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Crucial Conversations
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Crucial Conversations
The Artist as Entrepreneur: Churen's Fusion of Creativity and Commerce in Classical Music
Have you ever witnessed an artist wield the tenacity of a CEO while orchestrating their creative vision?
Our insightful guest, Churen, invites us into a world where brushes meet business acumen, unraveling the complex tapestry of being an entrepreneur in the realm of art. As we navigate the hurdles and triumphs of personal branding and the multifaceted roles artists embrace, we uncover the delicate art of distancing oneself from one's creation to foster a sustainable practice.
Churen's journey of self-discovery and dedication echoes across disciplines, revealing the paradoxical dance of immersion and objectivity in mastery.
The symphony of life is composed of myriad notes, each resonating with the timbre of our experiences, and this episode resonates with that very melody. Churen's narrative crescendos from the disciplined pursuit of piano to the existential reflections on identity accompanying artistic expression. Like a maestro conducting the orchestra of self, we traverse the transformative power of performance and the intricate process of shaping an artist's legacy. It's not just about the notes played; it's about the life lived between each measure.
Envision a classical concert infused with the spectral wonders of augmented reality, where the timeless beauty of tradition waltzes with the pulsing innovation of tech. Churen gives us a glimpse into the alchemy of blending classical music with AR to craft immersive experiences that defy convention. We venture through the mind of a composer balancing the dual act of performance and creation, touching on gender dynamics and societal norms through the universal language of music. Prepare to be enthralled by a dialogue that promises to etch a new lineage in the annals of classical music — where past, present, and future converge in harmony.
Thank you very much. Do you partner with NUS or any of the universities?
Speaker 2:We do. We do so as Huawei. We have different competitions for different things. So for the universities, we have our Tech for City campaign, which is focused on startups that haven't incorporated yet still within the university space but have good ideas. Nice opportunity to get exposure, some prize money and then to post that formulas. We have one startup that has won that competition is in my incubator upstairs now, so they can mature from that into either formal entity or to day jobs, depending on Do they get paid to be in the incubator?
Speaker 2:No, unfortunately not. You know it's got to be. You can pull that forward there. So it would be nice if you could get paid to be in an incubator. I would love that. I would be the first to put my hand up.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 2:Well, I think so. I mean, I enjoy innovating.
Speaker 1:But you've got to raise the stakes for the people in the incubator.
Speaker 2:Where do we get the money from? It's always where does the money come from, and then how do you get a return on that? Without having shares. Some incubators do do that right. Some incubators like Antler or there's a few others that take equity and then give you funding and then put you through the incubator process but then still pay the incubator staff out of the funding that they give you, why you want to be an incubator.
Speaker 1:I don't have an MVP, no, I'm just.
Speaker 2:You are the MVP, you just want to do.
Speaker 1:I do think of myself as a startup.
Speaker 2:Tell me more.
Speaker 1:Well, I am the product. Yeah I am the ceo running the company okay, so you've got a formal entity I do have a formal entity for tax purposes yeah but I think everyone is a startup, because we're all running our own personal brands, except that I.
Speaker 1:The only difference between being an artist and you know someone who's not an artist is that the artist is the product. The art that we create is the product, but we are the art, and so I'm the CEO, I am the PR girl, we are our own best publicists. What else? What else do I do?
Speaker 2:Project management.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 2:You're head of HR.
Speaker 1:Well, that falls under CEO.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Project management I outsource.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:But the three biggest functions the product, the CEO and the PR. That falls under me.
Speaker 2:Do you feel like there's a lot of pressure with that?
Speaker 1:Oh, of course, there's a tremendous amount of pressure. I think that as an artist grows and matures, the difficulty, or actually the growth process, is how do we distance ourselves from the art?
Speaker 2:What do you mean by that? It sounds counterintuitive, but I'm intrigued.
Speaker 1:It's an ever-evolving relationship right the art and the artist. It is also something I'm still in the process of working out.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:But I think distancing myself from the art would make for a more sustainable relationship with the art. So it's you know, taking a bird's eye view of what you create would help me to make a better product really, rather than just being so involved in it. In Chinese there is an idiom, 井底之蛙, which means you're the frog at the bottom of the well. When one is so engrossed in the art that they create like it's do or die, it feels a bit like being the frog at the bottom of the well looking up, and you only see a little bit of clear sky, but you want to be the frog outside of the well looking into the well interesting that makes sense interesting I would have.
Speaker 2:I would have thought, because I have so much respect for artists and you can be an artist in anything, right it it's. I think, what I, what I admire, is humans that have put so much time and effort into one discipline that they perfect it. And whether it's uh being a, um, an artist, whether it's in your craft, or it could be uh, cutting hair, you know, it could be making a sword, it could be grand pianist, it could be, um, anything. Really it's the discipline you've taken to to cross that threshold. I would think at some level you have to completely immerse yourself into it to become it, embody it.
Speaker 2:You have to become it yeah, so what you're saying to me is interesting because that's like, once you've done that, you have to know how to extract yourself out of it to become better at it. Yep, while still embodying the essence of it yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly, Go shit open.
Speaker 1:They always say art imitates life, but for me the reverse is more true my life imitates art.
