Welcome home, Sallynee! You have overcome us
Some people in this country get confused between “to welcome” and “to overcome”. Sallynee Amawat has no problem with that. Already well recognized in her early twenties as orchestral player, chamber musician and soloist, she suddenly disappeared from the Thai musical scene. Now she is back as member of “Le Concert de Montreal”, having earned 2 master’s degrees and become a specialist in Baroque music. With her other 5 North American colleagues, she has given 2 concerts and conducted a workshop for a selected group of string players from the Silpakorn Summer Music School (SSMS). The trainers and their trainees constituted a Baroque orchestra and gave their final concert at the Siam Society on May 18, 2012. It was a stunning success. What a heartwarming “homecoming” for Nong Sa!
When the Concert de Montreal played its first concert on May 14, I found it rather academic, since the musicians were trying to illustrate the rise and development of Baroque music and its passage to the Viennese Classic. Of course, they played very well, technically and stylistically, but the uninitiated might have found it difficult to differentiate one composer from another, their names being probably familiar only to scholars and specialist audiences. I assume most of us listeners missed the fine points, and I was looking with trepidation to the final concert.
Then a miracle happened. The concert on May 18 with works by Haendel, Lully, Corelli, Albinoni, Purcell, Biber and Telemann was a professional treat. Listening to the suite, “Burlesque de Don Quixote”, by Telemann made me fall into a trance, as if I were sitting in my favourite haunt, the Chamber Music Hall of the Konzerthaus am Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin; the sonority, the precision, the perfect intonation were all there.
How could the trainers bring up their trainees to that level of playing within 3 days? Mutual faith must have existed between them. But let us be honest. Something like this could not have happened in Thailand 20 years ago. The young musicians, some still in their teens, came to their North American trainers with an adequate background on which the visitors could build something. They did not start from zero point. Still, it was unbelievable that the youngsters could feel their way into the Baroque style and respond to the technical challenges of some of the compositions. The visitors did not hesitate to put some of their trainees at the front desks. Were they prepared to take risks or were they confident that the youngsters could do it?
Again, the Silpakorn people opted to play the “ranad thum” by filling in the gaps with two of its faculty (one modestly but effortlessly tackling the solo part in Albioni’s Trumpet Concerto) and a few senior undergraduates. Otherwise they were content with their supportive role. Let the teenagers and the visitors shine; they deserved it! The Canadian Embassy made the right decision to support this modest enterprise with little fanfare. Very soon they will be able to appreciate the virtue of the “ranad Thum” culture, which is the hallmark of Silpakorn. As for the Siam Society, it has been known for over a century as a paragon of scholarship. It is now emerging as Bangkok’s “Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde”. (Am I presumptuous in trying to anchor it in the august Viennese lineage?)
One surprise came at the end of the concert, an “encore”. His Majesty’s composition, “Blue Day”, in the arrangement by M.L. Usni Pramoj, was a reinterpretation in the best sense of the word. I had never heard this composition played with such finesse, subtlety and sophistication. Could that only happen when played by a Baroque ensemble? This is certainly not a paradox, but an affirmation of the universality of music.
As we bid welcome and then good-bye to Nong Sa and her great North American colleagues, we can’t help saying, “You have overcome us” or to be more precise, “You have overwhelmed us with your musicianship.” Do come back.
