About us

Been there, done that …

The SYC Ensemble Singers (formerly, the Singapore Youth Choir), formed in 1964, is the longest surviving community choir in the nation.

Yet, to call the Ensemble singers merely a “community” chorus is something of a misnomer, for the seemingly ordinary bunch of amateur musicians hailing from all walks of life has achieved many first feats.

The Ensemble was the first Singaporean choir to travel, and the first Singaporean choir to win an international competition (and that first win, at the famed Llangollen Eisteddfod no less). At home, it was the first and only choir to be awarded the President’s Charity Award for service to the state and community, and the Excellence for Singapore award for consistent excellence in the field of choral music. 

It has served as choir-in-residence to the Singaporean community by lending its voice to national projects (including a recording of the re-orchestrated national anthem), and has had the privilege of working with many respected figures in choral music.
 
Have Road, Will Travel

The musical journey has been equally eventful, if not more exciting.

Timeline-wise, the Ensemble has worked its way through a substantial chunk of “western classical” choral repertoire, from the Renaissance polyphony of Monteverdi to the 21st century jazz-inspired works of Gershwin.

Geographically, it continues to explore the singing traditions outside traditional western classical music and the works of composers who draw on such. Staples of Ensemble repertoire now include Chen Yi’s arrangements of Chinese folksongs and R Murray Schafer’s native American-inspired soundscapes, just to name a few.

Journeying outside of conventional “choir music”, the Ensemble increasingly programs and performs choral works which incorporate movement, space and lighting (such as R Murray Schafer’s Seventeen Haiku and Vox Naturae). In addition, it seeks to discover the use of choral music and ensemble singing in new ways: it has performed a work for choir and electronics (Nona Sensilia by Joyce Koh), collaborated with a Chinese orchestra (world premiere of Marco Polo and Princess Blue), and recorded a work for rapper and choir (Shadow Catcher by Robert Casteels).

The Ensemble is committed to promoting the music of its time and place. A substantial portion of its repertoire consists of 20th and 21st century works as well as works composed or arranged by Asian composers (or better yet, both). The Ensemble also regularly commissions and performs new works by Singaporean composers, through which it hopes to build up a repertoire of Singapore choral music. For its 40th anniversary celebrations, almost half of its commissioned music comprised Singaporean works (including Hoh Chung Shih’s Birth and Death and Goh Toh Chai’s Narcissus and Echo).

The Way Forward

The Ensemble itself is no longer young, and the average Singer is a twenty, thirty-something, no longer the teenager that the word ‘youth’ conjures. Even as it forges ahead, its creed remains unchanged: it is not merely a choir, its members not merely choristers, but maturing musicians who wrestle together with the challenges of making music of all ages relevant to the people of today.