Showing 1 - 10 of 11
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 09/04/2024
» In last year's award-winning film Tár, Cate Blanchett is an orchestral conductor at the peak of her fame, celebrated worldwide and powerful within the industry. But a scandal brings her downfall, and a final scene shows her exiled to a (non-specified) Southeast Asian country, recording video game background music with a local orchestra.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 31/05/2023
» The Royal Bangkok Symphony Orchestra made a triumphant return to Thailand last week after their whistle-stop tour of Europe, with three concerts in three cities in different countries, all in five days.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 08/11/2022
» Thai composer Somtow Sucharitkul's opera Helena Citronova had its European premiere in Hof, Germany, late last month, and it was a stunning success.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 25/08/2016
» It was bold of Somtow Sucharitkul to take Opera Siam to Bayreuth in Germany, the spiritual home of Wagnerians, to perform the first opera of a cycle of operas that challenges Richard Wagner's monumental Ring cycle, performed every year in Bayreuth, as the world's longest opera cycle. Sucharitkul's The Silent Prince is the first of the 10 operas of his Dasjati cycle telling the "Ten Lives Of The Buddha", familiar stories in Buddhist culture. Somtow has already composed five of the operas, and hopes to have all 10 finished by 2020, ready for a complete cycle in a sort of Bangkok Bayreuth Festival.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 16/08/2016
» Opera Siam and the Siam Sinfonietta are in Bayreuth, Germany, home each year to the famous Wagner Festival, for the European premiere of Somtow Sucharitkul's opera The Silent Prince, which forms part of the Bayreuth Annual Young Artists Festival. Before the opera opens members of the ensemble have performed concerts in Bayreuth and some small Bavarian towns nearby.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 07/01/2016
» Where is the closest place in Thailand to Vienna? The answer may have been last Monday, back in 2015, at the packed Thailand Cultural Centre, where the Siam Sinfonietta presented their fourth annual New Year's Concert to an enthusiastic audience.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 26/03/2015
» Somtow Sucharitkul's latest opera, The Snow Dragon, received its world premiere in the US earlier this month to unanimous critical acclaim.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 24/02/2015
» Somtow Sucharitkul realised what his next opera production should be when he was speaking with one of his students.
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 06/01/2015
» Christmas Day at the Thailand Cultural Centre saw the opening night of Opera Siam's wonderful new production of Mozart's The Magic Flute, conducted by the young Thai impresario Trisdee Na Patalung and directed by Somtow Sucharitkul (there were two further performances, one sponsored by the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority).
Life, Michael Proudfoot, Published on 19/08/2014
» The world premiere of Somtow Sucharitkul's Dan No Ura staged at the Thailand Cultural Centre on Aug 11 was the Thai composer's greatest operatic triumph to date. The opera deals with the Japanese sea battle of 1185, the final conflict in a war which effectively ended the power of the Taira samurai clan, close relatives of the imperial family of the time. They were defeated by the Genji, led by Minamoto no Yoshitsune, whose half-brother became the first Shogun, and power was effectively transferred to the Shoguns.