Speaker 1:So whatever I'm trying to do with the art becomes sort of, it manifests itself in my life. So, for example, a few years ago I was working on okay, let me speak about now. Actually, right now I'm working on getting more strength and power in my playing and, without delving into the gory details of my personal life, I'm finding out that the paths I pursue extra musically actually mirror what I'm doing physically at the piano. So, physically, to get more power at the piano, I'm adjusting my shoulder placement, adjusting the placement of my metacarpal joints in relation to my fingers, and this gives me more structure, more grounding in my body and my torso, in the way I relate to the ground below me, the chair, the way I sit. All of these have tangible impact on the way I sound. But because I'm able to find these adjustments of my body and to embody a different kind of being in the world in relation to my instrument, I find that I take what I've learned through the piano playing into my own life and then the universe somehow makes it fall into place. I find new paths of exploring power through different kinds of role play, and it's a fun journey. When I write about love in my composing, then I find that that manifests itself in different forms in my life as well.
Speaker 1:So I do think that the greatest art that one can make is that of one's life. As artists, we are the art, and that's also a very dangerous relationship. What are we without the art? I mean, what am I without the art?
Speaker 2:that's a dangerous, tenuous relationship to have, which is why I think that the next step really is to be able to craft a little bit of distance, but still holding on to the essence I can imagine that when you spend so much time doing one thing and then you become that thing, that you probably have some kind of identity crisis at some point when it comes to are you that thing? Are you more than that thing? If something happens to you that prevents you from being that thing, does that mean that you're nothing else? I don't know, and you're the first person I've spoken to that I would say is at the kind of professional level in a craft of this nature.
Speaker 2:But I often look at sports people right, and I wonder if it's the same thing. Because to become a professional sports player, you go through the same kind of journey discipline, focus and then, let's say, you're a football player or rugby player or American football, whatever you pop your knee, pop your back and all of a sudden you can't be that sports person. That whole identity fades away. Then what are you? And you have to reinvent yourself and I wonder how much pressure and how underestimated that journey is.
Speaker 1:Of course, my relationship with the instrument as a pianist, which is a very physical relationship, is a fundamental aspect of my identity as a musician. But I think being a musician is so much more than just playing the piano. So I compose, I produce to a certain extent music, and also I come up with fun, innovative projects.
Speaker 2:Which I'm keen to dive into. May I take a step back, which I'm keen to dive into. May I take a step back. I want to dive into the genesis of Chiran and how you got to this point, if you don't mind sharing what you're comfortable with. When did you first start playing piano and how did that arc materialize to this point?
Speaker 1:We had a piano at home and even as a toddler I was very drawn to it. So I would just go to the piano and bang out random noises and say, oh, this is the portrait of a carrot. To my mom. So she sent me for lessons and very early on they discovered that I have perfect pitch.
Speaker 2:What does that mean?
Speaker 1:That means, if you play a pitch to me, I can immediately recognize whether it's like a, c or E. Do Re Mi.
Speaker 2:Okay. How old, are you yet in this, when you start going for lessons?
Speaker 1:Probably five.
Speaker 2:Okay, so very early on.
Speaker 1:Very, very early on. I went to normal school like most Singaporean kids, and that's when it became a bit of a struggle to balance schoolwork with my growing musical ambitions. I was writing music, I was participating in piano competitions by that point this is sort of like early teens, but I was enrolled in raffles girl school, okay, which is this very intense, academically intense school uh how many hours are you playing a day at this point?
Speaker 1:at this point. I don't know if I should admit this, but I I made sacrifices. I made the sacrifice of not going to class in order to practice piano. So I would go to school and then excuse myself and just go to the music room and practice.
Speaker 2:And was that a pure intense drive from within? It wasn't like you were being forced or asked. It was just you naturally gravitating towards the piano yeah, it was my escape.
Speaker 1:The piano was my escape from the rigor and the tedium of being in school interesting.
Speaker 2:I think it's okay to admit it now. No one's gonna. I don't think you're gonna get into trouble. It's resulted in the amazingness that is your life and the journey that you're on now.
Speaker 1:I have to thank RGS, because my teachers were very discouraging.
Speaker 2:Really.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:It's weird how kids often show who they are and get pushed away from it, don't you think?
Speaker 1:What do you mean?
Speaker 2:Look, I find often children will show you who they are or what they want, and then the system will try and break it or suppress it to make you conform to what you're supposed to be doing or what the system thinks you should be doing.
Speaker 1:Absolutely be doing, or what the system thinks you should be doing. Absolutely, it's well, in hindsight, that was a great thing for me, because my rebellious nature just kicked into full drive.
Speaker 2:You're rebellious.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I skipped any. Anything I could skip, I would skip in school in order to practice, and it was to the point that a teacher called me aside and he asked me which is more important to you, your community or your own achievements and your own drive? Which I think is a terribly unfair thing to say to a 15-year-old, but for me that just represents the unfairness of the system, if you will.
Speaker 2:What a question.
Speaker 1:What a question, what? What is?
Speaker 2:why would it even be perceived that way?
