Making a Scene

Singapore's very own "King of Swing" shares his music picks from the first podcast edition of Now Hear This.

Cage “loved the way I prepared the piano”, Margaret Leng Tan, one of the foremost interpreters of his music, tells us in this episode of Making A Scene. In preparing the piano, she was influenced by the diverse music of her multicultural upbringing in Singapore. But for this Juilliard-trained pianist, it was also her encounter with Cage’s Asian-influenced artistic outlook that sparked a new engagement with her own cultural roots.

That’s just one way the subject of diverse cultural influences comes up in this spirited conversation between Tan and composer Huang Ruo, moderated by Esplanade programmer Lynn Yang. For China-born Huang, who is also a Juilliard graduate and based in New York like Tan, musical genres from different cultures are just one dimension of sound that inform his expansive creative process.

Singaporeans often describe Singapore as a food-obsessed nation. In this episode, we take a closer look at this purported obsession, and what it reveals about how we engage with Singaporean society and culture.

Based in the United States, celebrated percussionist Zakir Hussain talks about the tabla and his career in music. Known for his work with the fusion band Shakti and sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar, Hussain is also an Indian composer and music producer, who has brought the tabla to international prominence.

Discover Singapore’s Indian band scene from the 1940s to the 1980s when Mohamed Raffee’s band The Vasatham Boyz entered the scene. Hosted by Sheela Narayanan, this podcast also covers Md Raffee’s contributions to music scenes in Singapore and India, and what inspired him to become a full-time musician.

What are the challenges they face in terms of future opportunities and audience development? Is theatre part of everyday life or is it exclusive to the affluent? Does theatre reflect the voices in the society it inhabits and can it continue to thrive amid a global pandemic?

In this podcast, we look at how bharatanatyam has evolved within its traditional framework and examine how choreography has transformed to find relevance in a modern world. Diving into Leela Samson’s journey in dance including her work as a mentor, we find out what her practice means to her and shed light on how a dancer can make the transition to becoming a choreographer.

Devdutt Pattanaik writes on how mythology continues to be relevant to modern societies, especially in management, governance and leadership. In this podcast hosted by Himanshu Verma, we dive into Devdutt's success as an prolific author and mythologist, discussing challenges that he has overcome as a writer, as well as his new book Pilgrim Nation.

A poem about change and saving humanity by Mohamed Latiff Mohamed.

In this episode, dancer and dance writer Chan Sze-Wei speaks with ballet-trained New York Times dance writer Roslyn Sulcas about the function of cultural criticism, and how their experiences as performers shape the way they approach writing about dance.