Composition Workshop
The Singapore Saxophone Symposium 2015 will feature its first saxophone composition workshop, aimed at guiding composers to write idiomatically and skilfully for the saxophone!
Participants will be able to consult saxophonists from the Amigo Saxophone Collective, and be entitled to two individual lessons (of one hour each) with one of the following composers:
- Chong Kee Yong (Singapore/Malaysia)
- Zechariah Goh (Singapore)
- ChihChun Chi-sun Lee (Taiwan/USA/Korea)
- Kawai Shiu (Hong Kong/USA/Singapore)
- Michael Sidney Timpson (USA/Korea)
The workshop will culminate in a reading session by members of the Amigo Saxophone Collective, and receive a professional video recording of their read works.
Consultations and lessons with saxophonists and composers will be held on 12 and 13 August 2015 at Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) Campus 3. Consultations with saxophonists will take place between 4pm to 6pm on those dates. Subsequently, the reading session will take place on 14 August 2015, from 2pm to 5pm at the Multi-Purpose Hall & Lee Foundation Theatre.
The composition workshop is priced at $350 and includes the two-day pass to the Singapore Saxophone Symposium on 15 and 16 August (priced at $107).
Limited to 20 participants only! For registration and more information, sign up online now or email info@singaporesaxophonesymposium.com.
About the composers
Chong Kee Yong
Composer CHONG Kee Yong, the winner of multiple composition awards and one of Malaysia’s leading contemporary music composers, possesses one of the most exciting voices in new music today. His work has been hailed as “imaginative and poetic” by leading conductor-composer Peter Eötvös, and as “very inventive and artistically pure” by composer Jonathan Harvey. Belgian pianists Jan Michiels and Inge Spinette describe his as a “very personal voice, very deep and convincing.”
Chong’s initial musical training at the Malaysian Institute of Arts introduced him to the more cosmopolitan city life of Kuala Lumpur, and his formative studies further afield at the Xian Conservatory in China, with Professors Rao Yuyan and Zhang Dalong, brought him full circle to his Chinese heritage. Chong pursued his final studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Brussels (Flemish and French sections) under the guidance of Professors Jan Van Landeghem and Daniel Capelletti. In 2001, the Conservatory unanimously awarded him the “Meester in Muziek” degree with highest honours. Chong’s post-graduation studies included master classes with composers such as Brian Ferneyhough, Daan Manneke, Peter Eötvös, Salvatore Sciarrino, Henri Pousseur, Hanspeter Kyburz, and many others.
Chong’s distinctive style has won him an unending series of awards and commissions. His two-time success in Belgium with the Prix Marcel Hastir, awarded by Belgium’s Royal Academy of Sciences, Letters, and Fine Arts in 1999 and again in 2003, was followed in 2004 by his triumphant debut in his home country upon winning the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra International Composers’ Award (MPOICA). He also received a top prize at the 4th International Andrzej Panufnik Competition for Young Composers in Poland (2002); the Grand Prix at the 2nd Seoul International Competition for Composers (2003), a top prize at the Max-Reger-Tage International Composition Competition in Germany (2004); the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra International Composers’ Award (2004); the 2nd Lepo Sumera International Young Composer Prize (2006); a Lutoslawski Award (2006); the BMW Award in the International Isang Yun Composition Competition in Korea (2007); 2nd Prize in the Preisträgerkonzert des Internationalen Kompositionswettbewerbes “Global Music – Contemporary Expression” in Germany; 3rd Prize in the Luxembourg International Composition Competition (2008); the highly renowned Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation commission grant in the USA (2009); a special Giga-Hertz-Award from the Institute for Music and Acoustics Karlsruhe (ZKM) in Germany (2009); and the prestigious “Outstanding Young Malaysian Award” in the Cultural Achievement category in Malaysia.
Chong regularly receives commissions and grants from numerous high-profile organizations and groups in countries such as Belgium, Germany, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Canada, USA and Malaysia, and his music has been peformed internationally in venues all around the world. Chong’s prominence in the contemporary music world is also attested to by his frequent invitations to residencies and fellowships abroad. As an experienced educator, Chong is committed to drawing out the next generation of compositional voices.
Chihchun Chi-sun Lee
Taiwanese-American composer Chihchun Chi-sun Lee, winner of the 1st Brandenburg Biennial Composers Competition and 2015 Guggenheim Fellow, is originally from Kaohsiung, Taiwan and is the invited professor of composition and theory at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, Korea.
She has received numerous honors; these include the Harvard Fromm Music Fellowship, commissions from the Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation, Taiwan National Symphony Orchestra (NSO), National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra (NTSO), National Orchestra of Korea (NOK) and Taiwan National Chinese Orchestra, Theodore Front Prize from International Alliance for Women in Music, ISCM/ League of Composers Competition, International Festival of Women Composers Composition Prize, Florida Individual Artist Fellowship, and the Golden Melody Awards nomination.