Speaker 1:Because I just wasn't going along with the flow. I didn't do what they wanted me to do. Sometimes it meant leaving like team group mates in the lurch got you okay.
Speaker 2:So the sacrifices were self-made. Um, it seems like you had a really strong drive to be at the piano, be within, engrossed within your music and your musical talents. At what age did you know that you were gonna be famous? Did you ever know?
Speaker 1:famous is a relative thing sure.
Speaker 2:Maybe that's not the right question. At what age did you know that you would be doing this as a profession?
Speaker 1:In my 20s. Really, I never knew until it happened.
Speaker 2:How did it happen?
Speaker 1:Well, it was COVID, and I really lucked out. As a concert pianist. I was perhaps one of the only musical acts that could perform in the time of social distancing and therefore over COVID in 2021,. I played 70, 80 concerts, solo concerts. Wow. That's really when my career took off. Ironically, Interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the year before that I got a teaching job, two teaching jobs actually, at NUS and at Yale NUS College. That was sort of the halfway mark. I knew I had a career in music with the jobs, but it was when I had a volume of concerts that became financially and artistically sustainable that I knew okay, this is it, I've got enough momentum to keep going. And it's all about momentum.
Speaker 1:If you speak to older artists, they will tell you that at some point people go through phases. Right, you have to take a step back sometimes to focus on other parts of life that are as important, but one has to build enough momentum to sustain one phase before they can take a step back, build more whether that means family and kids or maybe a side hustle and then come back to the artistic practice with the momentum that they had generated before. So I've got this momentum going now that I'm so grateful for, because it's not just about the volume of concerts but it's about appearing enough so that the gears appearing in public, enough so that the gears keep moving. For myself, artistically, it's a. I think it's like it's a constant. It's a constant search, and once I stop searching for the art I don't know it'll be hard to start again, I guess at what age did you start playing for groups of people?
Speaker 1:That happened really young. My first performance was when I was seven. I wrote a piece for my mom called To Mother With Love, and I played that at the Esplanade when it was newly built.
Speaker 2:Mass, and how did that feel Terrifying.
Speaker 1:Terrifying Going through the motions of appearing on stage. Well, perhaps the better question is when did I first feel like I could get into flow when I'm on stage? That's probably around early teens Again, early teens that I could really lose myself in the music and feel so ecstatic being on stage that I would seek for that ecstasy again and again. It's thrilling to be on stage.
Speaker 2:I mean, there's this concept of flow state.
Speaker 1:Right, right, right, yep.
Speaker 2:That you hit when you get into this momentum and it's like something takes over. Yep.
Speaker 2:I've experienced it briefly in moments where I'm on stage, but for much smaller things, but the principle applies. Much smaller things, but the principle applies. And I asked you the question when we were walking to come and sit and have this chat. If you still get nervous when you have to do a show, and I think if you don't get nervous, I wonder if you're taking it seriously enough. I sometimes worry that I get too worried or anxious before I have to do an event, but then I find sometimes, then, when I start presenting or managing a panel, whatever it may be, I find myself on stage and then I kick into a different gear and that flow kicks in. I would imagine that that feeling that you're referring to is the same thing, but more personified, probably because it's quite lonely up there. It must be quite lonely and daunting up there because it's such a complicated thing that you're managing and it's so solo. Yes, okay, there's the solo element, but then there's also elements where you're working with a whole orchestra.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:I don't know. I get anxious thinking about what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Well, I admire your empathy to be able to perceive all of those details which are very present for me in the work that I do about entering flow state. For me, the shift of getting into a higher state of flow happened when I could trust that the joy of playing piano came from the joy of playing piano itself and not from the accolades that I would receive or the love from you know, audience, family, friends, whatever. But really it's the joy and the pain of working at your craft that you have to be able to transmute into joy. So walking on stage is not nervous Okay, that's a big statement to make. It's not as nerve-wracking as it used to be when I'm able to truly believe that I am there just to play piano, to make music, for the joy of making music and not to prove myself.
Speaker 2:Does everything fade into the background when you're on stage, Like? Can you describe what you're feeling when you're in that flow state? Is it just you and the piano? Are you cognizant or conscious of everything around you?
Speaker 1:I am hyper aware of everything around me. I listen differently, so I'm listening to what the venue, the hall reflects back to me and the sound. I'm not listening from a first person point of view anymore. I am listening with my ears out there in the audience, in the furthest corner of the room At my best. I'm hyper aware of every single movement my body is making and I can hear every detail, like nanosecond of detail, every inflection in the sound as it dies away and as it blends into the next sound. That, for me, is the peak of flow.
Speaker 2:What was your? I mean, you've played in leading up to your professional career. You've played in front of groups of people. Is there one specific event that was your breakout event that stands out from the rest, when you knew that there was a shift happening out from?
