Composing The Great Race
Lunar New Year begins on Tuesday, 1st February 2022, and people all over the world are getting ready to celebrate and welcome in the Year of Tiger!
At West End in Schools we will be celebrating in primary schools across England and Wales through our dance workshop based on The Great Race. This famous story is told to children in China every year, and tells the origin story of the Chinese Zodiac.
This year the workshop has beautiful new music composed by Liz Chi Yen Liew. Using traditional and contemporary Chinese musical styles, the music truly brings the story to life. We decided to speak with Liz to find out more about the inspiration behind her music. Watch the video for a fantastic demonstration of how the instruments are used in the composition, and read her answers to our questions below.
Tell us a little about yourself and your journey to being a composer.
I started composing as a way of exploring my British Singaporean Chinese cultural heritage. It felt like a natural progression from my career playing with bands and artists. I formed Chi2, a band with my sister and we experimented with blending traditional Chinese instruments with violins and electronics. We eventually wrote a theatre show which we toured in the UK. Since then I’ve written music for theatre shows, mixed-media shows (including O2 Arena), short films and documentaries.
I love composing as well as performing - I think both elements go really well together.
How did you approach writing music for The Great Race workshop?
After discussions with the creative team and choreographers, I started by mapping out the story lines and tempo (speed) of each of the four sections based on the original choreography. We felt that the piece should build to the final Celebration section where you'll hear the music speeds up dramatically. I thought about the stories of each section, how to set a different tone/mood, and also appropriate instrumentation. I wrote and recorded the musical themes for each sequence, checking that everything matched up with the dance moves. I then worked on the transitions between each section putting in audio cues to highlight new sections and then added the fun bits - gongs, firecrackers, tickling cat etc.
Your music for the workshop draws on a mixture of contemporary and traditional Chinese musical styles. How did these styles help to inspire the piece?
I've always explored the fusion of contemporary and traditional Chinese musical styles in my work so this was a fun project to work on! Looking at the overall piece, I worked out which sections I felt lent themselves to being more traditional and others that should have a more contemporary feel. The fan dance, for example, is inspired by the traditional Chinese dance so I thought that the soulful tones of the erhu (Chinese violin) would work well. In our group creative discussions we felt that the piece should also have a modern flavour hence the addition of beats and erhu riffs in the final sections.
Can you tell us about the instrumentation and how this affects the feel of the music?
The opening sequence is voiced on an array of Chinese percussion (red drum, gongs and cymbals) which lends a regal emperor feel and a sense that something significant is about to happen. The Animal section is played on a violin to reflect the playful animal movements in the choreography, hence the use of the dotted rhythms and slides. I used circular glissandi on the guzheng (Chinese zither or harp) to depict the animals crossing the river, a techinique which is used in traditional 'High Mountains, Flowing Water' music. The Fan dance was played on the erhu, a beautifully mellow instrument which I think lends an elegance to this section, mirroring the more traditional feel of the choreography. The electronic beats in the final sections gives a sense of the movement, anticipation and also joyfulness (receiving of the 'red packets').
What do you think music can bring to a story?
It can bring so much colour, depth and imagination!
Thank you, Liz! You can find out more about Liz’s work on her website: www.lizchiyenliew.com