by Kay Curry
Northwest Asia Weekly
From left: violinist Kara Ramnath; Reena Esmail, composer; and conductor Kahchun Wong. (Photo by Assunta Ng)
“We all create music in one way or another, in our homes, in our communities…we are all connected by the power of music.”
Seattle Symphony Orchestra President and CEO Krishna Thiagarajan speaks to Northwest Asia Weekly about the importance of Celebrating Asia this March 20 at Benaroya Hall sex.
Two years ago, as Thiagarajan described it, the annual festival showcasing Seattle’s diverse Pacific Rim community marked the Symphony’s last live event before the COVID-19 lockdown. Now in its 14th iteration, it’s hard to ignore the pandemic-related impact as Celebrating Asia is back and helping us get out of the house again.
“We’re trying to create moments of inspiration and empowerment…We live in times full of stress and anxiety, and we want to leave you with moments of hope…to be able to manage all those tensions ,” Thiagarajan said. War wages in Ukraine, we as a nation have been at war, masked and non-masked, for and against vaccines, and hate incidents have increased. But in Celebrating Asia, we come together as a city to “strengthen the bond,” as Deputy Mayor Yamaguchi explained in her presentation; as Symphony Orchestra’s composer-in-residence Reena Esmail hopes, Striking a balance between the beauty and destruction of nature.
This dichotomy exists in us and our planet. The evening’s program explored this theme through four pieces, each musically representing the ups and downs of fortune, as soothing and precipitous as the waves of the sea.
Hasegawa’s opening song, titled “Meditation,” is about “the power of water,” explains Thiagarajan. At the other end of the spectrum is Claude Debussy’s “La Mer” (“The Sea”), which “explores the sparkling, lapping waves of romantic, beautiful nature,” continued Thiagarajan. “We want to bring [an] Arch from every aspect of what it means to tell a full story. “
The audience was jittery listening to “Meditation,” the thumping drums and soaring strings vividly reminded of a storm approaching—especially the tsunami that hit Japan’s coast due to the “3-11” earthquake in 2011 Before – another sombre anniversary.
“La Mer” was inspired by something gentler – Hokusai Katsushika’s famous painting “Under the Waves Off Kanagawa” or “The Great Wave”, which expresses the swelling movement of the ocean and the relationship between the sand and the sea familiar to Western Washingtonians. Mountains – for us, Mount Rainier; for Hokusai, Mount Fuji – when it wants to peek out from the clouds – or capriciously suggests Singapore guest conductor Kahchun Wong, who moves briskly, His hands are as expressive as the instruments he conducts, through every arrangement of sounds.
This year’s “Celebrating Asia” is especially visually musical synesthesia. You can listen to every meticulously crafted detail, watch the musicians go all out, or just immerse themselves in the associations the piece offers. During the U.S. premiere of Tan Dun’s “Trombone Concerto: Three Muses in Video Games,” one could imagine a majestic natural landscape, or a marching army holding brightly colored flags. Jazz elements are juxtaposed with familiar typical Chinese instruments.
Trombone master Koichiro Yamamoto delighted audiences with challenging breathing and a trombone sound that many have never heard, while his body moved to the rhythm of this surprising dance piece.
The interaction between the star soloist and conductor is one of the most enjoyable parts of the concert. In the third piece, Kala Ramnath’s beautiful smile is captivating as she follows Wong’s lead in bringing her own rich Hindustani violin to the world premiere of Esmail’s “Hindustani Concerto for Violin and Orchestra”.
According to Esmail, the piece explores five elements of nature – space, air, fire, water, earth – which can be destructive when out of balance but beautiful when they are restored. All were hypnotized by the musical journey through climate change, the havoc that engulfed our planet, and ended on an “optimistic note,” says Esmail – a prayer of atonement, written by Ramnath sings. This piece, like the trombone concerto, received a standing ovation. At the end of the program, conductor Huang conducted every part of the orchestra generously and focused on the audience’s applause.
“March 11, 2020, about 11 o’clock,” recalls Thiagarajan. The symphony had been rehearsing “for 45 minutes or so, I had to go into the hall and interrupt our conductor and the orchestra to tell everyone, ‘You have to go home. The governor just issued an order, ‘We all have to go into lockdown.’ “How far we have come, but not out of danger. The usual pre-concert entertainment has been curtailed to minimise close contact, and masks are still required inside the concert hall. At the beginning of the concert, Tiagarayan announced that the Symphony had joined the “Yellow Whistle” movement, calling for anti-Asian hatred and encouraging everyone to pick up the whistle and use it in case of witnessing a hateful incident.
The festivities come with pain, but the Seattle community struggles to shake itself out of the haze on this day, indecisive, reminiscing, but also moving forward. It’s raining outside and inside is a rainbow of women in bright sarees and their best scarves, young girls in sequin dresses, men in shiny shoes and blazers, or their best Guayabella. As we entered, red and yellow lion dances frolicked with the audience, their sparkling eyes twinkling flirtatiously.
When we left, everyone looked towards the second floor where the drums were beating.
Once again, “Celebrating Asia” helps viewers find harmony in discord, creating “understanding between cultures” and “bonds between communities,” as Tigarayan puts it.
Celebrating Asia 2022 will be streamed live from the Seattle Symphony Orchestra for a full week on Sunday, March 27 at 11:59pm.
Kay can reach info@nwasianweekly.com.