Speaker 1:the rest, when you knew that there was a shift happening. Yeah, it was the most difficult portion that I can remember of my musical studies. So it's not the biggest haul, it's not the most prestigious performance situation, but it was getting out of a period of deep self-doubt, of a period of deep self-doubt. And maybe coincidentally, the piece that I was working on in those few months was Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto his most famous piece and possibly the most famous piano concerto and definitely the most well-loved piano concerto ever written most well-loved piano concerto ever written. Rachmaninoff himself wrote this piece as he was coming out of not being able to write music probably depression and he worked with a hypnosis therapist to be able to write music again and that was the product of a dry period for him. Um, it was also a dry period for me and just psychologically having to play this piece and to imbibe it into my system was so difficult. But when I got to the end of that tunnel and I won a concerto competition with that piece, that was a breakthrough.
Speaker 2:What year was this?
Speaker 1:2014.
Speaker 2:Okay, wow.
Speaker 1:Again. Late teens. Everything happened in my teens. I'm getting too old.
Speaker 2:Please, I think you have such an amazing career ahead of you. It's still early days, yeah. From the moment I met you, I kind of went immediately after that event and took a look at your work and I was just in awe because I've always appreciated the arts and I just sit and watch.
Speaker 2:you know that how you own the room and it just, on the one hand, is majestic and beautiful to watch, on the other hand, it's. I just couldn't put myself in that position to hold that much responsibility. But I think, based on what you've described today, I can understand how, once you find your flow, it's electrifying right. Yep. It must charge you because you're controlling that reality, you're shaping it.
Speaker 1:Part of that responsibility is also a responsibility to tradition, to the classical, western classical music tradition, and that's a relationship that I've grappled with for some time because I perceive the boundaries, the rules of this revered Western classical tradition to be so beautiful, yet so stifling and rigid, interesting and discriminatory as well really yeah, I mean I shouldn't sound surprised, but I am so.
Speaker 2:Help me understand how. What, what do you mean exactly? Not so much on the discriminatory part but, but the stifling and the contrast.
Speaker 1:There are a lot of rules that are passed down. I mean, this is possibly the only art form that happens live. Yet we are reading from scripts that were written 400, 500 years ago, the script being the musical score. So there are many guidelines on how do you interpret what's written on the page, how do you translate that into sound? And there has to be, because otherwise how would you know what's good and bad?
Speaker 1:Yet these guidelines are very much tied to a specific culture, a specific geography, and I find that to be like just a huge baggage when I'm trying to express something that's personal and authentic as an artist. Yet it's precisely this tradition that gives me the power and, can I say, the authority, to stand in front of a thousand audience members and to say, hey, this music is beautiful, it's worthy, it's worthy of an hour of your attention, because this music is the product not just of myself, but of all of the giants that came before me, who have played this piece and have built this performance tradition that you are hearing today. What, what you hear from me when I play, say, a beethoven sonata, is not me just pulling it out of the air, but it's really the culmination of 300 years of people playing this and developing a style to play that in.
Speaker 2:Interesting, the first thing that jumps out to mind. You always want to respect the tradition, and there's always the purest element to this, but big. But yeah I think that the world we live in is one that craves innovation, and I'm with you on that fusion. I'm with you on that so how much do you get to unlock the fusion element I? I would love to believe that you have the ability to create your own version or fusion of a classic that brings together the East and the West. Do you ever experiment with that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's more than the East and the West, but it's the 1800s and the 2000s.
Speaker 2:It's a timeline thing, gotcha.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a timeline thing really In my own compositions.
Speaker 2:Which is so dramatically different.
Speaker 1:Right. In my own compositions I do that, and in my curatorial choices I do that as well. So one of my earliest forays into this was putting up my own concert at Zouk Nice, the nightclub the nightclub okay. Yeah. I've been there once. Okay, just once.
Speaker 2:Just once. Maybe I should go back again.
Speaker 1:I just wanted to take classical music outside of the concert hall, to plonk it into a contemporary setting and to see what happens.
Speaker 2:Did you just explain to me what you did there? Did you combine classical with EDM? What exactly did you do at Zouk?
Speaker 1:experience with the contemporary experience of live music, which includes sound design, lights, stage design, all of the nice things that you don't get in the traditional concert hall and how was that received? It was. Look, I was 18 when that happened. Yeah, um, yeah, it was well received. Yeah. And the next time I do that, I will do it with a team.
Speaker 2:Sure, there's one set I've saved on YouTube. I wouldn't be able to give you the name of it. I'll find it and share it with you, but it's an orchestra that collaborates with a DJ and they pulled it off. It was amazing. So like the build up, the break, the drop down. So I would love, did you record the Zouk experience? I did, yes.
Speaker 1:I've also, in more recent years, collaborated with electronic producers to create classical tracks, yeah there's definitely something there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, to create classical tracks, yeah, yeah, there's definitely something there.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm, I'm trying to think if I've ever heard a classical. Hmm, okay, put classical music concerts in non-conventional venues like nightclubs, or collaborated with electronic music producers. I believe more and more that there is so much value to the classical tradition itself. It's a different kind of satisfaction that I get.
Speaker 1:It's the, the work, the, the piece written by someone eons ago helps me get much deeper into the transcendental experience of performing live music. When I'm say doing the fusion stuff, it's more uh, it's, it's enjoyable. I feel like I'm connecting with people who listen to me because I can feel them responding to this music. But it's a thrill. It's a high rather than a deep satisfaction got you.
