Lightyears

It’s been some time since I watched concerts of Chinese music. It was really great to hear traditional Chinese music once again, especially when I used to play the Suona myself.

The recital was a relatively short one, but it showcased the versatility of the suona. The soloist, Meng Jie, is a musician with the Singapore Chinese Orchestra. There were traditional as well as modern pieces played in the concert, which I think was really appropriate, given the misconception people have with Chinese music. The performance began with a traditional piece titled “Celebrations” which was a great piece to start.

The following 2 pieces were rather modern, and were written by Meng Jie’s teacher, Zuo Ji Cheng. The first of the 2 pieces, “Rustic Morning Tunes” sounded rather nice and mellow, while the latter I thought was a bit cheesy, probably because of the music that was played on the MIDI file. Didn’t really like the composition I think…

The fourth piece “Family Portrait” I sort of forgot how it sounds like so moving on… A modern arrangement of a traditional piece I assume, cos it is also played with an MIDI file as an accompaniment. It started off rather ok, until rather cheesy music came in again. I hope I am not badmouthing about Chinese music, but I didn’t really like the tunes that were played on te MIDI file…

After which, “Polka”, a Polish dance, was played. It was a fun and entertaining song, which was played very well on the alto-levered suona, sort of like a clarinet. The evening’s performance ended with a suona classic “A Flock of Birds”. It was an amazing performance by Meng Xi in my opinion, with a bit of flaws nonetheless.

Overall, I think Meng Xi is a rather charming and talented performer, but probably needs to work on certain stuff, like the decrescendos and smorzandos because the sound sort of disappears too quickly. It was a great performance nonetheless, for someone who has never done a “solo” performance!