While having lots of things to do may not necessary ward away the low moods, I suppose doing things that I think was worthwhile may lead me nearer to something fruitful.
In the morning, I visited the Singapore Art Museum to catch the Xu Beihong in Nanyang exhibition. I will be posting an online article on the exhibition soon on Yesterday.sg, so do keep a look-out.
Afterwhich, in the afternoon, I was at the National Museum of Singapore to attend a seminar that was titled It's about routes, not roots. (Singapore 1820s - 1860s) by Iskander Mydin. I have learnt quite a few things new about Singapore of that period. One thing that I have learnt was that the Spanish dollar was the international dollar that was used during those times for trading at the Southeast Asian archipelago.
After the seminar, I spent some time in the late afternoon at the National Library of Singapore, specifically at the Lee Kong Chian Reference Library, to read a book on Xu Beihong.
Dinner was simple. Afterwhich, I was delightfully treated to an educational SSO Pre-concert talk by violinist, Seah Huan Yuh. Seah gave his independent yet interesting views on Samuel Barber's Violin Concerto, Op. 14. I particularly like how he analysed the composer's approach to the second movement of the violin concerto. The speaker even did a demonstration of a short section from the second movement on the violin. By the end of the talk, I felt I have had a better appreciation of the compositional ideas behind the concerto.
Seah did such a good job that I think SSO should consider engaging him once again for future SSO Pre-concert talk, especially those involving a violin concerto.
The night in some ways concluded with the SSO concert, Sweet Sorrows. The orchestra's rendition of Mahler's Fifth could be considered commendable. Afterall, I personally think that Mahler's works are challenging to play and to interpret. For myself, I suppose I would still need more exposure to be able to better appreciate the musical language of Mahler and even Barber.
Hi! THanks for your very generous review of my talk yesterday. I'm glad you enjoyed it! Pls come for my next one if there is. :)
ReplyDeleteSeah: Thank you for the review. I didn't expect that you would comment here.
ReplyDeleteSure, I shall make time to come for the next one if there is one.
I don't normally read blogs, but I vaguely remembered you reviewing TPO concert of Shostakovich symphony about 2 years ago....? and that included my name as well :)
ReplyDelete