Life and Leisure

Composer's sound transcends borders

By Kelly Chung Dawson (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-11-17 11:01

NEW YORK - The avant-garde composer Huang Ro, who aspires to what he calls a concept of "dimensionalism" in his music, performed with his five-piece ensemble at a gala hosted by the Committee on US-China Relations last week.

His FIRE ensemble (Future In REverse) that consists of violinist Sheryl S. Hwangbo, cellist Arash Amini, Molly Yeh on percussions, Yang Yi on guzheng - with Huang on piano and vocals - played cinematic scores they composed for productions such as the PBS series Building China Modern by I.M. Pei, and the Chinese feature Stand Up.

Huang's avant-garde arrangements have been performed by the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra and the Hong Kong Philharmonic.

Born in Hainan on the southern coast of China, he began studying music at the age of 6 under his father, who was a Chinese composer. When he was 12, he entered the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, but not before receiving a key bit of advice from his father.

"Before he sent me off to Shanghai, my father said, 'You can lose many things, you can lose your love ones, you can lose your money, but you will never lose your ability to keep writing music and being creative,'" Huang said. "So I always remember that."

When he was 18, Huang moved to the United States to pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees at Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the Juilliard School, where he began to pursue avant-garde music in earnest.

"I grew up in a very diverse culture, but my environment was even more diverse after I came to the US and experienced experimental music and pop culture," he said. During college, he said, he fell in love with the Beatles, Tom Waits and Bjork.

"I do feel that where I am today is due to my education in the US," he said. "But my training in China was very important as well because it built a very strong foundation. I've never forgotten my roots. When I write music, I am intentionally conscious of my roots. I write whatever feels truthful to my beliefs and my feelings."

Indeed, his music draws on a wide variety of influences, and has at different points in time been defined as folk, rock, traditional, jazz and avant-garde.

He spoke of the concept of dimensionalism as a goal he aspires for in his music.

"In music there are more than four dimensions," he said. "You don't just have five people playing on stage, you actually create a soundspace, or a soundscape. My goal is, 'How do I create a soundscape?' It's a perception, an idea of how to create and perceive sound according to my imagination."

Huang was recently awarded the First Prize in the Luxembourg International Composition Prize. He now plans in the upcoming year to include a performance of The Yellow Earth with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra; Sheng Concerto with the Brandenburg Philharmonic in Germany; and a production called Matteo Ricci: His Map and Music at the National Centre for Performing Arts in Beijing this December.

He will also work on a grand opera about Sun Yat-sen, commissioned by Opera Hong Kong and co-produced by Beijing's National Center for Performing Arts. It's slated to be performed four times from September next year.

China Daily