review: embassy series 1999

Singapore Embassy, D.C. (Friday, 14th May, 1999)

Elaine Chew is an extraordinarily talented young woman. Currently completing her doctoral thesis at MIT on mathematical models for the tonal analysis of music, she also is a concert pianist of great sensitivity. With her mission of introducing contemporary Chinese composers to the American public, she gave a unique recital of Impressionist piano music at the Singapore Embassy on May 14 as part of the Embassy Series. Concurrently, her photographs taken while studying in China are on exhibit in the Embassy. And if you want to know even more about this rising star, she has designed her own web site at http://web.mit.edu/eniale.

Her intriguing program entitled "Impressions" began and ended with works by two 20th century Chinese piano composers. Jiang Wenye's Poems of Seasons from the Home Village, a subtle work from the 1950s, is filled with the sounds of clangs and gongs from festival days, as well as the repetitive calming sounds of water in padi fields. Wang Lisan's Impressions of Paintings by Higashiyama Kaii, written in 1979 using the Japanese Toshi scale, is more appealing and concludes with a dynamic use of the closed fist on the piano anddramatic vibrations that create a musical picture of "Crashing Waves."

Between these two works, Ms. Chew revealed her deep understanding and appreciation of the French Impressionistic movement by playing Ravel's Gaspard de la nuit. This is one of the best pictorial works for piano, and it served as a clear marker of Ms. Chew's virtuosity. Baritone Jerome Barry gave a vivid reading of the French poems by Aloysius Bertrand that this spooky work of Ravel is based on. In a brief encore, Ms. Chew sang in Chinese and then played on the piano three songs of her childhood that Peter Child of MIT had been inspired to write as piano impressions after hearing her play.

At the reception afterwards, Ambassador Chan Heng Chee personally greeted the guests who enjoyed a sampling of Singapore style cooking along with having an opportunity to meet Ms. Chew. The gracious evening was enjoyable, while at the same time giving one a chance to think a bit differently about an early 19th century western musical style espoused by a later generation of composers in a different culture.