Composer Jeffrey Ching
Maestro Nowak brought out the best in the national orchestra.
Photos courtesy of Jeffrey Ching
Now it can be told.
The Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra (PPO) debut tour in the United Kingdom (UK) May 13 to 24, 2025 was a big hit.
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony was a powerful finale, but the audience favorite was Vaughn Williams’ Lark Ascending, interpreted with class by PPO soloist Diomedes Saraza, Jr.
CCP president Kaye Tinga notes how the UK debut of the PPO was a big hit.
From what Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) president Kaye Tinga could figure out from assorted audiences in the different venues, one of the most applauded numbers was the original composition of CCP artist-in-residence Jeffrey Ching, Il Maestro di Capella 5. Pointed out Tinga, “It was an enormous hit and, in every venue, it elicited much laughter and applause.”
Can a UK concert actually open with laughter and applause?
The back story, according to Ching: “Maestro Grzegorz Nowak and I had already agreed on the new pieces I would write as PPO composer-in-residence for the 2024-25 season. A few months later, he surprised me by asking for another new piece—this time, to open each concert of their nine-city UK tour, which I had no idea was being planned. I then thought it could be fun and even a bit naughty to begin a classical concert with something totally unclassical, not Broadway or pop, but avant-garde in a tongue-in-cheek way and also very visual and gestural—e.g., the conductor cueing the players’ entries with the movements of a traffic policeman—in total contrast to the rest of the program, where the musicians would just be sitting there concentrating on playing the most perfect Mendelssohn or Beethoven. Maybe the humor of it is slightly British, but it is also Italian, Il Maestro di Cappella being the title of an 18th-century Italian musical satire on the typical tug-of-war of orchestral rehearsals. My 21st-century update is, naturally, dedicated to Maestro Nowak.”
The Berlin-based Filipino composer was able to catch up with two of the nine UK tour concerts at Cadogan Hall in London and Symphony Hall in Birmingham. He noted how the venues have totally different acoustics. “The first is a converted church, beautifully resonant, but a bit limited in terms of backstage options. This was a challenge for the offstage effects in Il Maestro di Cappella. To be honest, the trumpets sounded just as loud playing offstage as onstage. But Birmingham Symphony Hall was another matter. It was gigantic and yet you could hear the smallest detail. We were able to make the trumpets sound really far away by placing them behind a thick acoustic curtain behind the stage. They could follow the conductor on a backstage TV monitor (expertly set up in minutes) and then magically appear onstage via a small flight of stairs. The PPO played brilliantly in both concerts. The highlights for me were the finale of Mendelssohn’s ‘Italian’ Symphony and the entirety of Beethoven’s Fifth, both of which brought the house down.”
The composer noted how the Polish maestro performed the Mendelssohn and Beethoven symphonies with absolute fidelity to the score by doing all the repeats. “Of the added length, the audience remained totally spellbound, yet you heard the grand dimensions of these masterpieces as their creators intended.”
The PPO was well-received with a standing ovation at Theater Royal in Norwich. (Photo: Noreen Oronce)
The PPO UK tour started May 13 at Beacon Hall in Bristol, and was greeted with a standing ovation, followed by equally enthusiastic audiences at Cadogan Hall in London (May 14), Symphony Hall in Birmingham (May 15), G Live in Guildford (May16), and another standing ovation at the Theater Royal in Norwich (May 18). The audiences at the Theater Royal in Norwich were so enthusiastic, the orchestra had to oblige with two encores.
The PPO’s seventh engagement at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester had Filipinos in the audience. Krina Cayabyab, daughter of National Artist for Music Ryan Cayabyab, told her father the PPO was well received by English audiences. “It was a proud moment for Filipinos as the applause was really long and well-deserved.”
The PPO’s seventh engagement at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester had Filipinos in the audience. Krina Cayabyab, daughter of National Artist for Music Ryan Cayabyab, said, ‘It was a proud moment for Filipinos, as the applause was really long and well deserved’
In the Birmingham concert, a netizen named Anna Prince commented on FB: “Last night’s performance was absolutely stunning!”
