphony Orchestra, and he also founded the Thai Youth Orchestra. His children grew up with classical music, and Paye and Parn were both recipients of the late HRH Princess Galyani Vadhana's scholarships to study classical music abroad. Paye (violin) did his undergrad work at the Royal Academy of Music in London, finished his AD and MM at Yale, and is working on his PhD at Stony Brook right now, commuting between New York and Bangkok. New Yorkers may have seen him subbing in the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra or playing with the Sybarite Players. Parn (cello)  studied in Hong Kong and does freelance work, mostly with the Bangkok Symphony Orchestra. Pui (also violin) is the youngest and I believe heads the Thai Youth Orchestra. 

I played with Paye and Parn briefly in the Siam Philharmonic, and later caught up with Paye to talk about some of his experiences. It was just after Princess Galyani had passed away, and he was in the midst of an extensive publicity campaign highlighting her efforts to promote Western classical music in Thailand. He expressed frustration with how orchestras in Bangkok were run,  the naivety of conservatory students, the lack of chamber music being made, the limitations both musicians and the broader public impose on themselves as far as learning more about classical music, and in general with the lack of visibility the art form had, how closed off it was from reality for so many. I know these all sound like universal problems for classical music, but they are exacerbated in Thailand and other developing nations, where funding is even harder to come by and the music is not on native ground. 

Last year Paye and Parn came into contact with "Boy" Takonkiet Viravan, one of Thailand's biggest TV producers. They were playing in his new stage spectacular, Fah Jarad Soi, and he saw in them the potential to reach across the aisle. The Srinarong siblings are equally attractive and talented, an easy combination to promote, and thus the VieTrio was born, with Paye and Boy managing the group. 

As you can tell from the music video above, they're going for straight pop appeal, and it's working. This marketing angle and the popularity the trio has found (9,000 in attendance at their first full-blown concert) is unique, and it may have huge implications for classical music in Thailand, where just getting images of a violin and cello on TV is progress. Also, something Paye and I discussed last year was the need for Thai "celebrities" in classical music. Bundit Ungrangsee is the name most Thais associate with Western classical music, but his actual work in Thailand has been limited and he's best known for his inspirational business memoirs. Now Paye and his sisters can act as Yo-Yo-Ma does for the US and Lang Lang for China, as liaisons to the often closed off classical world. And that's why I'm a sucker for the VieTrio. Paye, Parn, and Pui have the chops and are doing what they can to reach a broader public. And it looks like they're having a lot of fun, too, and there's nothing wrong with that. 

Symphony readers, welcome!

I just had an article published in the Jan/Feb issue of Symphony magazine on orchestra life in Thailand and have seen a spike in page loads, so welcome new readers! Regular visitors over the last year will know that the orchestra scene was just a fraction of what I was exploring in Bangkok, but as an extension to the Symphony piece I'm going to start posting excerpts from my as yet unpublished research, with a focus on the development of Western classical music in Thailand and Thai composers. In the meantime, please explore the blog archives between September 2007 and July 2008 for more on my experiences in Thailand. 

Inauguration music, WCO, & Orfeo

I'm lumping quite a bit together here, but these are the musical matters on my mind this morning.

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I commented at Dial "M" that I thought John

Williams' "Air/Simple Gifts" worked well enough, but that the meandering opening probably lost most of the 2 million on the Mall. The piece certainly fit the mood (reflective, excited, patriotic) but ideally, another composer would have been commissioned (perhaps a younger, lesser known composer as Michelle Obama did with her designer choice). Or, if Copland-esque was ordered, why not just go with straight Copland. Anyway, now it emerges that a recording was used and we in fact heard none of the sound that Yo-Yo's enthusiastic bouncing around was producing. Any musician will understand the necessity of using a recording in that weather, but after all of the cheering about classical music's place in the inauguration ceremonies, yesterday saw this new bit of information hashed out and laughed at on all of the news channels (I saw it flashing on CNN and MSNBC at the same time in the gym, and even the likes of Perez Hilton are now comparing Yo-Yo-Ma to Ashlee Simpson, not the pop-culture relevance we were hoping for). Hopefully the beautiful sight and sound of the quartet are what will linger for most, but instead of just letting this slightly controversial news leak out and then slip away, why not redeem any viewers who feel slighted and capitalize on the publicity.  Ma, McGill, Perlman, and Montero should reorganize and go on the Today show or Good Morning America to play Air/Simple Gifts live in the studio, along with some Messiaen (preferably Louange à l'Éternité de Jésus). 

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Last night I had my first encounter with the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, an ensemble that is still recovering from a musicians' strike that halted the start of their season. The program included Einojuhani Rautavaara's Concerto for Birds and Orchestra, Haydn's Cello Concerto No. 1 in C Major, and Respighi's Gli Uccelli (The Birds). Rautavaara's piece was a nice surprise, with lush, modal writing interjected with bird noises (set to the perfect volume). The WCO sounded totally in its element with the Haydn, and soloist Amit Peled had a gorgeous tone. A few things bothered me about his interpretation though: his phrasing choices seemed so far from natural, so distant from what Haydn wrote, that it came across very self consciously as just that, an "interpretation." Peled's different mannerisms also obstructed at times, but in the end I love this piece too much not to have enjoyed it. The last movement, which proceeds at a breakneck speed, was the least manipulated (likely because of the speed) and proved triumphant, all of the gloriously hard runs nailed. Peled was called for an encore and played what I'm guessing was an excerpt from a concerto written for him by an Israeli composer for his upcoming CD of contemporary Israeli works. The Respighi was pure fluff but I guess fit the avian theme well, and the orchestra again sounded excellent. Yet again I left the Overture Center feeling very lucky for all that Madison offers. 

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I debated heading to the Met's HD transmission of Orfeo ed Euridice today but opted for radio instead, saving my cash for the traveling John Doyle production of Sweeney Todd at the Overture Center tonight. What an amazing confluence of voices. Blythe and DeNeise both blew me away, so rich. It doesn't hurt that Gluck's writing is so good to the singer, perhaps the greatest hour and a half of opera ever written. Seriously.

Frigid day

This is what a -20 degree morning looks like from my window. Hence the ski socks and thermal underwear being worn to work today.