Speaker 2:It's different it's different. It's two different, fundamentally different experiences.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I hear you. I'm just thinking, even if you just focused on the pure classical, I haven't seen anything that combines it with a strong visual. You don't have to deviate too far away from the conventional classical. If you could just put it in a visual context and add the visual element, that could be amazing, because it could still remain pure to the core, as you're just adding a more modern digital experience to it. Mm-hmm, Do they do things like that? Have you seen, outside of what you've tried, anything like that?
Speaker 1:Silent movies.
Speaker 2:What do you mean?
Speaker 1:Well before the advent of talking pictures, you had people accompanying the screen and to a certain extent we still have that Concerts where the entire Star Wars movie plays, plays out, and you've got an orchestra playing the music on stage.
Speaker 2:I mean, look what that. Movies that implement an orchestra, that just changes the movie right? Yeah, I'm thinking more. Have you seen in the US? They've got that in Las Vegas, that dome.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So imagine you had an orchestra in there with visuals linked to a specific classic that just engross you. That could be quite epic.
Speaker 1:That would be so epic.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Okay. Is there other ways that you can express your own creativity with classics outside of fusing modern old? Is there other ways you wish you could be more creative?
Speaker 1:Combining different art forms, as you said, with visuals, but I think today the conversation really is about AR and AI. Right, and that's my question right now how do we leverage on such exciting, life-changing technologies that the rest of the world is adopting and bring it into this art form that's got so much tradition, that's so beautiful but so stuck in the past century? The concert music experience hasn't changed since the 1800s. Musicians play in the same halls, they play under the same settings, same settings, lights out don't clap between movements. All of that is a relic of the 1800s. What can we do today that will preserve the value and the beauty of this tradition, also augmented with visuals, for example, or with ar, I'm imagining can augment the human experience of listening to music in a in an in an immersive way.
Speaker 2:So, for those listening, when we refer to ar, we referring to augmented reality. I think that's when we first met what you said to me that perked my interest. You came to me with a very specific question, which was when are the Huawei augmented reality goggles? Available.
Speaker 2:This is who I am, this is what I want to do, and I was like, wow, okay, this perked my innovation interest and I think that's where my real passion is. It's on the innovation side and helping people to innovate. So let's dive into that and what your vision is for it. How do you see augmented reality? How would you like to see it combining with your skill? What vision do you have?
Speaker 1:The music transports people into worlds of fantasy. I would love that physically, or rather conceptually, they are immersed in an alternate world that is beyond what they can experience in real life, in order to give them more access into the worlds of fantasy that the music can transport them into stunning yeah, so it's not about like telling people what to see.
Speaker 1:We're not trying to create a movie that plays in their minds, but just give them enough that they can imagine more, and what everyone will imagine what everyone imagines will look different. That's the beauty of music it means something different to everyone.
Speaker 2:yeah, I'm thinking as you're speaking, trying to imagine what I've seen is from an augmented reality perspective. You can see it already, um coming through in helping to guide people on the learning side and understanding how to play an instrument it's not just pianos, it's guitar, all sorts of things.
Speaker 2:So that's happening. The ability to put a headset on and immerse yourself into a whole new environment. Experience is real. I started deep diving that recently and I'm blown away by just how powerful it is. I was on the sidelines for a while, just knew about the technology, understood it, felt like it was very immature, still immature still. Then in December, said let me get an Oculus 3 and dive into it, and was blown away to the point where it's almost too real and you completely lose yourself in a virtual environment. So the technology's progressed phenomenally.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking about discussions I've had. I showed you the rig outside, for StepVR is the name of the company and I sat with the CEO and understood his journey in producing that technology, which is just amazing. And we started discussing how AR comes into that realm of helping to where it's going. And I want to tether this back to what you said is AR generating an ending depending on the actions you take in game, in movie? The ability for you to be any character in any game, in any movie? Okay, which just blew my mind. So you know, you think of your favorite movie and being able to immerse yourself in that movie. It will get to the point where, excuse me, you can be a character, depending on the action you take. It changes the ending of the movie. It's just like this generative engine take it changes the ending of the movie. Right, it's just like this generative yep engine. Now, bringing it back to the vision, the amazing, beautiful vision that you have in your space, which is music, is so personal. It, like, defines us.
Speaker 2:It defines moments that we have right and we, we attach emotion right experiences, to, to music. It also can take you places without the visuals. Yeah, with the visuals would just be kind of insane. Um, if you could have a augmented reality experience coupled with a classical or, uh, you know a music genre. It's just about the art of the possible right. I think there's anything you could do.
Speaker 1:I think the greatest thing you can do for someone is to give them the freedom to imagine, and that's exactly what the traditional concert experience does. It's pitch black, it's completely quiet, it's as quiet as possible, and it's designed to give each person the illusion of personal space, because you're so alone. When you're sitting pitch black in a concert hall, in fact, the pianist faces away from you. The pianist is facing, you know, to the side of the stage and not directly towards the audience, and so this is really an aesthetic of aloneness. With the aloneness can one begin to start imagining and that's what I think is so powerful about AR that it's really an individual experience. When you put on a headset, it's only you in that world.
