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For a comprehensive list of pieces or demos (CD/VHS), please email Victor.
All clips require QuickTime Player to play.
Early Period
1990-1992
I took my first formal composition lesson with my school teacher, Scottish
composer Rory Boyle. Even though I had taken piano lessons since I was five,
my major instrument at that time was a guitar-sounding Chinese plucked-string
instrument called zhongruan (proun.as jung-ruaan). Prior to my study in England,
I also had already had years of experience in performing this instrument in
Chinese orchestras around the world. My fascination was in combining twentieth
century western compositional techniques with the sound of Chinese music.
When
I look back, this period was my most 'post-modern' period. This includes the
romantic-sounding Sonata for the
Zhongruan, an orchestral piece that travels from Medieval Europe to contemporary
China, Day and Night of China, an experiment on John Cage's philosophy
of silence, Symphony in A for multimedia, and Five Little Pieces
for a Chinese Ensemble.
Under Samuel Adler
1992-1993
My study under Samuel Adler at Eastman was an extremely productive period.
My beginning work at Eastman includes Variations On the Theme of Lan Huahua
for solo piano, A Little Piece for the Cello, and my pain-ridden
existential piece, Dance, Dance Dance, for an ensemble of woodwind
and string instruments.
Back in Hong Kong, I formed a music performing group, Ensemble Till the End of Time, and wrote four pieces for its debut multimedia performance, Zhongruan Sonata, Gossip for solo piano, Afterimage, for solo balalaika, and A 100% Love Song for the tenor, the piano, the pipa, and the erhu.
Listen to excerpt of Dance, Dance, Dance.
Late Eastman Period
After a quiet year, I studied with two composers who truly understood what I truly wanted to do, Augustus Reed Thomas and David Liptak.
I created an orchestra piece, He Comes, He Dreams, He Goes, a concerto for the string orchestra led by the basses, Ancient Dreams, The Piano Journal, Three Pieces for the Viola, and Goodbye, Derek, Goodbye for solo piano. I also began my experimentation with electronic music and used a lot of techniques in my theatrical work. These pieces include When a Penis Rams Into a Vagina (tape), Scenes from the Eyes of a Commuter (tape), The Bright Room of Roland Is Empty (tape), and The Death of Juexin for the alto flute and interactive midi controllers.
In this period, I was especially conscious of searching for the transcendence, and finding an inner sense of time.
Free Composition
After
graduated from Eastman, I focused mainly on my cinema work and film scoring.
No longer under the pressure of being a student, I could write concert pieces
in ways that I had never tried before. Besides my piano concerto, Floating
Clouds, most of these pieces are miniatures, like Jacket for
the oboe and the piano, A Little Piano Piece, A Quiet Roman
Morning for the guitar, Jasmine, Fate, and Journal 10.24.1999
for the piano. I have also written two rag-time pieces, Thomas, and Golden
Lining. My personal favourite is Nell'azzurro for the zhongruan,
which I wrote for my lover, Bob, on his birthday. Musically, a lot of these
pieces declare my freedom to speak in a way that is truthful to how I feel
and what I think. In 2004, I completed a set of Roman Catholic liturgical
pieces, The Three Prayers for SATB, which was a birthday gift for
mother's 60th birthday. I am currently working on a few projects. First, I
am writing a symphony based on Ancient Dreams. I am also working
on a piece scored for the flute and the string trio.
Film Score
The root of my scoring career was in the theatre. I scored on my own film, Goodbye, Derek, Goodbye in 1995, and did not think of composing for films at the time. One of my best friends, Debbie Abrahamson, asked me to score her film in 1997. It was a score with an ethereal vocal piece, and music made with glasses, percussion, and the sakuhachi.
When
I made The Well, an orchestral tribute to the music of Toru Takemitsu.
Before I worked on the piece for the
dongxiao and the string ensemble for Juke Assarat's film, Motorcycle,
I wrote two jazz piano pieces for Naoko Ogigami's video, Dreams in Dreams.
Later on, I worked on Chris Halmo's These Wild Woods. Halmo looked
for music that would evoke the sound of Preisner in Kieslowski's White.
Probably, the most unusual track I have done to date was a rokabilly piece I did for Devika Bhagat's film, Danny Boy here in New York in 2002.