Some of her most significant performances have included Carnegie Hall and 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. In addition, her music has had numerous performances and broadcasts worldwide in Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hawaii, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Poland, Singapore, Taiwan, Costa Rica, Ukraine, China, Hong Kong, and around the continental United States.
Kawai Shiu
Hailed by critics as among “the next wave of Chinese composers”, Kawai Shiu has received recognition from the Vienna Modern Masters’ Orchestral Recording Award, the Rudolf Nissim Award, Kent Kennan Scholarships, the SCI/ASCAP Student Composition Commission Award, and funding from the American Music Center. Recent major commissions include those from the South Bank Centre (U.K.), the Cheltenham Festival (U.K.), Around Festival (H.K.), Future of Imagination 7 (Singapore), and Sir Harrison Birtwistle through the Kawai Shiu Music Composition Fund at the University of Alabama.
Other past commissions and performances include those for the International Clarinet Course (Spain), Dartington Festival (U.K.), the World Saxophone Congress (Canada), the Pacific Contemporary Music Festival (U.S.), In Midair (H.K.), Esplanade’s Spectrum (Singapore), and the Alabama Wind Ensemble. Kawai’s work has also been performed by the Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra, Huxford Symphony Orchestra, Chicago 20th Century Music Ensemble, Endymion, CUBE, Hong Kong New Music Ensemble, and his own ensemble. Kawai records for CRI, Vienna Modern Masters, Ablaze Records, Soundpocket, and Soy Sauce Records. His published work includes poetry, drama, and writings on music and art criticism.
Kawai has served as the Music Director for Sir Peter Hall at the British Royal National Theatre while appearing with Sir Harrison Birtwistle in presenting lectures at Lucerne Festival, London Hayward Gallery, and British Royal Academy of Arts. He has been an Honorary Visiting Professor of Music at the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music and Research Fellow at the Paul Sacher Stiftung. Last year Dr Shiu presented a retrospective concert at The Arts Center during his U.S. lecture and masterclass tour. He has been selected for inclusion in International Who’s Who in Music and Musicians’ Directory and Who’s Who in Hong Kong. His latest CD for loss was named one of the Top Ten Classical Albums in 2013 by Philadelphia City Paper.
Michael Sidney Timpson
Michael Sidney Timpson’s musical beginnings were borne out of playing baritone saxophone and “electric” bass clarinet with a strong interest in American improvisational forms, especially Free Jazz and Fusion; this would later evolve into incorporations of American popular genres, such as Funk, Hip-Hop, and Alternative Techno. A child of the multicultural era in Northern California, he was intrigued with East and Southeast Asian traditional musics, these seeds that would eventually bear a lasting impact on his musical style. With his research on Chinese and Korean instruments, he has also become an improviser on various Asian woodwinds.
A composer in virtually every medium, many of his recent compositions are for percussion ensemble and for orchestra; he has also composed many works for Chinese and Korean instruments. A winner of multiple composition awards, recorded on major labels, and with significant publications, his works continue to be featured throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia. Timpson won the ASCAP Grant for Young Composers, the BMI Student Composers Award, the DownBeat Magazine award for extended composition, and was twice nominated for the American Academy of Arts and Letters composition award. He also won the Brian M. Israel Prize (The Society for New Music and the New York Federation of Music Clubs), the Lee Ettelson Composer’s Award, National Federation of Music Club’s Youse compeition, second places at the Music From China International Competition and in NACUSA’s composition competition, very highly commended in England’s Kathryn Thomas Flute Competition, and honorable mention at the National Federation of Music Club’s Beyer competition. His orchestral works have received performances and recordings by the Kiev Philharmonic, the Czech Philharmonic, the Florida Orchestra, the Jacksonville Symphony, the Singapore Chinese Orchestra, and the National Orchestra of Korea. Timpson’s works continually appear on radio shows throughout the U.S., Asia, and Europe and have a strong visibility on the web.
He is an Associate Professor of Music Composition at at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, Korea. He was a Senior Fulbright Research Scholar in the Humanities in Taipei, Taiwan in 2009 for research on his forthcoming book on orchestration and compositional philosophy on Chinese instruments for western composers (for which he has already published two articles.) He has also been on the music composition and electronic music faculty at the University of South Florida, Rhodes College and the University of Kansas. A student of Samuel Adler, William Albright, William Bolcom, Donald Crockett, Morten Lauridsen, Frederick Lesemann, Milcho Leviev, Andrew Mead, and Joseph Schwantner, he earned his undergraduate composition degree at the University of Southern California, his master’s at the Eastman School of Music, and a doctorate from the University of Michigan.