Speaker 2:How do you interlock the individual imagination, the music and the AI experience? What is? How does that look? What does that look like? It's like I can imagine that it's somehow generating a visual that thinks you would want to see, or that you can't read your mind. Yet. Neuralink's not there yet.
Speaker 1:No, it's not. The music will review different things. Well, an ideal listener will find things about themselves through any artistic experience. I think the process of consuming art is a process of looking into a mirror at oneself, and therefore it's not really about what do we show people through the augmented reality experience, but how much freedom can we give whoever is looking at the art to define their own imagination?
Speaker 2:Okay, have you experimented with AI? Yet I have experimented with AI.
Speaker 1:In fact last year I had a competition with an AI.
Speaker 2:Tell me more.
Speaker 1:I competed against a gen music AI to see who could write quote-unquote better music based on audience-given prompts. So I would invite the audience members to come on stage and to just give five random notes, which would be fed into the AI as a MIDI file and from which I would also improvise a completely original piece of music.
Speaker 2:Of just the five notes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just five notes, just five pitches, and this is not a fair, this is not really a fair competition, because the current music, the current gen music, ai technology really excels at text-to-music, not music-to-music prompts.
Speaker 2:Okay, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1:So current-gen music AIs do really well when you tell them something like write an R&B song. For me that represents the emotion of eating an ice cream while in a helicopter, Something like that. Yeah, sure, sure helicopter, something like that. Yeah, sure, sure. But when you give it music prompts it doesn't do so well, but it will get there. It's about imbibing musical syntax well enough that even from music notes alone they can develop the coherence of stringing together a piece of music.
Speaker 2:So the competition was anyone in the audience. Five pitches, yep, and then to see who could compose quicker, you or the AI.
Speaker 1:Not quicker, just nicer.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, got you and did you smash it.
Speaker 1:I did.
Speaker 2:Okay, great, well done.
Speaker 1:AI was not very coherent and I mean, at least to me, it sounded a bit like gibberish, because it didn't follow the patterns of musical syntax that our ears are trained to listen for, for example, regular meter. You know you want a steady pulse when you listen to music right. You want something that sounds pleasant and coherent when you listen to music right, you want something that sounds pleasant and coherent, and our ears are trained to listen to that, based on decades of musical entrainment. What we think sounds coherent might not sound coherent to someone who grew up in, let's say, ghana and doesn't have the same exposure to the same types of music that we listen to.
Speaker 2:We make assumptions Interesting Because we're actually all just AR models.
Speaker 1:We are, you're AR models, right? Yep, exactly.
Speaker 2:Never thought of that and I'm sure what you hear versus what I hear are very different things, true, very different.
Speaker 1:Are you threatened by AI? Probably the least. Oh sounds so presumptuous to say this. Ai will replace a lot of things, but the live art experience might be one of the last things to go.
Speaker 2:I think that's a fair statement. Boston Dynamics will need to get those robots to be a little less rigid. Yeah, it's interesting. It's very exciting and daunting at the same time. But it was like this. You know, when we went from horses to cars, the guys that had to, you know, look after the horses, pick up the horse manure, fix the horseshoes they all went to panic, but this is the human experience and we evolve rapidly and things change.
Speaker 2:When I last year, I had the opportunity to address the creative freelance industry, so we invited them here. We had an event at IMDA and I was presenting to them what we're doing in the AI space as Huawei, and then I also shared with them what I'm doing from a generative AI perspective. What was interesting for me is how few of them had really gone into it, like deep into it. They were still very rudimentary in their questions, which is how do I prompt? I'm like what this was like November last year or just before that.
Speaker 2:I've now, from the moment it was released, gone on this journey with AI. That has changed me as a human, because no longer am I just what is my role? I'm not just one thing right. I've become many things. Ai has enabled me to become a graphic designer, maybe a different kind of graphic designer.
Speaker 2:Ai has enabled me to become a videographer, a copywriter, and I think this is the interesting thing with technology is that allows you to diversify and develop new skills. It allows you to create magic between skill sets. I think if you lean into it and embrace it, it will make you a better human. If you stay fearful and shut off, you're probably going to get disrupted or displaced or become very uncomfortable. It's nice to hear that your creativity is still rooted in the purest form and there's a deeper I feel from what you've said a deeper resonance and appreciation and impact that you get from the purest form. So open and from early on have been experimenting with your own fusion and creativity on seeing how you could cross-pollinate this into the technology sphere, so that should yield some interesting collaborations in the future.
Speaker 1:Let's see.
Speaker 2:So what's next for you? I mean, you've got some concerts coming up. I'm going to come watch you for sure. Oh, yay, great, I've got some concerts coming up, I'm going to come watch you for sure, oh, yay, great, I've got some concerts coming up.
Speaker 1:That's really the bread and butter of what I do. Yeah. I lose myself when I stop playing at such an intense, rigorous and high level.
Speaker 2:How often are you playing every month? Does it ebb and flow?
Speaker 1:I play about 50 to 80 concerts a year.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's quite a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That is a lot right. So in musical terms is that a lot.
Speaker 1:It is a lot.
