Title: Distance mountains : For Chinese orchestra

Composer:Wong Alfred

Year: 2017

Genre:

• Large ensemble
• Original composition
• Chinese orchestral music

Call No.: SC1534

Description: Distant Mountains is a modern Chinese orchestral piece composed by Alfred Wong in 2017. Commissioned by the Hong Kong Composers' Guild in celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Music Office, the piece was premièred in April 2018 at the Music Office's Annual Gala by the Hong Kong Youth Chinese Orchestra (HKYCO). Wong provided two different programs for the piece's conception and its première respectively. The initial program imagines a young person's journey in life, braving mountains of challenges and reaching the top; the program for the première is rather intended for evoking traditional Chinese landscape paintings that "…make us feel as if we are… in unison with nature." The piece features a full modern Chinese orchestra and consists of three movements, i.e., "tiaowang" ("overlooking the mountains"), "manbu" ("the stroll"), and "pandeng" ("the climb"). "Tiaowang" begins with a majestic tutti statement whose tonally ambiguous melody-an exploration of the tension between major and minor sonorities-sets the tone for the rest of the piece. It is followed by a subdued section in D minor, which leads to a forceful close once again. "Manbu" takes on a walking pace in triple meter, as the instruments weave together a polyphony. The D minor sound is carried over to "pandeng," which returns to duple meter and deploys plucked strings to build momentum with repeated figures. The music then modulates to G minor and progresses with triplet figures and an impassioned polyphony, reaching the triumphant G major cadence at the end.

Note:

• Commissioned work
• Commissioned by the Hong Kong Composers' Guild and the Music Office

Instrumentation: bang di (1), qu di (1), xin di (1), gaoyin sheng (1), zhongyin sheng (1), diyin sheng (1), gaoyin suona/zhongyin suona (1), cizhongyin suona/diyin suona (1), yangqin (1), liuqin (1), pipa (1), zhong ruan (1), da ruan (1), zheng (1), timpani (1), da gu/triangle (1), da luo/small cymbals/suspended cymbal (1), glockenspiel/vibraphone (1), gaohu (1), erhu (1), zhonghu (1), cello (1), double bass (1)