In Guildford, England, the orchestra performed Mendelssohn’s Italian’ Symphony; Delius’ Piano Concerto, featuring acclaimed pianist Mark Bebbington; Elgar’s Nimrod from Enigma Variations; Bizet’s Carmen Suite No. 1 and Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake Suite.
The others concerts featured cellist Wen-Sinn Yang and violinist Diomedes Saraza Jr. in a repertoire consisting of Bizet’s Carmen Suite No. 1, Vaughan Williams’s The Lark Ascending, and again opening with Jeffrey Ching’s Il Maestro di Capella.
From the very beginning, PPO director Eugene de los Santos noticed the general mood of the musicians, which bordered on excitement and nervous reserve. “They know UK audiences have heard all the world’s greatest orchestras, and we are just another unknown orchestra from Asia.”
Like what Ching noticed, each venue has different acoustical conditions, but the orchestra quickly adjusted, with the seasoned Polish conductor always in command. “What was very noticeable was the consistency of execution of the pieces by Maestro Nowak. He truly knows how to adjust the sound of the orchestra to the different venues, and the orchestra performed as expected. Violinist Saraza, cellist Yang, and pianist Bebbington were well received by audiences. The three of them were fabulous, and the audiences in all the venues gave their solid approval.”
Present at the Cadogan Hall in London were Ambassador to the UK Teddy Boy Locsin and his wife Louie and some CCP scholars led by Aidan Baracol and singer Mark Bautista.
To prepare for the tour, Maestro Nowak had to consult with the artists’ managements in the UK and the venue organizers. “This is to avoid clashes of the same works being performed in the same season,” Nowak said. “That’s why we could not go with just one program, but with two symphonies, two major orchestra works, three soloists, and two shorter works by a British composer and our Filipino composer in residence.”
Since the UK is exposed to excellent visiting ensembles, the challenge is how to make an impression, since the PPO is unknown in this part of Europe. “It is a big challenge for an unknown orchestra to be compared with other excellent ensembles,” Nowak added. “After seven concerts, I believe the PPO has passed the test with flying colors, and was adjudged one of the world’s best orchestras.”
In preparation, the PPO performed the UK tour program in Manila and scheduled additional rehearsals just before the tour. “In addition, we have a two-hour rehearsal before each concert,” Nowak noted. “Altogether it is hard work. But the ensemble became better and better from one concert to another. Indeed, performing concerts every day to a demanding audience challenges our players to give their best, and indeed they did in this tour. The crucial factors are the desire of everyone to give their best individually and to become a unified ensemble inspired by their conductor.”
Tinga said the CCP may encourage more foreign engagements. “We hope that this is just the beginning of many foreign engagements not just for the PPO, but for Filipino musicians and performers. We are preparing for an Asian tour for 2026.”
The CCP president added that the tour was a high point in international exposure for Filipino musicians. “Because the orchestra performed to an international audience and was given the rousing response, we were able to prove that Filipino musicians are truly world class and amongst the best in the world. The CCP will continue its mission of promoting the very best in Filipino talents.”
The PPO under Maestro Novak at Samsung Theater
TheDiarist.ph learned that the PPO was able to pull off nine engagements in less than two weeks largely due to good timing. Tinga revealed, “When Maestro Novak learned that the Buenos Aires orchestra pulled out of the IMG Artists concert series, he took the opportunity and presented the PPO. It usually takes three years to prepare for such an undertaking. But we managed to do it in six months!”
Meanwhile, Ching describes his work relationship with Maestro Nowak. “All composers dream of working with conductors who master every note in the score and correct every note in the orchestra that doesn’t match—that’s Grzegorz Nowak! We’ve now done four world premieres together: Fiesta contrapuntistica is a symphonic toccata and fugue based on Lupang Hinirang. Before Brabant (in a new orchestration) is an opera-with-animation that premiered at last November’s Children’s Biennale. The biggest piece we did was my half-hour Concerto for Orchestra, premiered last 11 April, which gave each PPO player, down to the last second violin, a solo at some point.