Speaker 2:Okay. Does it not take its toll on you, physically, psychologically? How do you manage that? Do you have to stay fit? Do you have to have an exercise regime to balance out, or well, we have the normal things you know exercise, sleep, eat.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, that's really rudimentary holidays time out? Not really yeah, well, yes, the normal things.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you are taking time off, and do you? This is full time now, right, there's nothing in between planes, full time.
Speaker 1:I find it okay. How do I balance this? I find it helpful to be rooted to the institutions that ground us family, faith and US, with whom I'm very grateful to have a job part-time job where I take students out to do community projects and with community partners in Singapore nice yeah, so that's my way of being rooted to institutions and also rooted to larger demographics. Okay. And that helps me find balance. Otherwise I'm too much in my own world. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this helps me find balance. Took an hour out of practicing today for a very interesting chat and I'm sure I'll get back to the piano completely rejuvenated.
Speaker 2:I hope so. Hopefully not exhausted.
Speaker 1:Oh no, this has been great.
Speaker 2:No, that's good. I'm not done with you yet, so give me a few more minutes. I want to really kind of understand a few more things. Yeah, so so you? You mentioned that you've got the plane regime. It seems like you also like to compose. Uh, how much composing do you do?
Speaker 1:about 50-50. Oh really. Yep, and it's. I mean, it's an ever-evolving balance, but last year I played 50% my own pieces, 50% classical.
Speaker 2:Is that common?
Speaker 1:Not, really not for a classical pianist.
Speaker 2:Which one do you enjoy more, or is it a joint?
Speaker 1:Oh, it's a different relationship when I play the music of classical composers. The work itself is a structure that takes, that gives me access into greater realms of imagination when I have to like really chip away at it and try to understand what the music is saying and then convey that through my performance.
Speaker 2:When you were speaking earlier about the composers and the purest form and how the same piece is taken through history. Right. It made me think and I want to ask you the question do we write the same quality of music today as we had from the past?
Speaker 1:Oh, how does one even answer that? I mean it's subjective, yeah.
Speaker 2:From your humble opinion. Opinion is it different?
Speaker 1:is this, and I'll let you answer first, and I've got a follow-on question to that, because I'm interested in why because it feels like we're still quite deeply rooted in the past when it comes to classical pieces yeah, and also pop music today wouldn't have been possible without the Western classical music of 200 years ago. Empirically, I'm confident in saying that the level of complexity achieved by Western classical music is not matched by music that's coming out in more recent years.
Speaker 2:Which takes me on to my second question Technical complexity. Yeah, so it's exactly what I suspected. So my second question is why? What was so different back then? How did we have such amazing and it wasn't just music right, there's so much that came from the Renaissance period. That was just like what? Is it even the same kind of human? Is it the set of circumstances and environments at that point in time? Was there something in the water?
Speaker 1:I don't know. What do you think?
Speaker 2:You know, I like take a look at a person like Leonardo da Vinci and look at how well-rounded he was.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:In so many disciplines and you know how, and I know how difficult it is to perfect one discipline. Maybe there was less distractions, a flourishing of creativity, like a perfect sequence of environmental permutations or a permutation that allowed for this level of genius to materialize. It wasn't distracted, that was pioneering and free flowing in thoughts, creativity, innovation. Free-flowing in thought, creativity, innovation. It just feels like at that point in time there was something really different with that type of human and what was coming out of that era.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a zeitgeist. It comes and goes in waves. You've got groups of people often who are like friends and acquaintances, who just created amazing art around the same time period.
Speaker 2:I even look at. I don't want to get too philosophical, but you mentioned it and it seems like you're quite well rooted in your faith. I often go back and I study different scripture from different religions. I try and absorb all of them and I see them as blueprints and I always look at whether it's Christianity, the Bible, whether it's the Quran, whether it's Vedanta that I've studied, that I read the depth and complexity of the writing studied, that I read the depth and complexity of the writing and then I look at how it's shaped, modern day, human and stood the test of time. And then I look at what we produce today and pales in comparison. We don't have that depth. Maybe we do. Maybe I'm being very general, yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's just interesting for me. You know, you take a look at the Bible. You took ancient philosophy it's just mind-blowingly complex aura that builds up around these works that have shaped the way we think and that's why we are. We start thinking that it's more worthy and valuable because we see more into it when you produce your own music, when you compose, where does that?
Speaker 2:how?
Speaker 1:I'm drawing on the classical tradition. It all starts from the way my hands feel, the topography of the keyboard, the physicality of playing, the touch of the keys, and from that I derive inspiration. I might quote from existing classical pieces or mash them up together. They say great artists steal. Right, I'm not a great artist by any means, but I definitely steal a lot.
Speaker 2:Take it and make it your own. Yep, nothing wrong. What does the journey look like into this technical realm? How do you foresee yourself creating this next experience, this augmented, immersive experience? Have you mapped it out? Do you know what you want to do?
Speaker 1:Well, I'm partnering with my amazing creative lead, leila, and it's a wonderful partnership because we're so aligned on the way we imagine these worlds to be. But if you're talking about specific visual imagery, I'm just the control freak who is trying to make people listen a different way.
Speaker 2:So there's a creative process between you.
Speaker 1:Me and my creative collaborator.
