Bittymacbeth inspiredby American Idol
REVIEW/ COMEDY-DRAMA
T2TRAINSPOTTING (R21)117minutes/Now showing/
Thestory: Twodecades after the events ofthe first movie, the gang is reunited underdesperate circumstances. The previouslymissing Renton (Ewan McGregor) shows upin the Edinburgh neighbourhood that is stillhome to Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller) andSpud (Ewen Bremner). Heroin still casts ashadowover the group. The viciousBegbie(RobertCarlyle) shows up to repay the injurydoneto him in the first movie.
John Lui
Was there another Danny Boylemovie as Boyle-ish as Trainspotting(1996)? With that work, the Britishdirector captured magic. With its se-quel T2, he is out to prove that hecan out-Boyle his 1990s self.
And the first 30 minutes are a to-tal, exhilarating recall – the rocksoundtrack married to fast-cuttingimages is Boyle at his kinetic best.Blasts of visual joy come back inspurts over the film’s 117 minutes.
The thrill is not just in the chasescenes. Boyle is the master of themusic montage, a master deejay in
matching rock beats to dialogueand action.
When Begbie (Carlyle), who be-longs in the pantheon of all-timegreat movie villains, goes berserk,there is a jolt to the senses.
When heroin hits the vein, Boyleshows how Brian Eno’s sound-scapes matched to time-and-space-melting set design might bethe only way to describe the opiateexperience.
There is delicious Scottish-fla-voured swearing in this R21 picture.Boyle and the original movie’sscreenwriter John Hodge, looselyadapting Irvine Welsh’s Porno, hisfollow-up 2002 novel to his 1993
work Trainspotting, offer casualnods to how 20 years of gentrifica-tion and Eastern European immi-gration have changed Scotland.
There is nothing of the savagebleakness of the original, however.The story, once it gets the gang to-gether, runs out of ideas.
The remainder blends a caperfilm, “remember this?” flashbacksand gentle whining about gettingolder.
Quite entertaining, but as Rentonobserves at one point: “It’s just nos-talgia! You’re a tourist in your ownyouth.”
Eddino Abdul HadiMusic Correspondent
Home-grown singer-songwriterBeth Yap, better known by her nomde plume Bittymacbeth, comesfrom a musical family and has beenplaying the piano since she was six.
But it was only after watching TVsinging competition American Idolthat she started harbouring dreamsof becoming a singer.
The 22-year-old features in theseventh episode of the third seasonof ST Sessions, The Straits Times’online video series which featuresrising talents in the home-grown
music scene performing stripped-down live sets.
Currently a student at Berklee Col-lege of Music in Boston, Yap says inthe video: “I grew up in a musicalfamily, but it was only when I was12, I was watching American Idol,seeing all these people live out theirdreams of being singers, that Ithought that, hey, I kind of want todo it too.”
Her father was a guitar teacherand her older brother plays musicas well.
Her songs espouse positivity. Anoriginal tune that she performs inthe episode, Haters Gon’ Hate, isabout “taking time to understandand listen to people instead of judg-
ing them on preconceived notions”.The song is from her debut al-
bum, Beauty For Ashes, which shelaunched with a concert at the Es-planade Recital Studio last year.The release went to No. 1 on the lo-cal iTunes and Apple Music’sR&B/Soul charts.
Yap, whose music encompassesgenres such as soul, jazz, pop and
funk, says in the ST Sessions videothat she wants to put her music edu-cation to good use and give back tothe creative scene here.
“I just hope that with everythingthat I learn and all the opportunities(that I get), and all the people outthere (that I meet), that I’ll be ableto grow so much more and not onlymake my own music better, but real-ly contribute more to Singapore’smusic and arts scene.”
ST Sessions’ third season is partof a series of digital video pro-grammes produced in a partner-ship between the Info-communica-tions Media Development Authori-ty of Singapore and Singapore PressHoldings.
The new season features eightacts, including singer-songwriterTim De Cotta and indie duo Tom-girl. A new episode is launched eve-ry other Friday.
• View the video athttp://str.sg/st-sessions
REVIEW/ CONCERTTHE JOURNEY CONTINUES
re:SoundVictoria Concert Hall/Wednesday
Chang Tou Liang
The day re:Sound, Singapore’s firstprofessional chamber orchestra,gave its inaugural concert will be re-membered with fondness. Its sec-ond concert, conducted by Singa-pore Symphony Orchestra (SSO) as-sociate conductor Jason Lai onWednesday, showed that all thecritical acclaim and good noticeswere fully justified.
The essence of chamber music liesin diminutive forces, with a smallnumber of individuals listening andresponding to one another in a showof intimate cooperation. This waswell-illustrated in avant- garde Hun-garian composer Gyorgy Ligeti’sRamifications, scored for 12 stringplayers, each with a different part.
With six players tuned a quarter-tone sharper than the others, the ef-fect was one of deliberate aural dis-orientation through constantly wa-vering pitches. Like a floor thatshifts under one’s feet, the soundevolved from an incessant buzzing,through high-pitched tinnitus tosubterranean growls, all achievedwith utmost control at low vol-umes.
This “music” then evaporated,leaving the conductor beating timein thin air and ambient silence.These startling plays on sonics willexplain why film director StanleyKubrick so effectively used Ligeti’smusic for his iconic movies 2001: ASpace Odyssey (1968) and The Shin-ing (1980).
Altogether more traditional wasBeethoven’s Fourth Piano Concer-to In G Major with veteran Pen-ang-born pianist Dennis Lee as so-loist. His delivery of its openingchords was pivotal, a secure state-ment borne from a wealth of experi-ence, which defined the tenor ofthis reading. His was a more classi-cal-attuned view, of transparenttextures, measured gestures andno little nimbleness, as opposed tothe boisterously Romantic versionoffered by Nicholas Angelich re-cently with the SSO.
Both Lee and Angelich had muchto offer in this masterpiece, but onefactor that tipped in Lee’s favour wasthe smaller ensemble, which re-vealed often glossed-over details be-sidesprovidingsensitive accompani-ment. The rapt conversation of Or-pheus and the Furies in the slowmovement was a lovely interlude be-forethe unbridledjollity ofthe finale.
The programming of Mendel-ssohn’s Third Symphony (alsoknown as the “Scottish”) seemedlike straying into SSO territory, butthis was an enthralling account thatrevelled in the chamber forces uti-lised. Instead of falling victim to theconcert hall’s sometimes feared re-verberance, the strings sang with-out inhibition, while woodwindsand brass rang with bell-like clarity.
Conductor Lai’s tempos were ex-cellently judged and the solemnity ofthe opening movement (evoking theruins of Edinburgh’s Holyrood cas-tle) contrasted well with the vigor-ous Allegro that followed. Stormcloudshovered menacingly, butsun-shine prevailed in this luminous ac-count, which also gloriedin the snap-pyandmercurialScherzo,andnostal-giaof the song-like slow movement.
The martial finale did not strike awarlike posture for long, instead de-lighting in the ending chorale castin the major key.
(From left) Ewen Bremner, Ewan McGregor, Jonny Lee Miller and Robert Carlyle star in T2 Trainspotting. PHOTO: SONY PICTURES
Singer-songwriter Beth Yap comesfrom a musical family. PHOTO: ST VIDEO
Trainspotting sequelreunites the gang inEdinburgh with arock soundtrack,fast-cutting imagesand flashbacks
Nostalgia spotting
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