“Then, of course, there was Il Maestro di Cappella for the UK tour, which was a clear symptom of a healthy working relationship. I always accept the Maestro’s suggestions to improve the execution of tricky passages, especially in the strings, since he is an accomplished violinist himself. And he is only too glad for me to discuss improvements with individual players at his back, as this saves precious minutes in the rehearsal proper. But he can take the initiative too. I’ve seen him use the rehearsal break not to rest or have a cup of coffee, but to go through my woodwind parts one by one with a pencil, visually clarifying confusing rhythms for the players.”
‘I’ve seen Maestro Nowak use the rehearsal break not to rest or have a cup of coffee, but to go through my woodwind parts one by one with a pencil, visually clarifying confusing rhythms for the players,’ said Ching
Before the PPO tour, Ching’s works were heard in the UK. “Yes, several chamber works. But at the time I left the UK in 2003, no orchestral works. So, it’s thanks to Grzegorz Nowak and the PPO that I’ve made a belated orchestral debut in the UK years after I already had a number of orchestral and opera premieres in Germany.” To be sure, the PPO had performed Ching’s earlier works decades earlier.
In this latest encounter with the PPO, Ching said the national orchestra has sustained the high standards of its earliest years, when he heard Oscar Yatco lead them in unforgettable performances of Beethoven’s Eroica and Brahms’s Second Symphony.
Ching conducted the PPO in his Rococo-ish opera buffa Rendezvous in Venice about 30 years ago. Under Chino Toledo, they premiered his Third Symphony, Rituals, written for the Centennial of the Philippine Declaration of Independence from Spain in 1998. For another, the late Ruggiero Barbieri gave the Philippine premiere of his Second Symphony, The Imp of the Perverse, in 2003.
Reflected Ching: “To be honest, the PPO never programmed much contemporary music, but already with my Second and Third Symphonies, you saw the enormous potential of the orchestra in interpreting music of this kind under an empathetic conductor. From 2003 to 2024 is a gap of 21. My most recent work as composer-in-residence has gone much further than my Second and Third Symphonies in its technical and interpretive demands. Happily, this coincides with Maestro Grzegorz’s tenure, because his understanding and experience of modern music are uniquely deep and broad. I was especially impressed with how he rehearsed my Before Brabant over a two-week period last November, and with how the PPO as well as the cast of four singers responded to his precision and meticulousness with performances of astonishing accuracy and verve.”
Ching gave this interview in the middle of his concerts in Berlin, the city that has given him a rich musical life. “Berlin is a pretty intense place for classical music, and a magnet for talent from all over Germany and the world. Just from the creative quality of the people you run into here, amazing projects get hatched. I have been re-composing Schubert’s Winterreise, replacing the entire piano part with a virtuoso solo cello accompaniment, for a staged production by the famous German stage director and designer Achim Freyer, who also lives in Berlin.”
The composer’s wife, soprano Andion Fernandez
Jeffrey Ching and wife Andion Fernandez with MSO executive director Jeffrey Solares in a previous engagement
Achim’s wife Esther is, like Ching’s wife Andion, Fernandez, also a soprano. “They will divide Schubert’s 24 songs between them when Achim eventually stages the complete cycle. From the outset, Achim insisted that not the just two singers but also the cellist be female, which automatically halved the number of candidates. Making the shortlist even shorter, the female cellist had to live in Berlin, so that we could rehearse at my flat or Achim’s several times a week! After some trial and error, of course we found her—because this is Berlin! I am also working on a new opera with Roscha Säidow, another Berlin resident, who holds the guest professorship in Contemporary Puppetry at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts. We are creating a rather grotesque satirical opera based on Jarry’s Ubu roi trilogy, which will be staged next year with a mixed cast of opera singers and puppeteers.”
In Berlin, he made friends with the head of the opera studio of the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Music Conservatory in Leipzig, with whom he is planning yet another opera for next year, this time based on the theme of paradise.