Speaker 2:Is she a creative technologist? This is a new term I came across.
Speaker 1:Yes, she was there at the event. Yeah, yeah, okay Did I meet Layla, I'm not sure, I don't think so, I don't think you did.
Speaker 2:Is she a creative technologist?
Speaker 1:Yeah, did I meet Leila? I'm not sure. I don't think so, I don't think you did.
Speaker 2:Is she a creative technologist? Yeah, she's a visual artist. Okay Well, do you think you'll still do it within the year?
Speaker 1:Oh yes, it's taking place 16th to 18th August.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:We're in the middle of testing.
Speaker 2:So you've already, and this is the augmented solution.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the augmented reality show. That is currently a phone-based experience, but we hope to take it into a headset experience for future iterations are you working with anyone any um anyone in the virtual uh reality headset space?
Speaker 2:yet that's what I was asking you for help on sure, sure, sure, but I mean more so, like someone who develops within that space. So most definitely will try and help you from outside with the tech, but I'm talking about the guys that actually create the, the coded experience so virtual reality means it's a self-sustaining space and you don't see the room in the headset right, Correct.
Speaker 1:What we're trying to do is mixed reality, so we've superimposed things floating around, whilst still being able to see me play the piano. Okay. Yeah, right, I think that's quite important to clarify. It's not a VR piano, okay, yeah, yeah right, I think that's quite important to clarify. It's not a VR experience.
Speaker 2:Okay, I'm glad you clarified that because I was stuck in the VR space and I was trying to imagine that I was almost the Van Gogh experience. I don't know if you saw that when they came to Singapore, I was trying to imagine those visuals changing according to the classical music, or that you could select a theme and then it would change according to the tone, the pitch, whatever. The mixed reality is a whole different ballgame.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're still prioritizing the live musical experience, while augmenting that with technology VR would be almost easier to do because you can time it. This is all live. The visuals are live as well.
Speaker 2:Okay, now I'm with you. Yeah, so someone comes to watch the show, they get a headset.
Speaker 1:They use their phone.
Speaker 2:They use the phone and they can see. But you could theoretically have a headset as well. Yeah, and that's a technical.
Speaker 1:That's a different challenge.
Speaker 2:Got you, got you the performance. You have a mixed reality experience which combines your music and then other elements being put into the environment around you Yep, yep At designated points throughout the performance. What kind of elements Give us a teaser?
Speaker 1:I mean, I suppose it's it's linked to the specific song it's linked to specific songs and it's about building a fantasy world. I mean, fantasy comes up a lot, but it's about building a fantasy world that is beyond reality.
Speaker 2:Fantastical world has anyone else done something like this? I don don't know. I haven't seen it. Well, the date is booked. The date is booked 16th to 18th of August. 16th to 18th. Where are you going to do it?
Speaker 1:Arts House played in a black box, Doing it in a black box. So imagine we have a piano in the center and people can walk around and use their phones to look at different parts of the room and see different things appearing got it and that's the, that's the humanness of of a music performance.
Speaker 1:That's live. You see a body, physical body in front of you and it's communicating beyond just sound. It's not like listening to a Spotify track, for example, but it's uncertain, it's you can't, it's not pre-timed right, so it's not. It's a lot more flexibility.
Speaker 2:Got it. That's exciting.
Speaker 1:Yes, there's the huge element of human error. That's okay.
Speaker 2:Yes, there's the huge element of human error. That's okay. I think that's fine. You are human.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, and that's what makes this all worthwhile.
Speaker 2:What would be the complicating factor Timing the song to the visuals?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that would be a big complication.
Speaker 2:Is there an AI element that you're baking into it?
Speaker 1:In terms of producing? Yes, in terms of live music, composition like gen music, ai type stuff happening on stage no.
Speaker 2:Gotcha.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think AI is as you said. It's very useful for diversifying, it's very useful for augmenting and speeding up process, and AR comes in to augment our perception of reality. But how do we become superhuman?
Speaker 2:Yes, preach, preach, sister, preach Better human, superhuman. I like it. Well, I'm excited You've got some shows coming up now. Yep, which, uh? Do you want to just mention where people can come see you perform and when?
Speaker 1:sure, next saturday at the arts house chamber. This is where the parliament used to meet, so you've got the seats on two rows of on opposite sides of the hall and the program is called Femdom. I'm playing pieces. I'm playing soft feminine pieces by male composers, strong masculine pieces by female composers, just as a way to tease out power and gender dynamics, for which I think art is a very unique inroad to seeing some of these things beneath the surface.
Speaker 2:Amazing, such a contrast.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Did you come up with the concept?
Speaker 1:Yes, of course. Yeah, I came up with the concept.
Speaker 2:Nice, Love it. Jiren, I could speak to you for another hour and I'm conscious of your schedule. Thank you so much for taking the time to come and share, to provide us with insights into your creativity, your process, your vision. I think you have a very, very exciting future ahead of you and I look forward to not only seeing you live but watching your story unfold.
Speaker 1:Thank you, and thank you for your empathy, for your amazing questions that get me thinking. Anytime Thank you, chiron, all the best.
Speaker 2:Take care.