I managed to catch the Keat Hong CO performance at the Esplanade last Sunday. All the pieces were arranged by the conductor.
This is one of rare performances where I see the conductor actually doing some serious conducting. I think that the conductor tried to make his movements quite big and clear so that the whole orchestra can see the beat just by glancing. I had more fun looking at the conducting than the orchestra itself.
Maybe the reason is because the conductor has more than 20 years of experience... Anyway, his conducting is the best I've seen so far, and much much better than the "snake" conductor I've seen the other time. Nearly laughed out loud the other time.
His arrangement though doesn't seem to be easy. The time signature kept changing, which could be because they are mostly medley pieces. I love the last piece where he combined a few local folk songs like Rasa Sayang, and a few others. For the first time, I heard the Liu Qin section solo. Usually you can hardly hear them and I did tell people that its such a pity because I could see them do some quite interesting runs, which I cannot hear.
This esplanade performance was also the only performance I've seen with an encore. :p However, I didn't really like the Indian arrangement. A little ... ... weird? Indian pieces on CO instruments. :D
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