Ching and his wife Andion have been blessed with a boy and a girl, now grown up. Ching wished they pursued their parents’ interest in music. “I also respect their complete freedom of choice, as my parents did mine. Jeffrey Jr., 19, was for many years a piano scholar at the Berlin University of the Arts, one of the best conservatories in Europe, where his mother also studied. He is extremely partial to Bach. I’ve often wondered if he should have specialized in the harpsichord instead, but we never bought him one because I would have had to tune it every day. He is nearly at the end of his first year at Stanford now, doing a lot of management, computer, and philosophy courses. I hope he eventually figures out how to balance them with piano practice. Clara, 16, is a good violinist, and has been learning the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto. I sometimes wish she sight-read a bit less fluently than she does, because it might mean she would practice more methodically. So far neither of them intends to pursue music as career, maybe because they learned by observation quite early in life how much obsessive, relentless hard work is required even to make a dent in an already hugely saturated profession.”
How about his life as husband of a singer? “When your wife is a fine singer and the most experienced interpreter of your compositions, you handle her as a violinist handles his Strad—with the utmost love and care. That said, it could be illuminating if you asked Andion what she thought of life as a composer’s wife! Last year we celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary, and I think we were both equally astonished at the distance we’ve traveled both as spouses and colleagues, journeys which in our case were exactly co-terminus. Singers and composers can be the most individualistic, even narcissistic, examples of humankind in existence (although I’m not saying Andion and I are). It’s delightful that we can take for granted as totally routine my making suggestions to Andion in rehearsal about dynamics and phrasing, and she to me about breathmarks and syllabication, without ruffling each other’s feathers. Then we go home and ask each other, what’s for dinner? Or, have you fed the dog?”
‘When your wife is a fine singer and the most experienced interpreter of your compositions, you handle her as a violinist handles his Strad—with the utmost love and care,’ said Ching of his wife, soprano Andion Fernandez
About the two PPO UK concerts he heard, he says: “I’ve never heard the PPO play better than they did in London and Birmingham. I have no words to express how proud I am of our national orchestra more than holding its own on stages where the world’s most famous orchestras have preceded them. But I must admit that in some respects this artistic peak was attainable only thanks to two extraneous factors: first, the timely arrival of some brand-new instruments, e.g. for the principal oboe (whose Swan Lake opening was sublime); second, the economic necessity of the cellos and basses having to play with rented UK instruments, which, assuming that at least some of them were better than those left in Manila, possibly contributed to the exceptional beauty of the overall string sound I heard. I hope there are Maecenases with deep pockets out there reading this, who now realize how much good orchestral playing depends on good instruments, and not just the player’s talent.
Ching with the author after the PPO concert
“Other factors: Maestro Nowak’s unerring sense of theater. Then there was the PPO’s concertmaster, Dio Saraza, who had to kickstart the piece before the conductor arrived, and absolutely milked the role for all its comic potential. Then there was the unwavering support of the PPO’s unsung heroes, Noreen Oronce, Manual Agustine Chua, and Miguel Sto. Domingo, without whom it would have been impossible to devise the solutions we did for the offstage effects. Last but not least were the PPO players themselves, who were totally ‘game’ for all the unorthodox things the score asked them to do.”
For this successful PPO UK Tour, the Cultural Center of the Philippines acknowledges the support of the Okada Foundation, Rustan’s, Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO), the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra Society Inc. (PPOSI), Johann Strauss Foundation, and the office of Sen Miguel Zubiri as well as Tieline, Sapatero, Gregg Shoes, and Rhett Eala for the clothes of the orchestra. Meanwhile, Cecile Licad will be reunited with the PPO under Maestro Novak on September 24, 2025, 6:30 p.m. at the Manila Metropolitan Theater. It is a fundraising concert of the PPOSI. Licad is soloist in Mozart and Ravel concertos. After the Met engagement, Licad will go on a national outreach tour at the Baguio Country Club (September 27), Pinto Gallery in Antipolo City (September 28), MiraNila (October 1), University of the Philippines Visayas in Iloilo City (October 6), and Virac, Catanduanes (October 2025). For outreach inquiries, call tel. no. 0906-5104270.
